This also goes for economics whethere or not it is a science in some narrow sense modeled on, what physics, unless it's treated as a fundamentalist article of faith (as it is by some NCEs and some Marxists), in which case no amount of anomalous data can create a problem. In that case, as Einstein joked when asked, what if the 1918 experiment confirmining the truth of General Realtivity had gone the otherf way, "I should feel sorry for thed Dear Lord. The theory is correct."
--- On Sat, 7/12/08, Jim Farmelant <farmelantj at juno.com> wrote:
> From: Jim Farmelant <farmelantj at juno.com>
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] URPE Summer Conference -- Aug 15-18 -- REGISTER NOW! ORGANIZE A PANEL!
> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> Date: Saturday, July 12, 2008, 10:01 AM
> On Fri, 11 Jul 2008 21:40:15 -0800 Miles Jackson
> <cqmv at pdx.edu> writes:
> > Doug Henwood wrote:
> > >
> > > On Jul 11, 2008, at 8:55 PM, Jim Farmelant wrote:
> > >
> > >> And many philosophers of science would agree
> with
> > >> Laibman on that point.
> > >
> > >
> > > I'm not sure economics is a science, but that
> might be a quibble.
> > >
> > > Why do you have to prove a successor truth when
> you think
> > something is
> > > untrue?
> >
> > You don't. The argument is incoherent. If a
> theory is consistently
> >
> > contradicted by data, it's not a good scientific
> theory.
>
> In practice most theories are contradicted by at
> least some of the data that's out there. Defenders
> of a given scientific theory will then invoke ad hoc
> hyotheses to explain, or in some cases to explain
> away, the contradictions between the theory and
> the data. There are no hard and fast rules for
> determining when a theory can be said to be
> "consistently contradicted by data," just as
> there are no hard and fast rules for determining
> whether a theory is a "good scientific theory."
>
> > Whether or
> > not
> > there are other theories that explain the
> contradictory data is
> > irrelevant.
>
> Actually, it is quite relevant to the decisions made by
> scientists as to whether or not to adhere to a given
> theory. Writers like Philipp Frank, Thomas Kuhn,
> and Paul Feyerabend, have all pointed out that
> very often scientists will stick to a theory, even
> if it has been extensively contradicted by data,
> in lieu of there being another alternative theory
> to which they can switch their allegience to.
> Kuhn provided some examples of this in his
> *The Structure of Scientific Revolutions*.
>
> >
> > Miles
> > ___________________________________
> > http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
> >
> >
>
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