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From: gsmith@brahms (Gene Ward Smith)
Newsgroups: sci.physics,talk.philosophy.misc
Subject: Science is not the Philosophy of Science
Message-ID: <351@cartan.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: Tue, 18-Nov-86 12:20:48 EST
Article-I.D.: cartan.351
Posted: Tue Nov 18 12:20:48 1986
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Reply-To: gsmith@brahms.BERKELEY.EDU (Gene Ward Smith)
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Organization: Math Dept. UC Berkeley
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In article <3942@jhunix.UUCP> ins_akaa@jhunix.UUCP (Ken Arromdee) writes:

>>> All scientific beliefs are in principle falsifiable by experiment.

>>For example, I suppose, the scientific belief that all scientific
>>beliefs are in principle falsifiable by experiment...

>Actually this does make sense.  This doesn't lead to a contradiction unless
>one such experiment produces the paradoxical result.  As long as such an
>experiment doesn't produce such a result, there's nothing to worry about.
>Being falsifiable in principle isn't going to produce contradictions unless
>real falsification occurs.

   Actually, this doesn't make sense. The proposition "all scientific
beliefs should in principle be falsifiable by experiment" is not itself
a scientific belief, but a philosophical belief. One does not determine
whether this belief is correct by doing an experiment, because there is
no such experiment to be performed. Instead, one engages in philosophical
argumentation. What we can see from this is that the philosophy of science
is not a branch of science, but of philosophy; which really should come
as no surprise.

ucbvax!brahms!gsmith    Gene Ward Smith/UCB Math Dept/Berkeley CA 94720
ucbvax!weyl!gsmith                The Josh McDowell of the Net