Objective knowledge : an evolutionary approach

✍ Scribed by Karl R. Popper

• Publisher: Clarendon Press
• Year: 1974
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 402
• Edition: Reprint
• Category: Library

✦ Table of Contents

Title
Copyright
Dedication
Preface
Acknowledgements
Contents
1. Conjectural Knowledge: My Solution of the Problem of Induction
1. The Commonsense Problem of Induction
2. Hume’s Two Problems of Induction
3. Important Consequences of Hume’s Results
4. My Way of Approaching the Problem of Induction
5. The Logical Problem of Induction: Restatement and Solution
6. Comments on My Solution of the Logical Problem
7. Preference for Theories and the Search for Truth
8. Corroboration: The Merits of Improbability
9. Pragmatic Preference
10. Background to My Restatement of Hume’s Psychological Problem of Induction
11. Restatement of the Psychological Problem of Induction
12. The Traditional Problem of Induction and the Invalidity of all Principles or Rules of Induction
13. Beyond the Problems of Induction and Demarcation
2. Two Faces of Common Sense: An Argument for Commonsense Realism and Against the Commonsense Theory of Knowledge
1. An Apology for Philosophy
2. The Insecure Starting-Point: Common Sense and Criticism
3. Contrast with Other Approaches
4. Realism
5. Arguments for Realism
6. Remarks on Truth
7. Content, Truth Content, and Falsity Content
8. Remarks on Verisimilitude
9. Verisimilitude and the Search for Truth
10. Truth and Verisimilitude as Aims
11. Comments on the Notions of Truth and Verisimilitude
12. The Mistaken Commonsense Theory of Knowledge
13. Criticism of the Commonsense Theory of Knowledge
14. Criticism of the Subjectivist Theory of Knowledge
15. The Pre-Darwinian Character of the Commonsense Theory of Knowledge
16. Sketch of an Evolutionary Epistemology
17. Background Knowledge and Problems
18. All Knowledge is Theory-Impregnated, Including Our Observations
19. Retrospect on Subjectivist Epistemology
20. Knowledge in the Objective Sense
21. The Quest for Certainty and the Main Weakness of the Commonsense Theory of Knowledge
22. Analytical Remarks on Certainty
23. The Method of Science
24. Critical Discussion, Rational Preference, and the Problem of the Analyticity of Our Choices and Predictions
25. Science: The Growth of Knowledge through Criticism and Inventiveness
An Afterthought on Induction
26. Hume’s Problems of Causation and Induction
27. Why Hume’s Logical Problem of Induction is Deeper than his Problem of Causation
28. Kant’s Intervention: Objective Knowledge
29. The Solution of Hume’s Paradox: Restoration of Rationality
30. Muddles Connected with the Problem of Induction
31. What Remains from the Mistaken Problem of Justifying Induction?
32. Dynamic Scepticism: Confrontation With Hume
33. Analysis of an Argument from the Improbability of Accidents
34. Summary: Common Sense and Criticism
3. Epistemology Without a Knowing Subject
1. Three Theses on Epistemology and the Third World
2. A Biological Approach to the Third World
3. The Objectivity and the Autonomy of the Third World
4. Language, Criticism, and the Third World
5. Historical Remarks
6. Appreciation and Criticism of Brouwer’s Epistemology
7. Subjectivism in Logic, Probability Theory, and Physical Science
8. The Logic and the Biology of Discovery
9. Discovery, Humanism, and Self-Transcendence
Select Bibliography
4. On the Theory of the Objective Mind
1. Pluralism and the Principle of the Three Worlds
2. The Causal Relations between the Three Worlds
3. The Objectivity of the Third World
4. The Third World as a Man-Made Product
5. The Problem of Understanding
6. Psychological Processes of Thought and Third-World Objects
7. Understanding and Problem-Solving
8. A Very Trivial Example
9. A Case of Objective Historical Understanding
10. The Value of Problems
11. Understanding (‘Hermeneutics’) in the Humanities
12. Comparison with Collingwood’s Method of Subjective Re-enactment
5. The Aim of Science
Select Bibliography
Bibliographical Note
6. Of Clouds and Clocks: An Approach to the Problem of Rationality and the Freedom of Man.
7. Evolution and the Tree of Knowledge
1. Some Remarks on Problems and the Growth of Knowledge
2. Remarks on Methods in Biology, and Especially in the Theory of Evolution
3. A Conjecture: ‘Genetic Dualism’
Addendum. The Hopeful Behavioural Monster
8. A Realist View of Logic, Physics, and History
1. Realism and Pluralism: Reduction versus Emergence
2. Pluralism and Emergence in History
3. Realism and Subjectivism in Physics
4. Realism in Logic
9. Philosophical Comments on Tarski’s Theory of Truth
Addendum. A Note on Tarski’s Definition of Truth
Appendix 1. The Bucket and the Searchlight: Two Theories of Knowledge
Appendix 2. Supplementary Remarks (1978)
Index of Names
Index of Subjects