Feyerabends style of argumentation It was often quite

Feyerabend’s style of argumentation It was often quite difficult to show that his arguments were wrong [. . . ]. Feyerabend, in many cases, argued by means of immanent criticism. This means that he took the positions of a certain conversational partner into account, momentarily accepting the presuppositions of that position in order to begin his criticism, without thereby necessarily adopting those presuppositions as his own (although this structure is not always visible, especially in his later works). Feyerabend’s affinity for rhetoric, jokes, ironical remarks, insults, and other provocative elements often made the structure of his arguments unclear, sometimes even disguising their substance. Hoyningen-Huene 2000, p. 9

Feyerabend’s style of argumentation An important rule of argumentation is that an argument does not reveal the ‘true beliefs’ of its author. An argument is not a confession, it is an instrument designed do make an opponent change his mind. […] Basic rule: If an argument uses a premise, it does not follow that the author accepts the premise, claims to have reasons for it, regards it as plausible. He may deny the premise but still use it because his opponent accepts it and, accepting it, can be led in the desired direction. If the premise is used to argue for a rule, or a fact, or a principle violently opposed by those holding it, then we speak of a reductio ad absurdum (in the wider sense). Feyerabend, SFS III. 3. Marxist Fairytales from Australia, p. 156

Karl Popper’s Critical Rationalism in The Logic of Scientific Discovery (1935) Karl R. Popper 1902– 1994

Critical Rationalism • Falsification of theories as the method of science • Falsification: 1. Deduce observable consequences from a theory 2. Experimental test 3. If positive, theory is corroborated; if negative, theory is falsified • Demarcation criterion: If a theory is not falsifiable, it is not a scientific theory.

Feyerabend‘s “anything goes“ „ It is clear, then, that the idea of a fixed method, or of a fixed theory of rationality, rests on too naive a view of man and his social surroundings. To those who look at the rich material provided by history, and who are not intent on impoverishing it in order to please their lower instincts, their craving for intellectual security in the form of clarity, precision, 'objectivity', 'truth', it will become clear that there is only one principle that can be defended under all circumstances and in all stages of human development. It is the principle: anything goes. “ Against Method, Ch. 1

Feyerabend‘s “anything goes“ Finally, lmre Lakatos loved to embarrass serious opponents with jokes and irony and so I, too, occasionally wrote in a rather ironical vein. An example is the end of Chapter 1: 'anything goes' is not a 'principle' I hold - I do not think that 'principles' can be used and fruitfully discussed outside the concrete research situation they are supposed to affect - but the terrified exclamation of a rationalist who takes a closer look at history. Against Method, Preface

SFS: Preface Idealism: Practice has to be formed by Reason. Naturalism: Practice is already as perfect as it can be. (normative) (descriptive) Goal: To combine naturalism and idealism and to postulate an interaction of Reason and Practice

SFS, I. 2 Reason and Practice i. Traditions are neither good nor bad, they simply are. ii. A tradition assumes desirable or undesirable properties only when compared with some tradition. iii. i. and ii. imply a relativism of precisely the kind that seems to have been defended by Protagoras. * iv. Every tradition has special ways of gaining followers. v. Judging a historical process, one may use an as yet unspecified and specifiable practice. vi. There at least two different ways of collectively deciding an issue: guided the exchange and open exchange.

SFS, I. 2 Reason and Practice (cont. ) vii. A free society is a society in which all traditions are given equal rights equal access to education and other positions of power. viii. A free society will not be imposed but will emerge only where people solving particular problems in a spirit of collaboration introduce protective structures of the kind alluded to. ix. The debates setteling the structure of a free society are open debates not guided debates. x. A free society insists on the separation of science and society.

*Protagorean Relativism Socrates: And, indeed, if I may venture to say so, it is not a bad description of knowledge that you have given, but one which Protagoras also used to give. Only, he has said the same thing in a different way. For he says somewhere that man is “the measure of all things, of the existence of the things that are and the nonexistence of the things that are not. ” You have read that, I suppose? Theaetetus: Yes, I have read it often. Socrates: Well, is not this about what he means, that individual things are for me such as they appear to me, and for you in turn such as they appear to you —you and I being “man”? Theaetetus: Yes, that is what he says. . .

Protagorean Relativism (cont. ) Socrates: It is likely that a wise man is not talking nonsense; so let us follow after him. Is it not true that sometimes, when the same wind blows, one of us feels cold, and the other does not? or one feels slightly and the other exceedingly cold? Theaetetus: Certainly. Socrates: Then in that case, shall we say that the wind is in itself cold or not cold or shall we accept Protagoras's saying that it is cold for him who feels cold and not for him who does not? Theaetetus: Apparently we shall accept that. Plato, Theaetetus, 151 e-152 b

SFS, I. 3 The Cosmological Criticism of Standards “The standards we use and the rules we recommend make sense only in a world that has a certain structure. ” (p. 34) Three examples for the “implicitness” of standards: 1. Finite vs. infinite cosmology (Aristotle) 2. Information travels un/disturbed via the senses into the mind (Galileo) 3. We live in a non-/paradoxical world (Catholics)

SFS, I. 5 The Copernican Revolution Feyerabend’s account of the Copernican revolution 1. General remark: The Copernican revolution was a complex progress affecting different fields of study: cosmology, physics, astronomy, tables, optics, theology. The situation in all these fields has to be taken into account. 2. All traditional accounts of the Copernican revolution (naïve empiricism, sophisticated empiricism, conventionalism, falsificationism, crisis theory, research programs) fail, because they all assume that the Copernican system had advantages over its rivals and that it became accepted when these advantages were noted (p. 48). 3. Copernicus argument is convincing only to those who prefer mathematical harmony over qualitative empirical adequacy (p. 51). That is, certain cosmological assumptions have to be accepted (e. g. the distinction between real and apparent motion) before the argument becomes convincing.

SFS, I. 7 Incommensurability Origin in mathematics: two numbers A and B are incommensurable if A/B is not a rational number. Def. “incommensurable” Oxford English Dictionary: Not able to be judged by the same standards; having no common standard of measurement. In phil. sci. : “Incommensurability” denotes a specific type of incompatibility between theories/paradigms. The introduction of the term “incommensurability” in phil. sci. is commonly attributed to Kuhn and Feyerabend. However, it is not widely known that the term was already used by Popper in the German edition of the Logic of Scientific Discovery.

SFS, I. 7 Incommensurability (cont. ) In Feyerabend, incommensuability means conceptual incompatibility between universal theories. “[A] theory is incommensurable with another if ist ontological consequences are incompatible with the ontological consequences of the latter” Realism, Rationalism and Scientific Method. Philosophical papers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. xi. Two examples: electromagnetic waves; relativity of simultaneity.

SFS, I. 7 Incommensurability (cont. ) Popper on the incommensurability of classes of falsifiers of theories: Die Teilklassenbeziehung entspricht den anschaulichen ‘mehr oder weniger’ sehr gut; sie hat aber den Nachteil, dass wir mit Hilfe der Teilklassenbeziehung nur solche Klassen vergleichen können, die, anschaulich gesprochen, ineinander geschachtelt sind. Wenn daher die Klassen der Falsifizierungsmöglichkeiten einander beschneiden oder gar zueinander ‘fremd’ sind, d. h. kein gemeinsames Element enthalten, so kann der Falsifizierungsgrad solcher Theorien nicht mit Hilfe des Teilklassenverhätnisses verglichen werden: sie sind in bezug auf dieses ‘inkommensurabel’. (Popper, Logik der Forschung, ch. 6, 79– 80, 1935). In the English translation of the Logic “incommensurable” is translated as “noncomparable”.

SFS, Part I: Central Topics 1. Interaction between reason and practice 2. Implicitness of standards 3. The importance of cosmological assumptions 4. A specific type of relativism re: traditions 5. Incommensurability

SFS, Part II, 4: Democratic Judgement overrules 'Truth’ and Expert Opinion Main Works • • A System of Logic, 1843 Principles of Political Economy, 1848 On Liberty, 1859 Considerations on Representative Government, 1861 John Stuart Mill 1806 -1873

SFS, Part II, 4: Feyerabend‘s anti-consequentialist bend Two Types of Moral Theory/Ethics deontological vs. • rule/principle based ethics • déon (greek: duty) • An act is morally good if it conforms to a set of rules/principles • example: Kantian ethics consequentialist • consequence based ethics • An act is morally good because it produces a good outcome • example: Utilitarianism (Bentham, Mill ? ) Where does Feyerabend stand?

SFS, Part II, 4: Feyerabend‘s anti-consequentialist bend Where does Feyerabend stand? Individual freedom as an end in itself vs. ? ? ? Individual freedom as a good/utility

Definitions of scientism 1: methods and attitudes typical of or attributed to the natural scientist 2: an exaggerated trust in the efficacy of the methods of natural science applied to all areas of investigation (as in philosophy, the social sciences, and the humanities) Merriam Webster Online Dictionary “Scientism is the view that science is our best guide to the nature of reality. Its methods and its findings are our best account of the nature of reality. ” Alexander Rosenberg www. whyarewehere. tv/about-science/scientism/# “[S]cientism insists on the need not only for philosophy, but for the whole of culture, to be led by science. This form of scientism has a history stretching back at least to the 1600 s. ” Tom Sorell Scientism: Philosophy and the Infatuation with Science, Routledge, 1994

The Edinburgh School of Sociology of Science David Bloor’s and Barry Barnes’s Relativism, rationalism and the sociology of knowledge (1982) The four tenets of the Strong Program • • Causality Impartiality Symmetry Reflexivity

Kusch (2016): Feyerabend’s Relativism The Standard Model of Relativism 1. *Dependence: A belief is justified or unjustified only relative to an epistemic system of practice (SP). 2. *Plurality: There are or could be more than one SP. 3. *Exclusiveness: SPs are exclusive of one another. 4. *Notional Confrontation: One cannot pass from on SP to another based on a rational comparison between the two. 5. *Symmetry: SPs must not be ranked a) Methodological Symmetry: All SPs must be studied on par. b) Non-Neutrality: There is no non-neutral way of evaluating different SPs. c) Equality: All SPs are equally true. d) Non-Appraisal: For a reflective person the question of appraisal of other SPs does not arise. 6. Contingency: Which SPs a group or individual holds is a matter of historical contingency. 7. Groundlessness: There can be no non-circular justification of an SP. 8. Underdetermination: SPs are not determined by facts of nature. 9. Tolerance: Different SPs must be tolerated *=essential features

Kusch (2016): Comparison of F. ’s Relativism in SFS with the Standard Model Features of the Standard Model: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Dependence Plurality Exclusiveness Symmetry as non-neutrality Contingency Groundlessness Underdetermination Tolerance Modifications of the Standard Model: 9. Symmetry as political equality 10. Rejection of symmetry as equality of truth 11. Notional confrontation as transformative dialogue

Feyerabend’s theoretical pluralism in comparison to Popper’s critical rationalism See slides of my talk at the CLMPS Helsinki 2015.

SFS: Central Topics Cosmological assumptions - Incommensurability - implicitness of standards Relativism - Symmetry as political equality - Rejection of symmetry as equality of truth Pluralism - anomaly import thesis - principle of proliferation - non-monistic model of theory testing Anti-Scientism - challenging the dominant role of rationalism/science in society - democratic control of science - separation claim - Epistemic arrogance Individual freedom as a principle - Mill - non-consequentialist normativity - “leaving souls intact”; “give substance to the lives of people”