Natural Selection or Problem Solving. Critical Re-evaluation of Karl Popper's Evolutionism

• Authors: Alexander Boldachev
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Among the philosophers and the educated audience the name of Sir Karl Popper is usually associated with the critical method, evolutionary epistemology, falsification as a criterion for the demarcation of scientific knowledge, the concept of the third world and with his dislike to dialectics and contradictions. This article is aimed to show in what way all these things are connected in the evolutionary researches of the philosopher and the new conceptions, which he contributed to studying the mechanisms of evolution. Also there is an attempt to comprehend the evolutionary views of Popper, test them for falsification, relate his epistemology with his claims, which he puts forward to the theory of objective knowledge evolution and show the obvious contradiction between them.

Keywords

EN

evolution; epistemology; selection principle; Popper.

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: Studia Humana
• Year: 2014
• Volume: 3
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 29-42

Dates

published

2014-09-01

online

2014-10-08

Contributors

author

Alexander Boldachev

• Moscow, Russia

References

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• 2. Popper, K. Conjectures and Refutations: the Growth of Scientific Knowledge. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1962.
• 3. Popper, K. Epistemology Without a Knowing Subject, [in:] [6].
• 4. Popper, K. Natural Selection and the Emergence of Mind. First Darwin Lecture, Darwin College, Cambridge, 1977, [in:] Evolutionary Epistemology, Rationality, and the Sociology of Knowledge, eds. G. Radnitzky and W.W.W. Bartley, III. Open Court 1987.
• 5. Popper, K. Natural selection and the emergence of mind, Dialectica 32, 1978, 339-355
• 6. Popper, K. Objective Knowledge: An Evolutionary Approach, Revised Edition, Clarendon Press, 1979.
• 7. Popper, K. Evolutionary Epistemology, [in:] Popper К. Evolutionary Theory: Paths into the Future. London: John Wiley & Sons, 1984.
• 8. Popper, K. Towards an Evolutionary Theory of Knowledge, [in:] Popper К. A World of Propensities. Bristol, Thoemmes, 1990, 27-51.
• 9. Popper, K. All Life is Problem Solving All Life Is Problem Solving. London: Routledge, 1999.
• 10. Popper, K. Unended Quest: An Intellectual Autobiography. London, New-York: Routledge, 2002.
• 11. Popper, K. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. London and New York: Routledge / Taylor & Francis, 2005.
• 12. Rescher, N. Peirce, Popper and the Methodological Turn, [in:] Rescher Nicholas. Peirce's Philosophy of Science, ch.2, part 2. Notre Dame, London: University of Notre Dame Press, 1978.
• 13. Shishkin, M.A. Evolution as epigenetic process, Sovremennaya paleontologiya [Modern Paleontology] (in Russian). Moscow: Nedpa, 1988, vol. 1, pp. 142-169.

Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/sh-2014-0012