By "theory of a god", I assume the theory is "the god exists." So to falsify this, you'd have to show the nonexistence of the god. Demonstrating the nonexistence of anything is logically impossible. There is always another stone to turn over and look underneath (so to speak).

I'm not sure of what "choice of criteria" beskeptical is imagining, but I can't see that it matters.

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Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.

Soup, what is that worries you about what i said?

You are saying that a philosopher came up with the idea that a theory must be falisifiable inorder to be scientific, alright. But does that make falisifiability philosophical? Im not sure that it does. So i will still ask my question. What does a philosophical definition of falisifiability have to do with a scientific theory?

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They call 'em fingers, but i've never seen em fing..... oh there they go!! otto

Are you saying that ideas like string theory are philosophies?

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They call 'em fingers, but i've never seen em fing..... oh there they go!! otto

That would be to falsify the theory. To show that it is a scientific theory then you must show it is falsifiable. That is that there is a test or set of tests that can show if it is indeed false. Does the existance of God make predictions that can be verified experimentally?

Ok then I'l only say ; Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow". The rest was gravy.

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"Man has always found it easier to sacrifice his life than learn the multiplication table." - Somerset Maugham

I find your comment rather assumptive, if not insulting. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but it appears that you're quite close to equating BBT supporters to "believers".

Are you suggesting that those who accept the Big Bang based upon the merit of evidence supporting it do not abide by scientific methodology?

Some do. I'll try to keep this general enough not to degenerate into a religious argument, but some groups accept that some writings are the word of god and must be absolutely true. If it could be demonstrated that these writings were erroneous or inconsistent, that should be enough to demonstrate the falseness of that creed.

I think I am saying mathematical models are not in-and-of themselves scientific. For example, I use second degree polynomials to model and even predict the curing reactions of polymers, but I know the catalyzed chain forming functions are more complex.

A good scientific theory involves causality and a rational association with physical laws. A mathamatic model is important too, but these are off-the-shelf items.

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jwj

It's a big universe out there...is it really unwinding, really burning out?

daver wrote:
hmmmmmmmmmmmm, good point, and that goes to the very reason for my being a lapsed Baptist. Many others though do not accept the evidence that the Bible contains contradictions that show it to not be infallible.

So now it comes down to faith in which even if a theory is shown to be false, faith will conquer (trump) fasification, at least in the minds of the faithful. On this board we have seen this in the adherents to the Moon Hoax believers, the psychics and the alien visitation believers.

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"Man has always found it easier to sacrifice his life than learn the multiplication table." - Somerset Maugham

I stiill dont see how this explains what a philosohpical definition of falsifiability has to do with a scientific theory. You arent saying that theory based on mathematical models is a philosophy. Beyond that though, what are you saying?

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They call 'em fingers, but i've never seen em fing..... oh there they go!! otto

Still thinking of Nancy Lieder? :wink:

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

Drak Energy is a problem how do you find it, so I agree 'not Falsifiable' so maybe we got it wrong

however

Dark matter is not Falsifiable, because it is there and simply exists . Dark matter is real ! There is the idea that Drak Matter is simply a statement which describes our ignorance about the missing or mysterious matter. But that is not to say it is not there, or that it does not have an existance which we can detect.
For a long while people didn't understand gas and air, they thought the world was made from fire, water, earth and air yet they could not determine what air was this strange ghostly thing and did it have a formation or substance. When we see wind blow down a tree or fill a balloon with air we know that it has substance. However in the complexity of the universe our understanding of galaxies might be still quiet primitive. We now believe that it is the ealr matter after the big Bang matter and the four forces instead that played a role in the creation of this darkness of matter. Some have said we should look for weakly interacting massive particles, or try to detect Machos. However Dark matter has been found, "dark cluster" have been found whose weight would be 1014 solar masses. Scinetists have also been able to do other things, map out the distribution of dark matter in and around the distant Galaxies Fort and Meillier have identified two "dark clusters, the Darkmatter To detect the undetectable, the scientists used a high-resolution, wide-field imaging camera on the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope in Hawaii to analyze the light from 200,000 distant galaxies, looking for tiny distortions in the light caused by the gravitational effects of intervening dark matter. The analysis of the night skies showed a vast, interconnected web of dark matter the the Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris worked hard on mapping that darkestmatter, it has been found but we need to discover more there are mnay other ways and many new ideas for looking inside this dark matter.

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/20...ocalnews_b.jpg

If you ask me, it there are other areas of physics and astronomy that should be criticized for not been proper forms of science, the idea of worms and warps faster than light this is a crazy idea more like science fiction rather than physics and cosmology. It is said there are other big problems in science like the models on black holes which say the emit messenger particles, give out unique radiations and the gravity from a black hole comes out from the centre and sucks matter in like a super vacuum cleaner but if nothing can esacpe from a black hole and if Einsteins Relativity theory explains the gravational effects such as the distortion of space travels out in a wave but not faster than light, then how the heck can Gravity esacpe a black hole, it appears like some people have been making a mess of this explanation have they not ? And then the ideas of String theory, the look very nice and the mathematics can look great but there is no proof, no experiment. This is why people will say these areas of physics and astronomy are more a Philosophy rather than real science !!

Ah yes! That was the piece of knowledge that had fallen out of my brain leaving behind only the remembrance that you can't stick science and religion together. Thanks! 8)

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"The oxen are slow, but the earth is patient."

While I certainly agree 'dark matter' is an appropriate name for the phenomenon we have observed and to some degree quantified, the true nature of these abberations is open to debate.

If intrinsic redshifting is missplacing galaxies in the cosmic web, these galaxies, that are thought to be very distant, are in fact causing some if not most of these abberations. There may be truly dark baryonic burned-out galacy-sized structures - unlikely, but who knows?

The dark matter responsible for the rotational velocities of galaxies can be modeled and explained using wave functions. There appears to be definitive evidence a mechanism exists for radiation transfer in space in radio frequencies. Until we are certain of how light behaves in space, in all frequency domains. This is an open subject.

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jwj

It's a big universe out there...is it really unwinding, really burning out?

Well the idea is still, is there a way for us to prove it wrong? That's what falsifiable is. If you can think of some experiment that would prove it wrong, than it's falsifiable. Take, for example, the fact that water freezes at 0 degrees celsius. This is falsifiable since we could conceivably have an instance where it froze at say 2 C. That's the idea. If there is no way to prove it wrong, then it isn't science.

Intro

To start off, I think we need to acknowledge some common ground between Science and Philosophy. Even if they go about things in very different ways, they both aim to improve our knowledge and understanding of the world, and regardless of their differences, they often overlap.

Falsificationism is an obvious example of one such crossover. Falsifiabilty is a philosophical process that has implications for empiricism because it serves as a criterion for demarcating between science and non-science.

In other words, science and philosophy are inextricably entwined in this respect. Karl Popper is credited with the theory; indeed, it did not exist in any significant or similar sense before his work, although I have occasionally heard spurious claims to the contrary. He was a wide-ranging philosopher with a special interest in science, and has been described as the greatest ever philosopher of science.

Popper is falsification in other words. If we don't abide by his guidelines, we effectively refute falsifability before we even get started. There have been no modifications to his theory since his death, and it follows from this that there is no point in arguing that science has a different or better version of the falsification methodology.

Before we can continue, therefore, I think it is important that we broadly agree on the above. Any disagreement would be a potential source of discussion for a another thread, and I've had my fill of falsifiabilty for now. However, if you do disagree with some of the above, all may not be lost. We shall see.

Hereafter I will refer to the theory as Fal.


1. A little of the story behind Fal

a. Before Fal science was principally based on induction, the method by which we proceed from specific to the general. There were serious problems with this, however, and these were noted by a number of philosophers before Popper.

For example, if a man was only ever to observe white swans, he might conclude that all swans were white. And this would be a fair conclusion based on his observations. However, he would of course be wrong. This was known as the problem of induction.

If the man did eventually sight a black swan, this could easily be explained away as the exception that proved the rule. Popper challenged this, insisting that exceptions disproved the rule.

b. Poppers seminal achievement was to offer an acceptable solution to the problem of induction.

Falsifiability was born.

He noted that theories based on generalisations and probability lacked informative content, and that the more information a statement contained, the greater the number of ways there existed by which it might be proved false. Following from this, if a statement put itself at risk of being proved false, it had a higher chance of providing informative content.

Popper realised that these were the statements of interest to scientists. Those of high informative content, low probability, and which nevertheless came close to the 'truth'. Importantly, the more prone they are to being proved false, the more testable they are.

This is the basis of Fal, which I will define in more simple terms later.

Informative content, which is in inverse proportion to probability, is in direct proportion to testablity.


2. Some common misunderstanding and confusion

a. Fal can easily be confused with Boolean values, and this often happens. However, Fal does not boil down to anything as simple as statements based around the terms 'true' or 'false'. Just because a statement can be falsified does not necessarily make it falsifiable.

For example, if I say 'it will probably rain in Wimbledon tomorrow', the statement will be falsified if it does not, but this does not make the statement falsifiable, because no clear-cut statement was made in the first place, that is, no statement that left itself open to being proved conclusively false.

This is a very important point to grasp! Falsified does not equal falsifiable, contrary to what many people seem to think!

Disingenuous people have used subtle variations on this theme to switch the burden of proof away from the claimant, on whom the burden naturally falls. Extraordinary claims, as they say...

b. Fal, as formulated by Popper, has no relationship with Predictivity. Einstein said that the practical value of a theory can be meausured in its ability make accurate predictions, but this does not, in itself, make a theory falsifiable.

Predictability and probability often go hand in hand and, as we have seen, this is not necessarily a good basis on which to proceed. Probability has inherent weaknesses in common with all generalisations (See 1a).

This is not to say that we disapprove of theories that are both falsifiable and predictive. These are highly desirable. The point is that predictability does not equal falsifiabiliy.


3. So what is it Falsifiabilty, exactly?

Hopefully, I now need only summarise the above.

a. For a theory to be scientific it needs to be testable
b. For a theory to be testable it needs to be vulnerable to being proved false
c. A theory is accepted on a provisional basis until it is falsified. In this sense the theory is said to be verified.

In short

d. A theory can be said to be scientific if it is falsifiable

e. According to Popper's methodology, therefore, science progresses by a series of conjectures and refutations, and a theory is never conclusively verifiable, only ever conclusively falsifiable.


4. What it is not!

a. It is often said that science is NOT a search for ultimate truthes, and Fal underpins this. For a theory to be falsifiable it has to be open to being falsified, and this precludes absolute truthes.

b. The term 'proof' also implies some kind of ultimate truth, and so is also inadvisable. I have even heard people say 100% proof, which definitley implies ultimate truth. (OK, we occasionally use the term proof to mean mostly right as opposed to mostly wrong, but caution is recommended.) Something can be proved wrong (Conclusively falsified), but never proven (Conclusively verified). (See 3e.)

c. Fal is not inherently cautious or conservative. Popper proposed that the best theories are those which are bold, because they offer the highest chance of adding to our knowledge (See 1b). He even suggested that we should rejoice in the falsification of a theory, even if we may have cherished it as our brain-child.

d. Is Fal definitive? (See 7.)


5. The implications

Falsifiability marks a ground-breaking criterion of demarcation between science and non-science.

If we accept the basic principles of Fal, then by implication

a. If theories are not falsifiable, they are not scientific!
b. Fal demands specificity. Claims that might be verified at some indefinite time in the future are not acceptable.

Popper actually took a pragmatic attitude to science, recognising that theories are not automatically discarded as soon as contrary evidence comes along, as theories can be adjusted to account for it. In fact they should incorporate it. The rule is simple:
c. Auxiliary hypotheses should not diminish the falisfiability of a theory. In fact they should increase it by virtue of adding informative content, providing that the additional content is in itself falsifiable.

For example, if we were to say that water boils at 100*, this would be falsifiable. Once it has been falsified, we could add informative content to the theory: 'At lower pressures, water boils at lower temps...' This new informative content is acceptable because it is also falsifiable, and the theory is rescued.

Had we claimed that the waters boiling point was affected my ivisible Matter Z, the auxiliary would not be falsifiable and therefore unnacceptable because it adds no informative content.


6. Examples of some theories that are falsifiable, and some that are not

Hopefully these should already be reasonably clear by now.

a. Water boils at 100*. Falsifiable (See 6c).
b. There is/isn't a God. Non falsifiable.
i The concept cannot be tested.
ii The concept rests on interpretation, and an interpretation by it's very nature lacks the specificity demanded by Fal.

You could argue that the concept offers the potential to be falsified, that there is or is no God, but this relates to a quest for ultimate truth, a concept precluded by Fal (See 4a).

You could also argue that we will know one way or another at some point in the future, but again this lacks specifity. Indefinite time periods are not acceptable.

Although such concepts are non-science, Popper was keen to stress that this does not mean that they lack value, rather that they belong somewhere else. Within another discipline in this particular case.

d. Mathematical and logical statements are typically regarded as unfalsifiable, since they are tautological, and proving mathematical theorems involves reducing them to tautologies, that is, reducing the negative to a contradiction. This process tends to eliminate the possibility of counter-examples.

Much of the mathematics behind epicycles was correct, but the theory was wrong. Bertrand Russell argued that our reliance on math demonstrates our lack of understanding, rather than the contrary, but this is another big subject in itself.

e. Probability estimates are not falsifiable because of their strong relationship with generality (See 2a).

f. Moral and ethical statements are not falsifiable. Their function in language is not to state facts, but to express certain moral sentiments.


7. Problems with Falsifiabilty

a. Triviality

If a theory is bold and falsifiable should it necessarily be considered scientific? For example, if someone claims that a small meteorite will hit Wimbledon at 8am tomorrow! According to a rigid, albeit simplistic, interpretation of Fal, the theory is scientific. This seems petty.

b. Historical innaccuracy

Isaac Newton's theory of gravitation was apparently falsified by observations of the Moon's orbit shortly after it was published. At a later date these observations were shown to have been misleading. Despite this apparent refutation, Newton and others stuck with the theory, and this has obviously had many beneficial effects on the development of science. (Nigel Warburton, Philosophy Basics, 3rd Edition, P 126.)

c. Paradigm shifts

The above suggests that Fal does not always sit easily with history. Thomas Kuhn suggested that what actually happens is that a new paradigm develops, perhaps independently, and that there is no rational decision to jettison exiting thought, but that it just happens at the point where some kind of critical mass is reached. In other words, no justification for the new paradigm arises from the old. Thus progress by conjecture and refutation is denied.

This position seems to add weight to Max Planck's rather cynical view of science, when he said that 'Science proceeds funeral by funeral.'


Conclusion

Falsifiability is probably the best tool we have for demarcating between science and non-science. It is far from perfect, but also, I think, a long way from being conclusively falsified.


Addendum

Problems with hypothetical Dark Matter and hypothetical Dark Energy.

i They are not directly observable. Observations did not match expectations, and their existence was inferred to account for this discrepancy. In other words their existence rests on an interpretation of contradictory data.
ii They have not been discovered in any laboratory experiment, and therefore cannot be tested.
iii They do not add to existing theories so much as patch them up. They cannot be seen as auxiliary hypotheses because they do not add informative content; they are not themselves falsifiable (5c).
iv We cannot argue that they might be discovered at some indefinite time in the future because Fal demands specificity.
v. Predictions alone do not equate to falsifiability (2b).

They fail on all points, (5a, b, and c). On this basis I contend that Dark Matter and Dark Energy are not falsifiable, and therefore not scientific. The fact that science is investigating their potential existence does not make them real, anymore than investigating Magic makes it scientific.

Does this mean I rule them out completely? No! Emphatically no! (See 7b.) I am certainly not going as far as saying that they are pseudo-science, but I believe that they violate at least one scientific principle - falsifiability.

Source Material, if not already listed:
Popper, Bryan Magee, Fontana, 1973.
The Logic of Scientific Discovery, Karl Popper, Routledge Classics.

Edits: Typos

Dark Matter and Dark Energy are still falsifiable under your guidelines. You are wrong on a couple of points at the very end. DM and DE do add content as, if true, they predict observable actions and effects. This can be tested through observations. There is a common misconception that science must be "tested" in the labratory or under controlled situations for science to be valid. It is very difficult, for example, to experiment in a lab in order to learn about natural animal behavoirs. I can make a prediction (theory) based in a limited set of data (or even no data) about animal behavoir and "test" it by collecting a larger data set through direct observation in the field. This requires no classic lab experimentation. The large-scale universe is much as animals in the wild... we can not test, experimentally, every possibility. Therefore, we must rely on a series of observations and the data points they produce. If the data doesn't fit the theory time to amend or get rid of the theory. DM and DE are amendments to current cosmology to explain unexpected data points. As theories they do predict a great deal of what we are seeing.

That said, I understand that predictive ability alone to does not equate to falsifiability and is therefore less useful, however there are other observable (therefore testable) possibilities that would invalidate DM and DE. In other words, if certain things are seen, then DM or DE can not be true. This is the essence of falsification is it not. Alternatives, that if true, invalidate a proposal. I do not understand DM and DE well enough to be able to explain those alternatives but others here have indeed pointed out observable (again I point out this means testable) phenomena that if found would invalidate DM and DE... in this very thread I believe.

Edit to add: I don't think anyone here has disagreed in anyway with your extensive post about "falsifiability". I have seen nothing that would contradict anything in your post. If, as I said above, DM and DE theories do provide predictive observations that if found invalidate them... doesn't that sort or make your whole argument moot?

This is pretty much everything I was going to say. Well done. =D>

As Rich said, no one here seems to have any problems with your definition of falsifiability soup. In fact, it's been said in many less words several times already. But your conclusion about dark matter/energy appears to be in conflict with everything you say above. I won't bother restating it all, since Rich said it just fine.

No, sorry, this is NOT a theory. This is a PREDICTION, a way to test the theory, but it is not a theory. (Actually, it's a lousy "prediction" as 100C was defined as the normal boiling point of water.)

Similarly, your example of the "theories" that it will rain tomorrow or a meteor will strike tomorrow are predictions, not theories.

Theories are used to explain observations and to make predictions. The predictions are then used to falsify the theory. If the prediction flops, the theory needs to be at least revised; if the prediction is right, the theory is right in that instance.

Which explains why the various DM and DE theories are theories. They attempt to explain observations and they make predictions which can be tested.

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Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by ignorance or stupidity.
Isaac Asimov

Rich, I disagree. In these threads I have often substituted tractor beams for dark energy, and I might just as well have said pixy dust or fairy threads. The only evidence we have is an apparent attenuation rate of supernova that is greater than relativistic predictions. In this case the scientist are holding rigid the basic theory and inserting an untestable gel.

Riess's claim that an exhaustive search of other alternatives neglects the possiblitity basic BB framework is flawed. The supportive evidence gleaned from the WMAP data also assume this rigid structure, claiming the anisotropy observed in the CMB cannot be caused by ZKG effects in other galaxies, even though they are the prevailing cause of anisotropy in our own galactic plane. This is nuts!

From a scientific philosophical prospective, Soupdragon has made his case: incorporating unexplicable forces into the BB model denies the principle of falsification, and we are no longer talking about objective scientific solutions. Bad Astronomy!

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jwj

It's a big universe out there...is it really unwinding, really burning out?

Pure water at standard atmospheric conditions (sea level pressure).
It isn't tautological if soupdragon2's sentence refers to water in general.

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

All right, soup! Worth the wait.

But, as Einstein once said, "Das hätta ich einfacher sagen können."

It appears that your number 3 is the definition:
Others have made the case that you're wrong about dark matter and dark energy being non-scientific, so I'll let them. I want to bring up an old issue, which was dropped before, but you seem to allude to:
I'm not absolutely certain, but I think this refers to my post in January, which you never really responded to (your next post only refers to the troll comments).

Popper was describing the use of falsifiability. He devised the Theory of Falsifiability, but the method of falsifiability was used prior. It's kinda like evolution existed before Darwin came up with his theory of evolution.

Some minor comments to soupdragon2's post:

Although Russell said that, I disagree that mathematics is just a tautology. And counter-examples are common in mathematics. But since many people do not include math among the "sciences", I'll stop here.

If by epicycles you mean Ptolemy's model of the solar system, then I must point out that you can't reduce it to mathematics. It was, first and foremost, an attempt to predict the motions of celestial objects.

Is this a part of Popper's ideas, or an addition of yours?

I don't follow this. Why should the old paradigm justify the new paradigm?

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"A witty saying proves nothing" Voltaire.
"All your bias are belong to us" Ara Pacis.

Please translate.

Well, yeah, but the definition is of necessity a simplistic summation. Hence the length of the post.

I stand by this, and I have elaborated on the reasons for some of the confusion in point 2.

Prior to Falsificationsim, science rested on induction. If you want to argue agaist this, please provide some references and arguments to support your case. And again, please bear point 2 in mind.

Mathematical modelling is more complex and problematic in relation to Fal, but, yeah, let's not go there.

A fair summation, I'm sure. TLOSD, P181-183.

It doesn't in Kuhn's ideas! I apologise for your confusion, because I could have worded it better. (My red highlight, above.) In Fal, refutation follows conjecture, and therefore there is progress from existing theory. In Kuhn's idea of Paradigm shifts, existing theory is not falsified, just shoved unceremoniously aside.

Sorry, Jim, did I not write enough?

It's an anti-Cinderella shoe--it fits multiple feet.

Pais says, "I could have said that more simply"
Point 2 of the Big Post?

Perhaps I am misunderstanding you still. The only way out of this that seems to make sense is, if you also believe that no scientist since Popper gave it a name has had to use falsification.

In other words, as you say, falsification is a criteria for distinguishing between science and non-science, but it is not something that a scientist uses--it's what a philosopher uses.

Is that it?

Probability is such an important tool of science, I wonder if this statement is true. Theories of nuclear decay are based entirely upon probability, but they are highly predictable (and therefore falsifiable) because of the large sample sizes.

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jwj

It's a big universe out there...is it really unwinding, really burning out?

I don't think so, but let's examine your case.
You say you accept the definiton of falsifability. However, the rule of auxiliary hypotheses is that they must increase the falsifiabilty of a theory; not diminish it.

What specific predictions, if any, are we talking about?

Well, it helps, but we rarely have the luxury in Astronomy and Cosmology, of course.

Or add further hypotheticals? Can you guarantee that this won't happen, because it seems to have happened rather a lot?
Ammendments, granted.
Theories, no way. (Not enough testing has been done.) Hypotheses, maybe. They were postulated to bandage current models, but, at very best, they diminish their falsifiability.

Well, my point is that DE and DM are not falsifiable. But as I have stated, Fal is not necessarily infallible.

I don't follow you. Popper invented the concept of Falsificationism, and he named it.

The term falsified does not necessarily equate to falsifiability. Please see 1 and 2 in the long post.

In the intro of the long post, I explained that we needed to agree on the basics before proceeding. But it seems that you are now questioning the very first point which I made - That Science and Philosophy are inextricably entwined with regard to Fal?