The Principle of Falsifiability

The principle of Falsifiability with term ’Falsification’ is introduced by Popper which is a theory is disproved be empirical observations that contradict the implications of that theory. This theory came out to refute the logical positivism’s induction method. For example, a given statement ’ All sapphire is blue’ is considered true in general, however Popper contended that even if 99 sapphires are observed and it was all blue, the statement still should not be considered as true. Therefore, the it will be turn out to be false if newly found 100th sapphire has pink color even though the first 99 sapphires’ color is blue, so using falsification, it can be determined whether the theory or statement is verified by deducting false statement.

Popper asserted that the scientific theory should contain principle of falsifiability and its falsifiability is increased when empirical content ; potential falsifiers is higher and from earlier statement, the potential falsifiers is the ‘chance that the color of sapphire is not blue’. Popper criticized the logical positivism, especially verifiability principle in scientific methodology, that science can be distinguished from pseudo-science on the basis of its inductive methodology. Scientific theory is started with suggesting problems (theory) and the theory which turns out to be wrong by falsifications are deducted, finally the remained theories will be kept true by repeating conjectures and refutation.

Therefore it can increase the probability of the theory to turns out to be true. However, a statement or theory can be stayed true using three immunizing stratagem. First, when pink sapphire is found, re can ‘re-classify’ that pink sapphire is not sapphire because as our statement, the sapphire should be blue. Second, we can ‘adjust underlying theories’ by insisting pink can be regarded as blue. Last way is changing domain, if the pink sapphire is founded in USA, we can change all sapphire in South america is blue. By using these 3 immunizing stratagem, the statement ‘All sapphire is blue’ can be remained verified. The theory introduced by Kuhn, explains that a paradigm can provide puzzles for scientists and this is called normal science. The novel scientific theory can be developed with recognition of an anomaly. However, there is a probability of the theory will be degenerated and this is because of the incommensurability.

According to Kuhn, incommensurability shows that two competing paradigms cannot be compared because either there are no independent standards of evaluation or there is a misunderstanding between new paradigm and old paradigm. Therefore, Adjust underlying theories can improve the development of theory by giving new paradigm. Also from lakota’s point of view a theory will be developed when it is either theoretically progressive or empirically progressive and these progress is measured by the degree a series of theories result in the discovery of novel fact. But the theory will be degenerating if there is no progress.