Introduction to Critical Rationalism

[ActiveMind]

I’ll be doing the same type of analysis that I did with Introduction to Critical Fallibilism - #2 by ActiveMind. I read the article the day it came out.

Introduction

• fallibilist
  • knowledge is tentative
    • we can always improve our knowledge
  • no guarantee against errors
    • perfection impossible
    • there can always be errors in our ideas
  • mistakes are common
  • we can make progress despite never reaching perfection
    • this implies infinite room for improvement
• refutes induction and justificationism
  • there have long been known problems
    • more effort has gone into trying to fix them to make original theories work instead of thinking of alternatives
  • CR says they can’t work (logically, I think)
  • CR’s alternative is evolutionary epistemology
    • we make progress and learn (improve knowledge) by error correction
      • brainstorming and criticism
      • conjectures and refutations
      • trial and error
      • critical discussion