Talk:Falsifiability

The lede

I've done some reparagraphing of the lede just for clarity. But it brings out that the sentence about "some philosophers such as Deborah Mayo" is out of place in the lede. Obv., Popper's views have critics, but this does not seem to be the place to cite Mayo in particular. This material could be eliminated from here, or there could just be a reference to the fact that there are critics of Popper's claims. The detail can come later. The point is that the lede paragraphs are meant to provide a summary/overview about the significance and substance of a topic. Adding details that don't match that description will come across as jarring to the reader and may mislead about what is most important. Metamagician3000 (talk) 08:47, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Just to say that Popper's view has critics would be pointless and even misleading. The readers must be able to make their own judgment when they read the criticisms and be able to see them for what they truly are. This need for a context does not mean that they do not belong in the lede. Even the confusion that exists in the literature about falsifiability is an essential part of the subject. I know that it is a very difficult task, because the readers could easily get confused, if they expect to be simply told what falsifiability is. When criticisms are presented, they might think that it is because falsifiability really deserves them. But the other options, saying only that criticisms exist or completely ignoring them, seem unacceptable to me. The article must explicitly and clearly consider the confusion that exists in the literature and this aspect is important enough that it must be present in the lede.

There are two aspects in Popper's philosophy regarding falsifiability. The first is that it presents the very common view that predictive power and the existence of experimental tests are key features of science. Popper formalized and generalized this view with the falsifiability criterion. The second is that there are still today many philosophers that criticize the criterion with arguments that apply also to predictive power and the existence of experimental tests. For example, they might not realize that the Duhem-Quine problem says also that no law has true predictive power, because we can never be certain about these predictions. Because he understood very well the Duhem-Quine problem and similar problems, Popper provided a criterion to resist them. This is exactly why he insisted that falsifiability is a logical criterion. If it was only the non educated public that misunderstood this aspect of Popper's philosophy, I would say that you are right, but those who still apply arguments against Popper's philosophy that also apply to predictive power are professional philosophers. Mayo and Stove are examples. I am not saying they reject predictive power as a fundamental criterion, but I think they miss what Popper attempted to do (and succeeded in doing so in my view). He wanted a clear criterion that covers the natural notion of predictive power and resists the Duhem-Quine problem and other problems that he refers to as methodological problems without pretending that these problems have a solution at their own level. He accepted that there are no solutions to Hume's problem, to the Duhem-Quine problem and to other methodological problems. He understood that the Duhem-Quine problem takes a step back on his separation logical versus methodological and correctly says that the methodological problems are still there. He never denied that. He even gave his famous swamp analogy: "the bold structure of its theories [the logical side] rises, as it were, above a swamp [the methodological side]. It is like a building erected on piles". This misunderstanding of Popper's philosophy is a significant part of the literature on falsifiability. It seems to me that, on the contrary, it must also be a significant part of the article and this must be reflected in the lede.

I do appreciate your concern, however, because presenting this situation is a very difficult challenge, but I do not think it is a challenge that can be avoided. Dominic Mayers (talk) 17:15, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Headings

@Valjean: Your edit summary said that a blank line after a heading is "default" in Wikipedia, but that's not true: per MOS:BLANKLINE, a blank line after a heading is optional. Please refrain from making misleading statements about Wikipedia guidelines in your edit summaries. Thanks, Biogeographist (talk) 20:28, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

I didn't say anything about guidelines. When one adds a new section, the software automatically adds that blank line, and it helps me and others with poorer eyesight while editing. (It saves time and sometimes has prevented me from making serious editorial mistakes.) It does no harm to you or anyone else, so why make it harder for other editors? Why "do harm" by deleting the blank lines? You are literally going out of your way to make editing harder for some editors. That's not a sin of omission but of commission. That's not very collegial. If I hadn't explained it to you, it wouldn't be a big deal, but I did, yet you chose to actively act in an uncollegial manner. SMH. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 03:59, 20 March 2024 (UTC)

Patrollers should not give lessons regarding rules of collegiality to other editors unless they have very good justifications to do so, which is not at all the case here. Such an attitude does not contribute to create a nice working environment. I dislike a bit the extra blank lines, but I am much more concerned with the negative effect of this kind of attitude than I am with the extra blank lines. The MOS:BLANKLINE rule is clear: "with one blank line just before it; a blank line just after is optional" (emphasis is mine). Dominic Mayers (talk) 04:39, 20 March 2024 (UTC)

@Valjean: Stop saying it is "Wikipedia's default". That is not true. The "New section" function on talk pages is coded to add a blank line after a heading, but I can choose to use or not use that button; its behavior is not "Wikipedia's default". (I don't even see that button on article pages, only on talk pages.) In fact, the blank line does cause harm because it makes less content fit within the editing window, which means one has to scroll more while editing, which makes it harder for me to edit. So there are usability issues whether one includes a blank line or omits it, so stop acting as if your position is righteous and as if I am the evil sinner (when you are the one who unilaterally decided to impose your preference on the article—I was just restoring the article's longstanding and justifiable convention). Don't go around misleading less experienced editors by falsely claiming that your personal choice is "Wikipedia's default". Biogeographist (talk) 12:45, 20 March 2024 (UTC)

Re: lede

Hi! I would like to copy edit the lede but wanted to check in first. Falsifiability is an extremely important aspect of proper evaluation and decision-making, even just on a day-to-day basis. I think that this page in particular needs to be very accessible to the average reader because a solid understanding of falsifiability is vital for accurate critical thinking and civic participation.

To that end:

-I would like to add more citations to the lede for verification.

-I would like to use simpler language and examples in the lede. For example, I would change the first sentence of the second paragraph from "Popper emphasized the asymmetry created by the relation of a universal law with basic observation statements and contrasted falsifiability to the intuitively similar concept of verifiability that was then current in logical positivism." to "Falsifiability can be contrasted with verifiability." I would keep the 'All Swans Are White' example.

-The third, fourth, and fifth paragraphs do not provide a concise and intuitive consensus statement that I believe would be most beneficial to readers. I would like to incorporate more citations and third party sources so as to provide such a statement.

-I would like to incorporate the contents of the notes into the body of the lede and use a more traditional citation style.

-I would like to simplify and expand the explanations of the Problem of Induction, the demarcation problem, and the importance of "logical criterion" as a quality of falsifiability.

-This page reads to me as implicitly based on the theories of Karl Popper.

Like I said, just wanted to check in first because I am proposing substantial changes and I really believe that this page is one of the most important pages on Wikipedia right now. I'm only kind of exaggerating. StudentOfLif (talk) 19:45, 27 May 2025 (UTC)