Re: [bolger] Digest Number 2127

The politicians discovered this a long time ago. "Don't confuse me with the
facts! This is the way things are, and I've go the statistics to prove it."

Roger
derbyrm@...
derbyrm.mystarband.net/default.htm

----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris Crandall" <crandall@...>


> > > > Would someone please explain what the
> > > > Schnork-Finkelwort Theorem is?

> > Peter wrote . . .
> > Quine's Ontological relativism led him to agree with
> > Pierre Duhem that for any collection of empirical evidence
> > there would always be many theories able account for it.
> > Thus it is not possible to verify or falsify a theory simply
> > by comparing it to the empirical evidence; the theory can
> > always be saved by some modification. For Quine,
> > scientific thought formed a coherent web in which any part
> > could be altered in the light of empirical evidence and in
> > which no empirical evidence could force the revision of a
> > part.
> >
> >Howard wrote:
> > Maybe that'll make more sense to me after I've had a second
> > cup of coffee ....
>
> Here's a standard reply that I write to people who ask about my
> sigline, (at the bottom of this message).
>
> This is a philosophy of science joke that I like because I made it
> up. Karl Popper suggested that the sign of a good, open scientific
> theory is one that puts itself at risk, that can be *falsified*. A theory
> that cannot be falsified is a bad theory.
>
> But Duhem and Quine independently suggested that, when a test of a
> theory ends up falsifying a hypothesis, people don't necessarily discard
> the hypothesis, but wonder whether the apparatus worked properly,
> whether they operationalized the theory properly, whether something
> unusual happened, and so on. The idea is that data alone cannot
> disconfirm a hypothesis, because you're never sure exactly why the
> disconfirmation took place. Also, the theory may be adjusted in one
> way or another to be consistent with the "falsification".
>
> OK, so, long-windedly, the D-Q hypothesis is that you cannot
> disconfirm hypotheses. Hence the circular joke.
>
> Chris Crandall Dept. of Psychology University of Kansas
>crandall@...Lawrence, KS 66045 (785) 864-4131
> I have data convincingly disconfirming the Duhem-Quine hypothesis.

> > > Would someone please explain what the
> > > Schnork-Finkelwort Theorem is?
> Peter wrote . . .
> Quine's Ontological relativism led him to agree with Pierre Duhem
> that for any collection of empirical evidence there would always be
> many theories able account for it. Thus it is not possible to verify
> or falsify a theory simply by comparing it to the empirical evidence;
> the theory can always be saved by some modification. For Quine,
> scientific thought formed a coherent web in which any part could be
> altered in the light of empirical evidence and in which no empirical
> evidence could force the revision of a part.
>
>Howard wrote:
> Maybe that'll make more sense to me after I've had a second cup of
> coffee ....

Here's a standard reply that I write to people who ask about my sigline,
(at the bottom of this message).


This is a philosophy of science joke that I like because I made it
up. Karl Popper suggested that the sign of a good, open scientific theory
is one that puts itself at risk, that can be *falsified*. A theory that
cannot be falsified is a bad theory.

But Duhem and Quine independently suggested that, when a test of a
theory ends up falsifying a hypothesis, people don't necessarily discard
the hypothesis, but wonder whether the apparatus worked properly, whether
they operationalized the theory properly, whether something unusual
happened, and so on. The idea is that data alone cannot disconfirm a
hypothesis, because you're never sure exactly why the disconfirmation took
place. Also, the theory may be adjusted in one way or another to be
consistent with the "falsification".

OK, so, long-windedly, the D-Q hypothesis is that you cannot
disconfirm hypotheses. Hence the circular joke.

Chris Crandall Dept. of Psychology University of Kansas
crandall@...Lawrence, KS 66045 (785) 864-4131
I have data convincingly disconfirming the Duhem-Quine hypothesis.