Objective Knowledge: An Evolutionary Approach [Paperback]

(4 and a half stars)

In this book, Karl Popper developed his 'Evolutionary Epistemology', in which he proposed that our ideas and theories evolve and our knowledge 'grows'. In order to advance his case, he introduced some strange ideas, such as versillimitude (the idea that there are a certain number of possible propositions out there, and you can measure the value of a proposition relative to the total number of propositions in 'proposition-space') and his 'three worlds' (the real world, the subjective world, and the world of things that are written down and artifacts in general).

Regardless of defects in the specific arguments, his general approach was quite rich in insights and possibilities, and his notion of evolutionary epistemology in particular deserves to be taken up and further developed today in a sociocultural evolutionary context. In fact, the existing literature on evlutionary epistemology is mostly from the point of view of strict analogy with biological evolution (variation, survival of the fittest, etc) rather than evolution of ideas in a socio-cultural context. This has its place, but leaves interesting and important work to be done.

The book is a collection of papers, so there is some repetition, and sometimes you need to read another paper in the book before you really 'get' what he was saying in another paper. Some of the papers are fairly heavy going for the non-philosopher or someone who hasn't read at that sort of level of academic literature, so be warned, but if you skim to the good bits or persevere there is a lot of value in this - and a lot of ideas that are half formed, leaving you with the challenging and exciting task of redeveloping them.

Much food for thought.

If you just want an intro to Popper, and in particular to falsification, his logic of scientific discovery might be a better first stop.

You might also want to check out Lakatos, Feyerabend, and Kuhn if you want to get an overview of the seminal figures in the philosophy of science. Since then, a lot of the interesting work has been in the sociology of science, asking questions like to what extent the cultural attitudes and preconceptions of scientific groups shape the way science is done and what gets called science. 'Science in Context' by Barry Barnes and David Edge is a recent work giving the flavour of some of these developments. Some of the names in this field are Bruno Latour ('Laboratory Life : The Construction of Scientific Facts') and Richard Whitley, who has also done some interesting work on the sociology of economics.

This book is probably the best ever written on epistemology. Here Popper presents his theory of three worlds, one of which is the world of intelligibles, of ideas in the objective sense, which are Popper's candidates for knowledge without a knowing subject, or what he calls knowledge in the objective sense. Thus the term 'objective' in the title is intended by Popper to emphasize an analogy with physical objects; it is not intended in the more common sense of meaning 'unbiased' or 'unprejudiced' or anything like that (nor does Popper's philosophy have anything in common with Ayn Rand's so-called objectivist epistemology).

The book is subtitled 'An Evolutionary Approach'. Popper sees the evolution of knowledge as continuous with biological evolution: "From the amoeba to Einstein, the growth of knowledge is always the same: we try to solve our problems, and to obtain, by a process of elimination, something approaching adequacy in our tentative solution." In Popper's view, the evolution of knowledge is not merely analogous with biological evolution; rather, it is an extension of biological evolution: it is basically the same, continuous process, from the biological evolution of the amoeba to the most sophisticated theories of science.

The first chapter in the book contains Popper's most extensive discussion of the problem of induction. Popper's interest in this problem dates back to the earliest days of his career. His conclusion is, I think, totally convincing: there is no process of induction, and the sorts of things imagined by so many academic philosophers are just fantasies and misconceptions. Science gets along perfectly well without any inductive logic, as Popper explains.

The final chapters represent some of Popper's most mature philosophy. He offers a realist view of logic, physics, and history. He discuses in perfectly lucid terms the aim of science and the problem of rationality. The appendix, entitled "The Bucket and the Searchlight: Two Theories of Knowledge", is a brilliant climax in which many threads of the otherwise independent chapters are brought together.

If you want to understand Popper's epistemology, this is the book to read. It is the testament of a great mind and a great man, a philosopher who, in my view, will be seen in coming decades and centuries as perhaps the greatest of the 20th century.

When an undergraduate in college, I was mainly exposed to so called "Continental" philosophy which seems to have a tendency, to say the least, toward bosh, and to analytic philosophy which seems to have a tendency, to say the least, toward triviality, plus, since it was a Catholic college, selections from Plato, Aristotle, and medieval metaphysicians.
I could not really acclimate myself with these doctrines. It is in a sense unfortunate that I found an alternative outside my formal schooling. With Popper I found someone who is readable--I think that any intelligent general reader can understand him--original, and with an outlook congruent with natural science.
He is known for his ideas on scientific method--that science does not really "prove" theories, but creates conjectures which have rich empirical content and withstand falsification. With ideas like this, decades ago, he attacked doctrines like Marxism, and psycho-analysis. Demolishing the claims of these doctrines may seem to be no big deal today, but decades ago they were major tools of our intellecutal elites.
This book covers old ground such as his views on science but also, it seems to me, breaks new ground. A new contribution is his theory of the Three Worlds, which I think is fruitful. He also deals with the question of free will, which I sense is the weakest part of his book.
Popper distinguishes three realms or 'worlds.' World1 is the world of physical objects; World2 is the world of our subjective beliefs, thoughts, feelings; World3 is what he calls an objective world of knowledge, the objective contents of thought--the knowledge contained in books, musuems, libraries, etc.
Popper holds that most philosophers considered the object of epistemology--the theory of knowledge--to be World2. Popper argues that this is misguided. He thinks it is, to use his words, "irrelevant." The proper object for epistemology is World3. We should concern ourselves not with justifying our subjective beliefs but with objective theories--their contents, the arguments supporting them, etc.
A theory of knowledge based on World3 has some interesting ramifications. It is immune from modern relativistic attacks (this is my personal view). World2 epistemology has premises, both implicit and explicit, that make it vulnerable to relativistic attacks. World3 epistemology, instead, proceeds with the GROWTH of knowledge. Another interesting feature of World3 is that, even though it is man-made, it is autonomous. If humanity were to disappear, World3 will still be "outthere". World3 is created by individuals with certain goals, but the contents of World3 seem to have a life of its own(and this is very metaphorical). It can be used by others in different ways, it leads to new problems and solutions not considered before, etc.
Popper also deals with the problem of understanding in the humanities. There are some who hold that there is a difference between understanding in the natural sciences and understanding in the human sciences--that in fields like history, psychology, sociology, one has to understand by a method which seems to me to be something like a mystical intuitive grasp of the thoughts of another. Popper thinks that this is old hat. The method to, say, reconstruct a damaged ancient text is fundamentally no different from understanding regularities in nature.
Popper died not too long before the advent of the world wide web. It seems to me that Popper's ideas on the three worlds are very applicable to the world wide web. The World Wide Web would fall under the category of World3. It has an ever expanding content of knowledge, of conjectures, of arguments and discussion. Being a part of World3, it is human made, but the world wide web has a certain autonomy. A road built on the web by one person for one thing can be used in different ways by different people.