In contemporary Philosophy of Science there are two trends that assess the scientist's procedures and fundamentals. One is the Historical Trend and the other is the Analytical Trend.
As well as the vienna circle, Popper is part of the Analytical Trend that prioritizes the methodological aspect in scientific development, the also called justification context. However, despite the common adhesion, Popper is, perhaps, the immediate critic of everything that was established in the vienna circle.
First, Popper does not eliminate metaphysics; simply, like Kant, he tries to delimit the fields of action of science and science. Secondly, this delimitation occurs because Popper does not pay attention to the concept of meaning, solely as a criterion for demarcation or impossibility of metaphysics. Thirdly, Popper criticizes the way to proceed by induction. This would allow only a similarity of regularity that would provide a collection of facts that makes it impossible to refute a theory.
Therefore, Popper formulated a new method. It's the model
hypothetical-deductive. For Popper, the search for knowledge does not start from the simple observation of facts and inference of statements. In fact, this new conception presupposes a interest of the subject in knowing a certain reality that his frame of reference it no longer satisfies. Therefore, mere observation is not taken into account, but an intentionalized, oriented and selective observation that seeks to create a new frame of reference.Do not stop now... There's more after the advertising ;)
This is how the hypothetical-deductive model appears. From the selection of the object to be observed, and the insufficiency of the frame of reference verified, the scientist formulates a general hypothesis from which consequences are deduced that allow the possibility of a experience. Here it is no longer necessary to check to assign meaning, that is, truth or falsehood, but the attempt is to refute the theory that allows the establishment of knowledge and the possibility of its development. It is the criterion of the falsifiability.
THE falsifiability or its attempt is, therefore, the demarcation criterion between what is scientific and what is metaphysical, mythical or poetic, etc., replacing the concept of Verifiability of vienna circle. For Popper, this method characterizes (if not accentuates) the creative aspect of science to the detriment of the inference model that does not respond to any expectation of the subject/scientist.
By João Francisco P. Cabral
Brazil School Collaborator
Graduated in Philosophy from the Federal University of Uberlândia - UFU
Master's student in Philosophy at the State University of Campinas - UNICAMP
Philosophy - Brazil School
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
CABRAL, João Francisco Pereira. "Karl Popper's Conception of Science"; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/filosofia/a-concepcao-ciencia-karl-popper.htm. Accessed on June 27, 2021.