Karl Popper: Critical Appraisals

248 Pages·2004·1.89 MB·English

by  Philip Catton

KARL POPPER
One of the most original thinkers of the twentieth century, Karl Popper inspired
his own and subsequent generations of philosophers, historians and politicians.
The essays presented here, specially written for this volume, offer a fresh philo-
sophical examination of key themes in Popper’s philosophy, including the
philosophies of knowledge and science, and political philosophy. Drawing from
some of Popper’s most important works, the contributors address Popper’s solu-
tion to the problem of induction and his views on conventionalism and criticism
in an open society, while exploring his unique position in twentieth-century
philosophy. The contributors also examine the current relevance of Popper to
understanding liberal democracy along with his critique of tribalism. Addition-
ally, they offer new evaluations on Popper’s relationship with analytic philosophy
in general, and with Wittgenstein in particular, and draw on the studies of Isaac
Newton and Albert Einstein to assess Popper’s conception of science.
This volume offers new insights on key topics from some of Popper’s most
important work and is essential reading for students of Popper and anyone inter-
ested in political philosophy and the philosophy of science.
Contributors: Alan Musgrave, Semiha Akıncı, Philip Catton, Wenceslao Gonzalez,
Jeremy Sheamur, Peter Munz, Christian List, Philip Pettit, Graham Macdonald,
Alan Ryan, Anthony O’Hear, Jeremy Waldron
Philip Catton is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Canterbury,
New Zealand. Graham Macdonald is Professor of Philosophy at the University of
Canterbury.

KARL POPPER
Critical appraisals
Edited by
Philip Catton and Graham Macdonald
First published 2004
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2004.
Selection and editorial matter © 2004 Philip Catton and Graham Macdonald;
individual chapters, respective contributors
Alan Musgrave ‘How Popper (might have) solved the problem of induction’,
reproduced with kind permission from Cambridge University Press. First
published in Philosophy (date forthcoming), Cambridge University Press
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Karl Popper: critical appraisals / edited by Philip Catton and Graham
Macdonald. – 1st ed.
p. cm.
1. Popper, Karl Raimund, Sir, 1902–94
I.Catton, Philip, 1956– II.Macdonald, Graham.
B 1 649.P64K34 2004
192–dc22
2004002913
ISBN 0-203-32688-1 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0–415–31970–6 (hbk)
ISBN 0–415–31971–4 (pbk)
CONTENTS
List of contributors vii
Preface xi
Introduction 1
PHILIP CATTON AND GRAHAM MACDONALD
1 How Popper (might have) solved the problem of induction 16
ALAN MUSGRAVE
2 Popper’s conventionalism 28
SEMIHA AKINCI
3 Constructive criticism 50
PHILIP CATTON
4 The many faces of Popper’s methodological approach to prediction 78
WENCESLAO J. GONZALEZ
5 Popper versus analytical philosophy? 99
JEREMY SHEARMUR
6 My adventure with Popper and Wittgenstein 114
PETER MUNZ
7 An epistemic free-riding problem? 128
CHRISTIAN LIST AND PHILIP PETTIT
8 The role of experience in Popper’s philosophy of science and
political philosophy 159
GRAHAM MACDONALD
CONTENTS
9 Popper’s politics: science and democracy 174
ALAN RYAN
10 The open society revisited 189
ANTHONY O’HEAR
11 Tribalism and the myth of the framework: some Popperian
thoughts on the politics of cultural recognition 203
JEREMY WALDRON
Index 231
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CONTRIBUTORS
Semiha Akıncıis Associate Professor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Communi-
cation Sciences at Anadolu University, Turkey. She took her degrees from the
Middle East Technical University in Ankara, and these included a Master’s on
Popper as well as a Ph.D. on the metaphysics of possible worlds. Her publica-
tions are diverse, as she writes on philosophy of science, ontic commitment,
possible worlds, human rights, the environment, theodicy and education.
Philip Cattonis Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Canterbury,
New Zealand, where he heads up the programmes in history and philosophy of
science and also mathematics and philosophy. His early degrees are from New
Zealand, and his Ph.D. is from the University of Western Ontario. He has
published on the philosophy of space and time, ecology, and problems with the
deductivist image of scientific reasoning.
Wenceslao J. Gonzalez is Professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science at the
University of La Coruña in Spain. He has been a visiting researcher at the Uni-
versity of St Andrews, the University of Münster and the London School of
Economics, as well as Visiting Fellow at the Center for Philosophy of Science,
University of Pittsburgh. He is the editor of Philosophy and Methodology of
Economics (1998) and Lakatos’s Philosophy Today (2001). He has published
numerous articles on scientific methodology, economics and individual ratio-
nality.
Christian Listis a Lecturer in Political Science in the Department of Govern-
ment at the London School of Economics. He took his degrees from the
University of Oxford, modulating from mathematics and philosophy into
political science, and subsequently held several visiting and postdoctoral posi-
tions at Oxford, ANU, MIT and Harvard. His publications range over topics
in political philosophy, rational choice theory, philosophy of economics and
philosophy of science.
Graham Macdonaldis Professor of Philosophy at the University of Canterbury,
New Zealand. His research areas are philosophy of social science, philosophy
of mind, and teleosemantics, on which he has published in journals such as
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CONTRIBUTORS
Mind and Language, Philosophical Quarterly, Analysisand Proceedings of the Aris-
totelian Society. He is co-author of What Philosophy Does and Semantics and
Social Science, and editor or co-editor of numerous volumes, including Fact,
Science, and Morality (with Crispin Wright) and Philosophy of Psychology(with
Cynthia Macdonald).
Peter Munzis Emeritus Professor of History at the Victoria University of Welling-
ton, New Zealand. He is the only person to have been a student of both
Popper and Wittgenstein. He is the author of several books on early medieval
history as well as of several books on philosophy, including The Shapes of Time,
Our Knowledge of the Growth of Knowledge: Popper or Wittgenstein?, Philosophical
Darwinism: On the Origin of Knowledge by Means of Natural Selectionand Cri-
tique of Impure Reason. His new book, Beyond Wittgenstein’s Poker: New Light on
Popper and Wittgenstein, is in press.
Alan Musgrave is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Otago, New
Zealand. He took his degrees at the London School of Economics, where with
Imre Lakatos he edited Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge, an outstandingly
influential collection of essays assessing the competing views about science of
Popper and Thomas Kuhn. His chief interests are the theory of knowledge and
the history and philosophy of science, in which areas he has published widely
including his books Common Sense, Science, and Scepticism and Essays on Real-
ism and Rationalism.
Anthony O’Hear is the Weston Professor of Philosophy at the University of
Buckingham, UK and is Editor of the journal Philosophy. Among his many
interests in philosophy are philosophy of science; philosophy of religion, aes-
thetics and culture; political philosophy; and ethics. His books include Karl
Popper, Beyond Evolution: Human Nature and the Limits of Evolutionary Explana-
tion, After Progress, and Philosophy in the New Century.
Philip Pettitteaches political theory and philosophy at Princeton, where he is
William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Politics and at the University Center
for Human Values. He works on the foundations of cognitive and social sci-
ence, and moral and political theory. Among his recent books are: A Theory of
Freedom: From the Psychology to the Politics of Agency and, with Geoffrey Bren-
nan, The Economy of Esteem: An Essay on Civil and Political Life.
Alan Ryan is Head of New College, University of Oxford, and Tutor there in
political philosophy. His main interests are political philosophy, philosophy of
the social sciences, and the history of ideas. He has written and edited several
books on John Stuart Mill, theories of property and the philosophy of social
sciences. His most recent books are John Dewey and the High Tide of American
Liberalism and Liberal Anxieties and Liberal Education.
Jeremy Shearmuris Reader in Philosophy at the Australian National University.
He obtained his degrees from the London School of Economics, where he
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CONTRIBUTORS
worked for eight years as Popper’s assistant. His research areas include political
philosophy, philosophy of science and social science, moral philosophy, and
mid-twentieth-century social and political theory, in all of which he has pub-
lished widely, including the recent books Hayek and After and The Political
Thought of Karl Popper.
Jeremy Waldronis the Maurice and Hilda Friedman Professor of Law and Direc-
tor of the Center for Law and Philosophy, Columbia University. He has
written on a wide range of topics in social, legal and political philosophy. His
books include The Right to Private Property, Nonsense Upon Stilts(ed.), Liberal
Rights, The Dignity of Legislation, Law and Disagreement and God, Locke and
Equality. He is also the author of numerous articles in law journals and is a
member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
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