Popper Kuhn Rawls Homework

ü  WHY AREN’T ALL TRUE BELIEFS JUSTIFIED?

o   We get knowledge by criticizing the existing theories. Moreover, we need to say that justifications are circular arguments and infinite regress.

§  Anything we use to justify our theories might be mistaken. True is objective and corresponds with the facts. Not looking for the final truth always possible to improve. We can feel absolutely sure our belief is right and still be wrong. There is knowledge in books so it can’t be belief.

ü  WHAT IS AN ANTI-FOUNDATIONALIST?

o   A person who does not believe that there is some fundamental belief or principle which is the basic ground or foundation of inquiry and knowledge.  

§  Anti-foundationalists oppose metaphysical methods. 

ü  WHY IS IT EASIER TO FALSIFY A STATEMENT THAN TO VERIFY IT?

o   He grounded this distinction in a logical asymmetry between falsification and verification of a universal law; this asymmetry was dependent, in turn, on the equivalence of a universal statement and a negative existential statement. An "existential statement" claims that a state of affairs exists somewhere and sometime, for example "there exists a black swan". A universal statement, such as "all swans are white", is also the denial of an existential statement: in this case a denial that "there exists a non-white swan".

§  It is clear that it is much easier to confirm an existential statement than a universal statement. In order to confirm that a black swan exists we would only need to see a black swan. In order to confirm that no black swans exist we would need to trawl through the whole of space and time.

ü  WHAT REASONS DOES THE ARTICLE IN THE ECONOMIST GIVE FOR THE DOUBTFUL QUALITY OF MUCH PUBLISHED SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH TODAY? HOW IS FALSIFICATIONISM RELATED TO THIS PROBLEM? 

o   Reasons = Competitiveness of Science, and Careerism.

§  A scientific philosophy based on the requirement that hypotheses must be falsifiable in order to be scientific; if a claim is not able to be refuted it is not a scientific claim.

§  Falsificationism relates to this problem because scientists had lost their taste of self-policing and quality control because of the obligation to publish something has come to rule over academic life, and competition for jobs is difficult.   

ü  HOW IS THE STATEMENT FORM THE ARTICLE RELATED TO POPPER´S VIEWS? - “(SCIENCE’S) PRIVILEGED STATUS IS FOUNDED ON THE CAPACITY TO BE RIGHT MOST OF THE TIME AND TO CORRECT ITS MISTAKES WHEN IT GETS THINGS WRONG.”

o   Definitely, science’s constant improves come as a result of criticism.

§  For Popper, we can get knowledge by identifying any problem(s) and giving a possible solution to them.

§  We can use one of his most famous quotes “Science is perhaps the only human activity in which errors are systematically criticized and, in time, corrected.” 

ü  WHAT IS AN OPEN SOCIETY?

o   Popper defined the open society as one “in which individuals are confronted with personal decisions” as opposed to a “magical or tribal or collectivist society.”

§  A society characterized by a flexible structure, freedom of belief, and wide dissemination of information.

ü  WHAT IS A PARADIGM SHIFT?

o   Is a fundamental change in approach or underlying assumptions.

o   Kuhn argues that scientific advancement is not revolutionary, but rather is a “series of peaceful interludes punctuated by intellectually violent revolutions”, and in those revolutions “one conceptual world view is replaced by another”.

o   We can think on a Paradigm Shift, as a change form one way of thinking to another. It’s a revolution, a transformation, a sort of metamorphosis. It just does not happen, but rather is driven by agents of change.

ü  WHAT IS DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE?

o   It concerns the nature of a socially just allocation of goods in a society.

§  A society in which incidental inequalities in outcome do not arise would be considered a society guided by the principles of distributive justice. 

ü  WHAT IS THE VEIL OF IGNORANCE?

o   According to Rawls, the veil of ignorance is a device that can be used to help a person determine whether something (an action, an institution or such) is moral.  

§  Lack of knowledge about a situation.

ü  WHY DID JOHN RAWLS NEED THE VEIL OF IGNORANCE FOR HIS THOUGHT EXPERIMENT?

o   To make people think about the different situations that could happen, intended to help people and make them aware about a certain situation, but in a new perspective that they don’t know or understand, and have a clearer way of thinking.