Karl Popper: All observation is theory laden. Yeah, I would go with this. Some theories are in-born. Some theories - the theories used for everyday observation - span the majority of human individuals. And there is also variation across individuals, so different people approach observation differently because of different theories of observation.
Scientific theories: tested by observation, not derived from it.
Is it enough to say scientific theories are testable conjectures? No - because many myths are testable conjectures. And when they fail the test, the myth-teller provides an ad-hoc correction.
Is it enough to say scientific theories are testable conjectures? No - because many myths are testable conjectures. And when they fail the test, the myth-teller provides an ad-hoc correction.
- Bad explanation - easy variability in details, trivially modified - ad-hoc - after the fact - when disproving facts are discovered - variations in details added by motivated defenders of bad explanation
- Good explanation - assertions about broad range of reality - details hard to vary after the fact - it stands on its own or doesn't, the hardest possible test, to the highest possible standard of explanatory power
TED Blog: A new way to explain explanation: David Deutsch:
For tens of thousands of years our ancestors understood the world through myths, and the pace of change was glacial. The rise of scientific understanding transformed the world within a few centuries
Why? Physicist David Deutsch proposes a subtle answer.(Recorded at TEDGlobal 2009, July 2009, Oxford, UK. Duration: 16:39)
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