Miles Jackson:
> Yep. But just like any practical scientist, Popperians ignore or
> explain away examples that contradict their favorite theory. And this
> is not meant to diss scientists: holding onto a theory in the face
> of "unruly" data is in fact a crucial characteristic of science
> (PKF's stuff on Galileo is great on this). Anybody who thinks that
> scientists digilently throw out an elegant theory just because some
> data contradicts it needs to put down the Popper and actually talk to
> some practicing scientists.
Yeah, but fudging doesn't really contradict Popper.
I see the problem with Popper's formulation as a lack of interest or maybe relevance. I think of science as the concoction and collection of _interesting_ statements which correspond (accurately, one hopes) to sets of phenomena. Because a statement or statement set is falsifiable yet isn't falsified doesn't necessarily make it interesting -- interest comes from the power, beauty or entertainment which we get from the statements. And those in turn depend on our desires, which guide us in the first place -- for instance, Copernicus reworking the model of the solar system not because the Ptolmaic system was inaccurate -- his was no better on that score -- but because it was _inelegant_.
-- Gordon