Pan-critical rationalism

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The pancritical rationalism , also comprehensively critical rationalism , is one of William W. Bartley developed addition to the critical rationalism of Karl Popper . It introduces an all-encompassing method of criticism that builds on falsification but extends it so that it can be applied to its own foundations. This makes it possible to represent critical rationalism without violating one's own claims. Pan-critical rationalism rejects the ' comprehensive rationalism ', which says that a position can only be rationally represented if it is justified or at least theoretically justified. He replaces it with the basic position that there is no justification and that rationality instead consists of the willingness to keep positions that one takes open to criticism. All positions may be represented as long as they stand up to strict examination.

Rationality problem

A basic problem that arises from critical rationalism, as Popper describes it in the logic of research and the open society , is the question of whether it can be accepted at all according to its own criteria. In both works Popper did not assume that metaphysics was pointless, but he was of the opinion that the limits of falsifiability also represent the limits of rational discussability and thus the absolute limits of science. Critical rationalism could not answer the question of its validity with its own means. The consequence of this is that even from the point of view of critical rationalism there is no possibility of rationally deciding between critical rationalism and other existing positions and thus no reason to prefer critical rationalism to these other positions.

Popper's first attempt at a solution was to speak of an "irrational belief in reason ". He came to this view through the discussion of comprehensive rationalism, which insists that every decision must be based on experience or arguments, and complete irrationalism, which regards every decision as purely arbitrary and therefore arbitrary. Popper recognized that a decision in favor of comprehensive rationalism cannot be justified according to his own criteria. But he saw it in the form of a critical rationalism that openly admits this problem and "recognizes certain limitations" as the lesser evil. He argued for this with some negative consequences of irrationalism. In a later essay on the topic, he then formulated specific criteria for checking and differentiating between metaphysical theories:

  • Is the theory a solution to the problem?
  • Does the theory solve the problem better than other theories, or does it just shift the problem?
  • Is the solution easy?
  • Is the solution fruitful?
  • Does the solution conflict with other philosophical theories needed to solve other problems?

WW Bartley found Popper's positions very unsatisfactory and stressed that they can be attacked with a variant of the tu-quoque argument: when critical rationalism cannot justify the validity of its own criteria and principles, but judges other positions according to these criteria and principles , then the other positions must also be allowed to judge critical rationalism according to their criteria and principles. However, this also consequently leads to irrationalism, since the choice of criteria and principles is not logically related to reality and is therefore arbitrary. Bartley referred to this problem as the problem of rationality, following Popper's problem of induction and delimitation.

Criticism instead of justification

The first step in Bartley's approach to solving this problem was a strict separation of reasoning and criticism. Bartley saw that in comprehensive rationalism the classic form of criticism was to point out a lack of justification. However, if one assumes an absolute truth, then a lack of justification does not mean the falsity of the criticized thesis. Popper had already advocated this before, but did not refer it explicitly to the foundations and standards of rationality itself. Bartley, on the other hand, rejected this form of criticism, which had also led Popper in the open society to his skeptical attitude towards his own position, for everyone Areas completely considered invalid. For Bartley, a critical argument was only admissible if it attacked the truth of the criticized position; if it was in logical contradiction with the criticized position. Far more explicitly than Popper, Bartley opposed any form of justification and justification and radically distanced himself from comprehensive rationalism. Bartley spoke of comprehensive rationalism as an authoritarian thought structure, which at the same time was much closer to irrationalism than Popper had recognized in the open society .

Rational reasoning

The second step in resolving it was to further elaborate the logical connection between arguments aimed at the truth of the attacked position, rather than its justification. While Popper had already recognized that a contradicting position and a falsifiable theory that contradicts a true basic theorem cannot be true, Bartley introduced another form of the rational argument:

  • A metaphysical theory that contradicts a true falsifiable theory cannot be true.

Thus, metaphysical theories can be checked against empirical theories. Such arguments are undogmatic, since the empirical theory used can in turn be falsified by observational sentences. Conversely, there is also no argument that would only allow the use of observation sentences and not the use of falsifiable theories for criticism, because the strength of observation sentences is not their provability, which is not given, but, as with falsifiable theories, the possibility to verify them by further observation at any depth. Popper's view of the irrefutability of metaphysics was thus obsolete.

Furthermore, Bartley made use of the logical relationship between normative or methodical statements and real conditions. In his view, the discussion of Critical Rationalism had the invalidity of naturalistic fallacies of form

Science uses an induction method
Science is supposed to use an induction method

led too much to normative and descriptive statements being wrongly viewed as independent and a logical relationship between the two being denied. Bartley rejected this view in its generality and limited it to the thesis that there is simply no possibility of justifying a normative statement by assuming the truth of a descriptive statement. However, normative statements can be criticized by descriptive statements, because normative statements are in a strictly deductive, logical relationship to descriptive statements, such as the conclusion

Karl should become a genius
Karl can become a genius

Bartley argued that the normative statement could well be criticized by the empirical finding of severe brain damage. Ultra posse nemo obligatur as a form of criticism of norms based on facts was also represented by Popper.

Basic position

With these results and the expansion of Popper's falsification method to a comprehensive theory of rationality, the significance of falsifiability as a limit of science falls; it becomes a demarcation between empirical and non-empirical propositions, which is decisive for the method but not for the epistemological status of the propositions. Science is characterized exclusively by its comprehensive, critical-rational approach, not by the logical structure or other criteria of the propositions it represents. Bartley called this position pan-critical rationalism and summarized it with the basic hypothesis

All positions can be criticized

together. Any rejection of a thesis that is not based on factual arguments but on the assertion that the thesis is in principle not debatable, for example unprovable, or not falsifiable, or not coherent with one's own basic assumptions, is therefore a dogmatic recourse. (See also, on the one hand, rational dogmatism and, on the other hand, 'doubly entrenched', 'reinforced' or 'intensified dogmatism' - intentionally constructed immunization strategies, for example the defense against any counter-argument by referring to an alleged mental illness of the discussion partner.) Bartley emphasized that a metaphysical determinism which, in principle, analogous to the indeterminism of quantum physics, could follow from a falsifiable theory, the position of pancritical rationalism according to its own criteria, since it would expose any criticism as an illusion.

Despite long-term differences between Popper and Bartley, both agreed on many points, but the precise situation is very complicated. There are a few passages in Open Society from the fourth edition and in Realism and The Goal of Science that strongly suggest that Popper ultimately fully accepted Bartley's position. On closer inspection, however, it turns out that Popper had given Bartley permission to make these changes himself; so they were all written by Bartley himself. After Bartley's death, Popper distanced himself from full agreement with Bartley at a meeting in Kyoto.

dialectic

Joachim Klowski worked on the critical method of pan-critical rationalism for criticism of dialectical positions. He distinguished between context-invariant and context-variant objects in the language. If in a dialectical sentence (a sentence in which there are contradictions) a context-variant object cannot be converted into a context-invariant object, and the logical contradictions of the sentence are only caused by such objects (for example the whole in the sense of totality ), then one can still argue rationally with deduction and criticism and the contradictions are not an argument for rejecting the position.

So Klowski tried to solve the problem of the criticizability of a dialectical sentence by making it a logical part and limiting the scope of the critical method to this part. On the one hand, he wanted to prevent dialectical sentences from being generally excluded from criticism and rejected without comment, and on the other hand from being subjected to criticism in all, especially in their dialectical components, although this would inevitably lead to a general rejection due to the contradictions.

Since every dialectical sentence always has such a logical part, the position of Pan-Critical Rationalism can be successfully defended against dialectics. Because it only says that all positions can be criticized. However, this criticism does not have to include the structure of each individual object about which the position speaks. If you isolate such objects, they no longer represent a sentence and consequently no longer a position, so that they are no longer affected by pan-critical rationalism. Since such dialectical objects, which make up the dialectical part of a dialectical sentence, are necessarily contradictory, they cannot, conversely, be used to infer anything. Because this would also lead to arbitrariness. This means that the critical method has priority, i.e. That is, it can and must be applied to everything that belongs to logic, including the logical part of dialectical sentences.

Klowski derived this primacy from Bartley's statement that there is some core logic that is irreversible . Without them, any discussion would be completely arbitrary and would only consist of an incoherent exchange of arbitrary sentences. It is therefore an absolute prerequisite for any meaningful argumentation and can only be abandoned together with the argumentation itself, but cannot be replaced by something else in the context of an argumentation. The primacy of the critical method is therefore irrevocable. From Klowski's point of view, however, it does not have absolute dominance, as Popper saw it: in his eyes it must not be applied to the dialectical components of a sentence, i.e. that is, to cross its own limit, although beyond it it has no validity.

Because this would lead to an uncritical and blanket rejection of every dialectical sentence, solely on the basis of assumptions that the dialectician does not share and without which he believes he can get by, namely the validity of logic, in particular the unreserved exclusion of contradictions. The pan-critical rationalist would lose the right to criticize the dialectician for anything at all, since he could hold against him that the rejection results solely from the inadequacy of the critical method that he, the dialectician, has recognized and which he therefore consciously in favor of dialectics avoid.

Klowski concluded from his considerations:

Pan-critical rationalism [becomes] only really pan-critical through this methodological revision, namely also critical with regard to the scope of its own method.

Using the example of totality , he explained that a rational criticism would be possible on the basis of a successful argument against the claim that it exists at all, but not on the basis of a blanket rejection because of its contradictions.

criticism

John F. Post and John WN Watkins have doubted that pan-critical rationalism is itself entirely open to criticism and has raised concerns that it could be an aggravated dogma. Bartley replied to this in additional appendices on Escape into Engagement , and David Miller further discussed the question. Armando Cíntora believes that this clarification is ad hoc and that the problems remain.

swell

  1. ^ Open Society II , Chapter 14
  2. ^ Karl R. Popper: On the Status of Science and of Metaphysics. Ratio 1 (1958), pp. 97-115, also Chapter 8 of Conjectures and Refutations
  3. ↑ Karl R. Popper: From the sources of our knowledge and our ignorance. Conjectures and refutations , first presented in 1960 as an Annual Philosophical Lecture at the British Academy
  4. ↑ William W. Bartley: Rationality versus the Theory of Rationality ( Memento of the original from September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , In Mario Bunge: The Critical Approach to Science and Philosophy (The Free Press of Glencoe, 1964), Section VIII. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.the-rathouse.com
  5. ^ Karl R. Popper: Replies to my critics. In PA Schilpp (ed.): The Philosophy of Karl Popper (La Salle: Open Court Press, 1974), section 6, point (8)
  6. ^ David Miller: Comprehensively Critical Rationalism. Critical Rationalism (1994), Section 4.3.b
  7. ↑ Lorenzo Fossati: We're all just provisional! (PDF; 51 kB). Enlightenment and Criticism 2/2002, p. 9
  8. ^ The ethical nature of Karl Popper's Theory of Knowledge , Part 1, especially Section III
  9. ↑ Joachim Klowski: The irrevocable primacy of logic, the dialectic of the whole and the limit of logic. Zeitschrift fur Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 4 : 1 (1973), pp. 41-53
  10. ↑ Joachim Klowski: Can a core logic be constituted? Zeitschrift fur Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 4 : 2 (1973), pp. 303-312.
  11. ^ John F. Post: Paradox in Critical Rationalism and Related Theories. Evolutionary Epistemology, Rationality, and the Sociology of Knowledge (Illinois: Open Court, 1988)
  12. ^ John F. Post: A Goedelian Theorem for Theories of Rationality. Evolutionary Epistemology, Rationality, and the Sociology of Knowledge (Illinois: Open Court, 1988)
  13. ^ John WN Watkins : Comprehensively Critical Rationalism: A Retrospect. Evolutionary Epistemology, Rationality, and the Sociology of Knowledge (Illinois: Open Court, 1988)
  14. ^ Critical Rationalism , Chapter 4
  15. ↑ Armando Cíntora: Miller's Defense of Bartley's Pancritical Rationalism ( Memento of the original of August 18, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Sorties 15, ISSN 1135-1349 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.ifs.csic.es 

literature

  • William W. Bartley: Flucht ins Engagement , Mohr Siebeck 1987, ISBN 3-16-945130-8
  • David Miller: Critical Rationalism , Open Court Publishing Company, 1994, ISBN 0-8126-9198-9
  • Karl R. Popper: The open society and its enemies I. Study edition. The magic of Plato. (Ed. by Hubert Kiesewetter), 8th edition, Tübingen 2003, ISBN 3-16-148068-6
  • Karl R. Popper: The open society and its enemies II. Study edition. False prophets Hegel, Marx and the consequences. (Ed. by Hubert Kiesewetter), 8th edition, Tübingen 2003, ISBN 3-16-148069-4
  • Masaaki Kudaka: Is the Fallibilism Principle Contradictory? (PDF; 68 kB) Interdisciplinary Information Sciences 9 : 2 (2003), pp. 309-314
  • Mariano Artigas: The Ethical Nature of Karl Popper's Theory of Knowledge: Including Popper's unpublished comments on Bartley and critical rationalism (Peter Lang Publishing, 1999), ISBN 0820446068 .

Web links