Steve You might want to hold back on the thanks somewhat -- what I agree with in falsificationism is its use as a test of bona fides: I certainly *don't* think it's (usually) much use in assessing the truth of theories. This is for a reason which you bring out in another post: empirical evidence is rarely terribly conclusive, even if we leave the D-Q problem aside. Moreover, I'm surprised to see you instancing statistical testing of hypotheses, since falsification seems to be something that stat.s tests are intrinsically incapable of producing. Your account of your econometric work seemed to say that there have been (many?) occasions when the evidence, when it has become available, has lowered your degree of belief in your initial hypotheses. This, of course, is Bayesianism, which has always seemed to me highly effective as both description of and prescription for actual practice in empirical testing. Julian > -----Original Message----- > From: Steve Keen [SMTP:s.keen@uws.edu.au] > Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2000 11:13 PM > To: ope-l@galaxy.csuchico.edu > Subject: [OPE-L:4171] Re: Who agrees with Popper? > > Dear Julian, > > Thank you thank you thank you! -:) > Steve > At 21:11 19/10/00 +0100, you wrote: > >It's annoying to have to put in a good word for this vastly-over-rated > (not > >least by himself) thinker -- but falsifiability is *quite* a good idea as > a > >test of whether a set of notions is, so to speak, advanced in good faith. > >(And his anecdote against Adler, which he uses to illustrate his > >disillusionment with confirmationism, is certainly both funny and > >well-directed). >
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