130-588: Old Book is the name given to a purported ghost or spirit that haunts a cemetery and tree on the grounds of the Peoria State Hospital in Bartonville, Illinois . While rumors of ghosts and ghost stories are highly speculative, the Old Book tale has been documented many times. Among those documenting the tale is the first director of the state insane asylum, George Zeller . The name Old Book
260-472: A black swan" is not a basic statement, because it is not specific about the instance. On the other hand, "this swan here is black" is a basic statement. Popper says that it is a singular existential statement or simply a singular statement. So, basic statements are singular (existential) statements. Thornton says that basic statements are statements that correspond to particular "observation-reports". He then gives Popper's definition of falsifiability: "A theory
390-459: A continued presence in some form of afterlife , the spirit of a deceased person that persists in the material world (a ghost) is regarded as an unnatural or undesirable state of affairs and the idea of ghosts or revenants is associated with a reaction of fear. This is universally the case in pre-modern folk cultures, but fear of ghosts also remains an integral aspect of the modern ghost story , Gothic horror , and other horror fiction dealing with
520-651: A criterion of meaningfulness does not coincide with a criterion of demarcation . The problem of induction is often called Hume's problem. David Hume studied how human beings obtain new knowledge that goes beyond known laws and observations, including how we can discover new laws. He understood that deductive logic could not explain this learning process and argued in favour of a mental or psychological process of learning that would not require deductive logic. He even argued that this learning process cannot be justified by any general rules, deductive or not. Popper accepted Hume's argument and therefore viewed progress in science as
650-479: A crying sound echoed from the Graveyard Elm and everyone in attendance turned and looked, including Dr. Zeller, who later detailed Bookbinder and the surrounding events in his diary. They all claimed to have seen Old Book standing by the tree. They so believed it to be true that Zeller had the casket opened to ensure that Old Book still lay inside. As the lid was opened the crying ceased and Old Book's corpse
780-412: A general justification: they may or may not be applicable depending on the background knowledge. Johnson-Laird wrote: "[P]hilosophers have worried about which properties of objects warrant inductive inferences. The answer rests on knowledge: we don't infer that all the passengers on a plane are male because the first ten off the plane are men. We know that this observation doesn't rule out the possibility of
910-402: A ghost has often been regarded as an omen or portent of death. Seeing one's own ghostly double or " fetch " is a related omen of death. The impetus of haunting is commonly considered an unnatural death. White ladies were reported to appear in many rural areas, and supposed to have died tragically or suffered trauma in life. White Lady legends are found around the world. Common to many of them
1040-422: A key notion in the separation of science from non-science and pseudoscience , falsifiability has featured prominently in many scientific controversies and applications, even being used as legal precedent. One of the questions in the scientific method is: how does one move from observations to scientific laws ? This is the problem of induction. Suppose we want to put the hypothesis that all swans are white to
1170-784: A law to be false, but contradict a law to show its falsifiability. Unlike falsifications and free from the problems of falsification , these contradictions establish the value of the law, which may eventually be corroborated. Popper wrote that an entire literature exists because this distinction between the logical aspect and the methodological aspect was not observed. This is still seen in a more recent literature. For example, in their 2019 article Evidence based medicine as science , Vere and Gibson wrote "[falsifiability has] been considered problematic because theories are not simply tested through falsification but in conjunction with auxiliary assumptions and background knowledge." In Popper's view of science, statements of observation can be analyzed within
1300-447: A logic is a relation between formal sentences in languages and a collection of mathematical structures. The relation, usually denoted A ⊨ ϕ {\displaystyle {\mathfrak {A}}\models \phi } , says the formal sentence ϕ {\displaystyle \phi } is true when interpreted in the structure A {\displaystyle {\mathfrak {A}}} —it provides
1430-527: A logical standpoint, if one finds an observation that does not contradict a law, it does not mean that the law is true. A verification has no value in itself. But, if the law makes risky predictions and these are corroborated, Popper says, there is a reason to prefer this law over another law that makes less risky predictions or no predictions at all. In the definition of falsifiability , contradictions with observations are not used to support eventual falsifications, but for logical "falsifications" that show that
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#17327652058171560-448: A logical structure independently of any factual observations. The set of all purely logical observations that are considered constitutes the empirical basis. Popper calls them the basic statements or test statements . They are the statements that can be used to show the falsifiability of a theory. Popper says that basic statements do not have to be possible in practice. It is sufficient that they are accepted by convention as belonging to
1690-415: A non-basic statement is "This angel does not have large wings." It is not a basic statement, because though the absence of large wings can be observed, no technology (independent of the presence of wings ) exists to identify angels. Even if it is accepted that angels exist, the sentence "All angels have large wings" is not falsifiable. Another example from Popper of a non-basic statement is "This human action
1820-453: A non-logical manner on the basis of expectations and predispositions. This has led David Miller , a student and collaborator of Popper, to write "the mission is to classify truths, not to certify them". In contrast, the logical empiricism movement, which included such philosophers as Moritz Schlick , Rudolf Carnap , Otto Neurath , and A. J. Ayer wanted to formalize the idea that, for a law to be scientific, it must be possible to argue on
1950-484: A part of his epistemology. He wrote that his interest was mainly in the logic of science and that epistemology should be concerned with logical aspects only. Instead of asking why science succeeds he considered the pragmatic problem of induction. This problem is not how to justify a theory or what is the global mechanism for the success of science but only what methodology do we use to pick one theory among theories that are already conjectured. His methodological answer to
2080-441: A potential falsifier is "In this industrial area, the relative fitness of the white-bodied peppered moth is high." Here "fitness" means "reproductive success over the next generation". It is a basic statement, because it is possible to separately determine the kind of environment, industrial vs natural, and the relative fitness of the white-bodied form (relative to the black-bodied form) in an area, even though it never happens that
2210-406: A specific period to atone for their transgressions in life. Their penance was generally related to their sin. For example, the ghost of a man who had been abusive to his servants was condemned to tear off and swallow bits of his own tongue; the ghost of another man, who had neglected to leave his cloak to the poor, was condemned to wear the cloak, now "heavy as a church tower". These ghosts appeared to
2340-477: A variety of illnesses to the action of ghosts, while others were caused by gods or demons. There was widespread belief in ghosts in ancient Egyptian culture . The Hebrew Bible contains few references to ghosts, associating spiritism with forbidden occult activities cf. Deuteronomy 18:11. The most notable reference is in the First Book of Samuel (I Samuel 28:3–19 KJV), in which a disguised King Saul has
2470-427: A woman passenger." The reasoning pattern that was not applied here is enumerative induction . Popper was interested in the overall learning process in science, to quasi-induction, which he also called the "path of science". However, Popper did not show much interest in these reasoning patterns, which he globally referred to as psychologism. He did not deny the possibility of some kind of psychological explanation for
2600-795: Is ahma , Old Norse has andi m., önd f.), it appears to be a dental suffix derivative of pre-Germanic *ghois-d-oz ('fury, anger'), which is comparable to Sanskrit héḍas ('anger') and Avestan zōižda - ('terrible, ugly'). The prior Proto-Indo-European form is reconstructed as *ǵʰéys-d-os , from the root *ǵʰéys- , which is reflected in Old Norse geisa ('to rage') and *geiski ('fear'; cf. geiskafullr 'full of fear'), in Gothic usgaisjan ('to terrify') and usgaisnan ('to be terrified'), as well as in Avestan zōiš- (cf. zōišnu 'shivering, trembling'). The Germanic word
2730-580: Is a Scots word for ghost , spectre , or apparition . It appeared in Scottish Romanticist literature, and acquired the more general or figurative sense of portent or omen . In 18th- to 19th-century Scottish literature, it also applied to aquatic spirits. The word has no commonly accepted etymology; the OED notes "of obscure origin" only. An association with the verb writhe was the etymology favored by J. R. R. Tolkien . Tolkien's use of
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#17327652058172860-410: Is a basic statement because the inert mass and the gravitational mass can both be measured separately, even though it never happens that they are different. It is, as described by Popper, a valid falsifier for Einstein's equivalence principle. In a discussion of the theory of evolution, Popper mentioned industrial melanism as an example of a falsifiable law. A corresponding basic statement that acts as
2990-459: Is a swan" and P = {\displaystyle P=} "the thing here is a white swan". If what is observed is C being true while P is false (formally, C ∧ ¬ P {\displaystyle C\wedge \neg P} ), we can infer that the law is false. For Popper, induction is actually never needed in science. Instead, in Popper's view, laws are conjectured in
3120-459: Is altruistic." It is not a basic statement, because no accepted technology allows us to determine whether or not an action is motivated by self-interest. Because no basic statement falsifies it, the statement that "All human actions are egotistic, motivated by self-interest" is thus not falsifiable. Some adherents of young-Earth creationism make an argument (called the Omphalos hypothesis after
3250-411: Is aware that observation statements are accepted with the help of statistical methods and that these involve methodological decisions. When this distinction is applied to the term "falsifiability", it corresponds to a distinction between two completely different meanings of the term. The same is true for the term "falsifiable". Popper said that he only uses "falsifiability" or "falsifiable" in reference to
3380-432: Is dead but her refusal would mean his damnation. This reflects a popular British belief that the dead haunted their lovers if they took up with a new love without some formal release. " The Unquiet Grave " expresses a belief even more widespread, found in various locations over Europe: ghosts can stem from the excessive grief of the living, whose mourning interferes with the dead's peaceful rest. In many folktales from around
3510-557: Is distinct from the related concept "capacity to be proven wrong" discussed in Lakatos's falsificationism . Even being a logical criterion, its purpose is to make the theory predictive and testable , and thus useful in practice. By contrast, the Duhem–Quine thesis says that definitive experimental falsifications are impossible and that no scientific hypothesis is by itself capable of making predictions, because an empirical test of
3640-405: Is false. Popper did not argue against the problems of falsification per se. He always acknowledged these problems. Popper's response was at the logical level. For example, he pointed out that, if a specific way is given to trap the neutrino, then, at the level of the language, the statement is falsifiable, because "no neutrino was detected after using this specific way" formally contradicts it (and it
3770-442: Is falsifiable and much more useful from a scientific point of view, if the method to detect the neutrino is specified. Maxwell said that most scientific laws are metaphysical statements of this kind, which, Popper said, need to be made more precise before they can be indirectly corroborated. In other words, specific technologies must be provided to make the statements inter-subjectively-verifiable, i.e., so that scientists know what
3900-457: Is falsifiable if it can be logically contradicted by an empirical test . Popper emphasized the asymmetry created by the relation of a universal law with basic observation statements and contrasted falsifiability to the intuitively similar concept of verifiability that was then current in logical positivism . He argued that the only way to verify a claim such as "All swans are white" would be if one could theoretically observe all swans, which
4030-542: Is inter-subjectively-verifiable—people can repeat the experiment). In the 5th and 6th editions of On the Origin of Species , following a suggestion of Alfred Russel Wallace , Darwin used "Survival of the fittest", an expression first coined by Herbert Spencer , as a synonym for "Natural Selection". Popper and others said that, if one uses the most widely accepted definition of "fitness" in modern biology (see subsection § Evolution ), namely reproductive success itself,
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4160-424: Is needed, he does not refer to a general inductive method of justification that, to avoid a circular reasoning, would not itself require any justification. On the contrary, in agreement with Hume, he means that there is no general method of justification for induction and that's ok, because the induction steps do not require justification. Instead, these steps use patterns of induction , which are not expected to have
4290-562: Is no requirement that the potential falsifier can actually show the law to be false. The purely logical contradiction, together with the material requirement, are sufficient. The logical part consists of theories, statements, and their purely logical relationship together with this material requirement, which is needed for a connection with the methodological part. The methodological part consists, in Popper's view, of informal rules, which are used to guess theories, accept observation statements as factual, etc. These include statistical tests: Popper
4420-410: Is no-one left to remember the one who died. In many cultures, malignant, restless ghosts are distinguished from the more benign spirits involved in ancestor worship. Ancestor worship typically involves rites intended to prevent revenants , vengeful spirits of the dead, imagined as starving and envious of the living. Strategies for preventing revenants may either include sacrifice , i.e., giving
4550-474: Is not concerned with the validity of theories based on observations in the empirical world, but rather, mathematics is occupied with the theoretical, abstract study of such topics as quantity , structure , space and change . Methods of the mathematical sciences are, however, applied in constructing and testing scientific models dealing with observable reality . Albert Einstein wrote, "One reason why mathematics enjoys special esteem, above all other sciences,
4680-445: Is not even a discussion, exists only in principle. This is where the distinction between the logical and methodological sides of science becomes important. When an actual falsifier is proposed, the technology used is considered in detail and, as described in section § Dogmatic falsificationism , an actual agreement is needed. This may require using a deeper empirical basis, hidden within the current empirical basis, to make sure that
4810-403: Is not falsifiable, because it does not matter how old a man is, maybe he will die next year. Maxwell said that this statement is nevertheless useful, because it is often corroborated. He coined the term "corroboration without demarcation". Popper's view is that it is indeed useful, because Popper considers that metaphysical statements can be useful, but also because it is indirectly corroborated by
4940-407: Is not possible. On the other hand, the falsifiability requirement for an anomalous instance, such as the observation of a single black swan, is theoretically reasonable and sufficient to logically falsify the claim. Popper proposed falsifiability as the cornerstone solution to both the problem of induction and the problem of demarcation . He insisted that, as a logical criterion, his falsifiability
5070-531: Is recorded as masculine only, but likely continues a neuter s -stem. The original meaning of the Germanic word would thus have been an animating principle of the mind , in particular capable of excitation and fury (compare óðr ). In Germanic paganism , " Germanic Mercury ", and the later Odin , was at the same time the conductor of the dead and the "lord of fury" leading the Wild Hunt . Besides denoting
5200-499: Is scientific if and only if it divides the class of basic statements into the following two non-empty sub-classes: (a) the class of all those basic statements with which it is inconsistent, or which it prohibits—this is the class of its potential falsifiers (i.e., those statements which, if true, falsify the whole theory), and (b) the class of those basic statements with which it is consistent, or which it permits (i.e., those statements which, if true, corroborate it, or bear it out)." As in
5330-409: Is somewhat unusual among ghost stories in that it was reportedly witnessed by hundreds of people. The story goes that when Old Book died his funeral was attended by hundreds of patients and staff members who became witnesses to the ghostly phenomenon that was about to transpire. As workers were attempting to lower what should have been a heavy casket they discovered that it instead felt empty. Suddenly,
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5460-502: Is that its laws are absolutely certain and indisputable, while those of other sciences are to some extent debatable and in constant danger of being overthrown by newly discovered facts." Popper made a clear distinction between the original theory of Marx and what came to be known as Marxism later on. For Popper, the original theory of Marx contained genuine scientific laws. Though they could not make preordained predictions, these laws constrained how changes can occur in society. One of them
5590-440: Is that there is no proof that ghosts exist. Their existence is impossible to falsify , and ghost hunting has been classified as pseudoscience . Despite centuries of investigation, there is no scientific evidence that any location is inhabited by the spirits of the dead. Historically, certain toxic and psychoactive plants (such as datura and hyoscyamus niger ), whose use has long been associated with necromancy and
5720-416: Is the concept of a fetch , the visible ghost or spirit of a person yet alive. A notion of the transcendent , supernatural , or numinous , usually involving entities like ghosts, demons , or deities , is a cultural universal . In pre-literate folk religions , these beliefs are often summarized under animism and ancestor worship . Some people believe the ghost or spirit never leaves Earth until there
5850-416: Is the name given to a popular patient at the hospital. The well-liked Old Book worked as a gravedigger during his time at Peoria State Hospital . It is said that following burial services for deceased patients he would lean against an old elm tree and weep for the dead. Various sources report that Old Book's official name was recorded as Manual Bookbinder aka A. Bookbinder (1878 - 1910), grave marker 713 on
5980-680: Is the theme of losing a child or husband and a sense of purity, as opposed to the Lady in Red ghost that is mostly attributed to a jilted lover or prostitute. The White Lady ghost is often associated with an individual family line or regarded as a harbinger of death similar to a banshee . Legends of ghost ships have existed since the 18th century; most notable of these is the Flying Dutchman . This theme has been used in literature in The Rime of
6110-505: Is white", but if what is observed is ¬ Q = {\displaystyle \neg Q=} "the specific swan here is not white" (say black), then "all swans are white" is false. More accurately, the statement Q {\displaystyle Q} that can be deduced is broken into an initial condition and a prediction as in C ⇒ P {\displaystyle C\Rightarrow P} in which C = {\displaystyle C=} "the thing here
6240-456: Is yet a third notion of induction, which overlaps with deductive logic in the following sense that it is supported by it. These deductive steps are not really inductive, but the overall process that includes the creation of assumptions is inductive in the usual sense. In a fallibilist perspective, a perspective that is widely accepted by philosophers, including Popper, every logical step of learning only creates an assumption or reinstates one that
6370-493: The Witch of Endor summon the spirit or ghost of Samuel . The soul and spirit were believed to exist after death, with the ability to assist or harm the living, and the possibility of a second death. Over a period of more than 2,500 years, Egyptian beliefs about the nature of the afterlife evolved constantly. Many of these beliefs were recorded in hieroglyph inscriptions, papyrus scrolls and tomb paintings. The Egyptian Book of
6500-470: The abolition of slavery and women's suffrage . By the late 1880s, credibility of the informal movement weakened, due to accusations of fraud among mediums, and formal Spiritualist organizations began to appear. Spiritualism is currently practiced primarily through various denominational Spiritualist churches in the United States and United Kingdom. Spiritism, or French spiritualism, is based on
6630-401: The logical possibility of falsifications, which is falsifiability. He cited his encounter with psychoanalysis in the 1910s. It did not matter what observation was presented, psychoanalysis could explain it. Unfortunately, the reason it could explain everything is that it did not exclude anything also. For Popper, this was a failure, because it meant that it could not make any prediction. From
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#17327652058176760-493: The middle and upper classes, while the corresponding movement in continental Europe and Latin America is known as Spiritism . The religion flourished for a half century without canonical texts or formal organization, attaining cohesion by periodicals, tours by trance lecturers, camp meetings, and the missionary activities of accomplished mediums. Many prominent Spiritualists were women. Most followers supported causes such as
6890-528: The motif index designation E200–E599 ("Ghosts and other revenants"). The English word ghost continues Old English gāst . Stemming from Proto-Germanic *gaistaz , it is cognate with Old Frisian gāst , Old Saxon gēst , Old Dutch gēst , and Old High German geist . Although this form is not attested in North Germanic and East Germanic languages (the equivalent word in Gothic
7020-646: The underworld , have been shown to contain anticholinergic compounds that are pharmacologically linked to dementia (specifically DLB ) as well as histological patterns of neurodegeneration . Recent research has indicated that ghost sightings may be related to degenerative brain diseases such as Alzheimer's disease . Common prescription medication and over-the-counter drugs (such as sleep aids ) may also, in rare instances, cause ghost-like hallucinations, particularly zolpidem and diphenhydramine . Older reports linked carbon monoxide poisoning to ghost-like hallucinations. In folklore studies , ghosts fall within
7150-475: The Ancient Mariner by Coleridge. Ghosts are often depicted as being covered in a shroud and/or dragging chains. A place where ghosts are reported is described as haunted , and often seen as being inhabited by spirits of deceased who may have been former residents or were familiar with the property. Supernatural activity inside homes is said to be mainly associated with violent or tragic events in
7280-552: The Dead compiles some of the beliefs from different periods of ancient Egyptian history. In modern times, the fanciful concept of a mummy coming back to life and wreaking vengeance when disturbed has spawned a whole genre of horror stories and films. Ghosts appeared in Homer 's Odyssey and Iliad , in which they were described as vanishing "as a vapor, gibbering and whining into the earth". Homer's ghosts had little interaction with
7410-491: The Greek word for navel) that the world was created with the appearance of age; e.g., the sudden appearance of a mature chicken capable of laying eggs. This ad hoc hypothesis introduced into young-Earth creationism is unfalsifiable because it says that the time of creation (of a species) measured by the accepted technology is illusory and no accepted technology is proposed to measure the claimed "actual" time of creation. Moreover, if
7540-476: The Precambrian era. Despite opinions to the contrary , sometimes wrongly attributed to Popper, this shows the scientific character of paleontology or the history of the evolution of life on Earth, because it contradicts the hypothesis in paleontology that all mammals existed in a much more recent era. Richard Dawkins adds that any other modern animal, such as a hippo, would suffice. A simple example of
7670-564: The Scottish wraith (of obscure origin), phantom (via French ultimately from Greek phantasma , compare fantasy ) and apparition . The term shade in classical mythology translates Greek σκιά, or Latin umbra , in reference to the notion of spirits in the Greek underworld . The term poltergeist is a German word, literally a "noisy ghost", for a spirit said to manifest itself by invisibly moving and influencing objects. Wraith
7800-467: The absence of conditions such as a hidden string attached to the brick is also needed for this state of affairs to eventually falsify Newton's law of gravitation. However, these applied methodological considerations are irrelevant in falsifiability, because it is a logical criterion. The empirical requirement on the potential falsifier, also called the material requirement , is only that it is observable inter-subjectively with existing technologies. There
7930-440: The ad hoc hypothesis says that the world was created as we observe it today without stating further laws, by definition it cannot be contradicted by observations and thus is not falsifiable. This is discussed by Dienes in the case of a variation on the Omphalos hypothesis, which, in addition, specifies that God made the creation in this way to test our faith. Grover Maxwell discussed statements such as "All men are mortal." This
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#17327652058178060-424: The basis of observations either in favor of its truth or its falsity. There was no consensus among these philosophers about how to achieve that, but the thought expressed by Mach's dictum that "where neither confirmation nor refutation is possible, science is not concerned" was accepted as a basic precept of critical reflection about science. Popper said that a demarcation criterion was possible, but we have to use
8190-622: The baths at Chaeronea by the ghost of a murdered man. The ghost's loud and frightful groans caused the people of the town to seal up the doors of the building. Another celebrated account of a haunted house from the ancient classical world is given by Pliny the Younger ( c. 50 AD ). Pliny describes the haunting of a house in Athens , which was bought by the Stoic philosopher Athenodorus , who lived about 100 years before Pliny. Knowing that
8320-412: The building's past such as murder, accidental death, or suicide—sometimes in the recent or ancient past. However, not all hauntings are at a place of a violent death, or even on violent grounds. Many cultures and religions believe the essence of a being, such as the ' soul ', continues to exist. Some religious views argue that the 'spirits' of those who have died have not 'passed over' and are trapped inside
8450-433: The case of actual falsifiers, decisions must be taken by scientists to accept a logical structure and its associated empirical basis, but these are usually part of a background knowledge that scientists have in common and, often, no discussion is even necessary. The first decision described by Lakatos is implicit in this agreement, but the other decisions are not needed. This agreement, if one can speak of agreement when there
8580-401: The cemetery grounds. It is said that Old Book was mute, so no one could ask him his name. No one knows what his given name was, but he is allegedly called Bookbinder because of his previous occupation at the printing house where he worked before he was brought to the hospital. Despite his disabilities, he was one of the staff's most favored patients. The superstitious tale surrounding Old Book
8710-422: The characteristics which constitute science as (see Pennock 2000 , p. 5, and Ruse 2010 ): In his conclusion related to this criterion Judge Overton stated that: While anybody is free to approach a scientific inquiry in any fashion they choose, they cannot properly describe the methodology as scientific, if they start with the conclusion and refuse to change it regardless of the evidence developed during
8840-458: The collection that cannot be expanded to a structure that satisfies ϕ {\displaystyle \phi } contain such a contradicting set of observations. In response to Lakatos who suggested that Newton's theory was as hard to show falsifiable as Freud's psychoanalytic theory, Popper gave the example of an apple that moves from the ground up to a branch and then starts to dance from one branch to another. Popper thought that it
8970-642: The context for these reported visits by the murdered boy. Haunted houses are featured in the 9th-century Arabian Nights (such as the tale of Ali the Cairene and the Haunted House in Baghdad ). Renaissance magic took a revived interest in the occult , including necromancy . In the era of the Reformation and Counter Reformation, there was frequently a backlash against unwholesome interest in
9100-408: The corroboration of the falsifiable law "All men die before the age of 150." For Popper, if no such falsifiable law exists, then the metaphysical law is less useful, because it is not indirectly corroborated. This kind of non-falsifiable statements in science was noticed by Carnap as early as 1937. Maxwell also used the example "All solids have a melting point." This is not falsifiable, because maybe
9230-408: The custom of binding the dead persists, for example, in rural Anatolia . Nineteenth-century anthropologist James Frazer stated in his classic work The Golden Bough that souls were seen as the creature within that animated the body. Although the human soul was sometimes symbolically or literally depicted in ancient cultures as a bird or other animal, it appears to have been widely held that
9360-417: The dark arts, typified by writers such as Thomas Erastus . The Swiss Reformed pastor Ludwig Lavater supplied one of the most frequently reprinted books of the period with his Of Ghosts and Spirits Walking By Night. The Child Ballad " Sweet William's Ghost " (1868) recounts the story of a ghost returning to his fiancée begging her to free him from his promise to marry her. He cannot marry her because he
9490-542: The dead food and drink to pacify them, or magical banishment of the deceased to force them not to return. Ritual feeding of the dead is performed in traditions like the Chinese Ghost Festival or the Western All Souls' Day . Magical banishment of the dead is present in many of the world's burial customs . The bodies found in many tumuli ( kurgan ) had been ritually bound before burial, and
9620-473: The dead residing in the spirit world can be contacted by " mediums ", who can then provide information about the afterlife . Spiritualism developed in the United States and reached its peak growth in membership from the 1840s to the 1920s, especially in English-language countries . By 1897, it was said to have more than eight million followers in the United States and Europe, mostly drawn from
9750-436: The dead was believed to hover near the resting place of the corpse, and cemeteries were places the living avoided. The dead were to be ritually mourned through public ceremony, sacrifice, and libations, or else they might return to haunt their families. The ancient Greeks held annual feasts to honor and placate the spirits of the dead, to which the family ghosts were invited, and after which they were "firmly invited to leave until
9880-460: The elm was struck during a lightning storm and was finally removed from the potters field . Ghost In folklore , a ghost is the soul or spirit of a dead person or non-human animal that is believed by some people to be able to appear to the living. In ghostlore , descriptions of ghosts vary widely, from an invisible presence to translucent or barely visible wispy shapes to realistic, lifelike forms. The deliberate attempt to contact
10010-511: The empirical language, a language that allows intersubjective verifiability : "they must be testable by intersubjective observation (the material requirement)". See the examples in section § Examples of demarcation and applications . In more than twelve pages of The Logic of Scientific Discovery , Popper discusses informally which statements among those that are considered in the logical structure are basic statements. A logical structure uses universal classes to define laws. For example, in
10140-618: The expression "survival of the fittest" is a tautology. Darwinist Ronald Fisher worked out mathematical theorems to help answer questions regarding natural selection. But, for Popper and others, there is no (falsifiable) law of Natural Selection in this, because these tools only apply to some rare traits. Instead, for Popper, the work of Fisher and others on Natural Selection is part of an important and successful metaphysical research program. Popper said that not all unfalsifiable statements are useless in science. Mathematical statements are good examples. Like all formal sciences , mathematics
10270-424: The falsifiability of a theory, because basic statements are not required to be possible. Methodological rules are only needed in the context of actual falsifications. So observations have two purposes in Popper's view. On the methodological side, observations can be used to show that a law is false, which Popper calls falsification. On the logical side, observations, which are purely logical constructions, do not show
10400-400: The falsification or its failure actually means. In his critique of the falsifiability criterion, Maxwell considered the requirement for decisions in the falsification of, both, the emission of neutrinos (see § Dogmatic falsificationism ) and the existence of the melting point. For example, he pointed out that had no neutrino been detected, it could have been because some conservation law
10530-542: The falsifications which had happened. Popper more fundamentally criticized 'historicism' in the sense of any preordained prediction of history, given what he saw as our right, ability and responsibility to control our own destiny. Falsifiability has been used in the McLean v. Arkansas case (in 1982), the Daubert case (in 1993) and other cases. A survey of 303 federal judges conducted in 1998 found that "[P]roblems with
10660-489: The five books of the Spiritist Codification written by French educator Hypolite Léon Denizard Rivail under the pseudonym Allan Kardec reporting séances in which he observed a series of phenomena that he attributed to incorporeal intelligence (spirits). His assumption of spirit communication was validated by many contemporaries, among them many scientists and philosophers who attended séances and studied
10790-401: The house was supposedly haunted, Athenodorus intentionally set up his writing desk in the room where the apparition was said to appear and sat there writing until late at night when he was disturbed by a ghost bound in chains. He followed the ghost outside where it indicated a spot on the ground. When Athenodorus later excavated the area, a shackled skeleton was unearthed. The haunting ceased when
10920-538: The human spirit or soul, both of the living and the deceased, the Old English word is used as a synonym of Latin spiritus also in the meaning of "breath" or "blast" from the earliest attestations (9th century). It could also denote any good or evil spirit, such as angels and demons; the Anglo-Saxon gospel refers to the demonic possession of Matthew 12:43 as se unclæna gast . Also from the Old English period,
11050-478: The hypothesis requires one or more background assumptions. Popper's response is that falsifiability does not have the Duhem problem because it is a logical criterion. Experimental research has the Duhem problem and other problems, such as the problem of induction, but, according to Popper, statistical tests, which are only possible when a theory is falsifiable, can still be useful within a critical discussion . As
11180-594: The largest proportion and greatest number of followers. The physician John Ferriar wrote "An Essay Towards a Theory of Apparitions" in 1813 in which he argued that sightings of ghosts were the result of optical illusions . Later the French physician Alexandre Jacques François Brière de Boismont published On Hallucinations: Or, the Rational History of Apparitions, Dreams, Ecstasy, Magnetism, and Somnambulism in 1845 in which he claimed sightings of ghosts were
11310-518: The latter question is that we pick the theory that is the most tested with the available technology: "the one, which in the light of our critical discussion , appears to be the best so far". By his own account, because only a negative approach was supported by logic, Popper adopted a negative methodology. The purpose of his methodology is to prevent "the policy of immunizing our theories against refutation". It also supports some "dogmatic attitude" in defending theories against criticism, because this allows
11440-399: The law "all swans are white" the concept of swans is a universal class. It corresponds to a set of properties that every swan must have. It is not restricted to the swans that exist, existed or will exist. Informally, a basic statement is simply a statement that concerns only a finite number of specific instances in universal classes. In particular, an existential statement such as "there exists
11570-562: The law makes risky predictions, which is completely different. On the basic philosophical side of this issue, Popper said that some philosophers of the Vienna Circle had mixed two different problems, that of meaning and that of demarcation, and had proposed in verificationism a single solution to both: a statement that could not be verified was considered meaningless. In opposition to this view, Popper said that there are meaningful theories that are not scientific, and that, accordingly,
11700-433: The learning process, especially when psychology is seen as an extension of biology, but he felt that these biological explanations were not within the scope of epistemology. Popper proposed an evolutionary mechanism to explain the success of science, which is much in line with Johnson-Laird's view that "induction is just something that animals, including human beings, do to make life possible", but Popper did not consider it
11830-538: The living to ask for prayers to end their suffering. Other dead souls returned to urge the living to confess their sins before their own deaths. Medieval European ghosts were more substantial than ghosts described in the Victorian age , and there are accounts of ghosts being wrestled with and physically restrained until a priest could arrive to hear its confession. Some were less solid, and could move through walls. Often they were described as paler and sadder versions of
11960-662: The local priest requested to speak to the boy directly, leading to an extended disquisition on theology. The boy narrated the trauma of death and the unhappiness of his fellow souls in Purgatory, and reported that God was most pleased with the ongoing Crusade against the Cathar heretics, launched three years earlier. The time of the Albigensian Crusade in southern France was marked by intense and prolonged warfare, this constant bloodshed and dislocation of populations being
12090-438: The logical side and that, when he refers to the methodological side, he speaks instead of "falsification" and its problems. Popper said that methodological problems require proposing methodological rules. For example, one such rule is that, if one refuses to go along with falsifications, then one has retired oneself from the game of science. The logical side does not have such methodological problems, in particular with regard to
12220-457: The meaningfulness of sentences (rather than as criteria of demarcation applicable to theoretical systems) again and again after the publication of my book, even by critics who pooh-poohed my criterion of falsifiability." Scientists such as the Nobel laureate Herbert A. Simon have studied the semantic aspects of the logical side of falsifiability. These studies were done in the perspective that
12350-568: The medieval period an apparition of a ghost is recorded from 1211, at the time of the Albigensian Crusade . Gervase of Tilbury , Marshal of Arles , wrote that the image of Guilhem, a boy recently murdered in the forest, appeared in his cousin's home in Beaucaire , near Avignon . This series of "visits" lasted all of the summer. Through his cousin, who spoke for him, the boy allegedly held conversations with anyone who wished, until
12480-410: The melting point will be reached at a higher temperature. The law is falsifiable and more useful if we specify an upper bound on melting points or a way to calculate this upper bound. Another example from Maxwell is "All beta decays are accompanied with a neutrino emission from the same nucleus." This is also not falsifiable, because maybe the neutrino can be detected in a different manner. The law
12610-411: The memory and personality of the dead person. They traveled to the netherworld, where they were assigned a position, and led an existence similar in some ways to that of the living. Relatives of the dead were expected to make offerings of food and drink to the dead to ease their conditions. If they did not, the ghosts could inflict misfortune and illness on the living. Traditional healing practices ascribed
12740-651: The metaphorical meaning of "breath" in certain languages, such as the Latin spiritus and the Greek pneuma , which by analogy became extended to mean the soul. In the Bible , God is depicted as synthesising Adam , as a living soul, from the dust of the Earth and the breath of God. In many traditional accounts, ghosts were often thought to be deceased people looking for vengeance ( vengeful ghosts ), or imprisoned on earth for bad things they did during life. The appearance of
12870-535: The nonfalsifiable nature of an expert's underlying theory and difficulties with an unknown or too-large error rate were cited in less than 2% of cases." In the ruling of the McLean v. Arkansas case, Judge William Overton used falsifiability as one of the criteria to determine that " creation science " was not scientific and should not be taught in Arkansas public schools as such (it can be taught as religion). In his testimony, philosopher Michael Ruse defined
13000-529: The other hand used figuratively of any shadowy outline, or fuzzy or unsubstantial image; in optics, photography , and cinematography especially, a flare, secondary image, or spurious signal. The synonym spook is a Dutch loanword, akin to Low German spôk (of uncertain etymology); it entered the English language via American English in the 19th century. Alternative words in modern usage include spectre (altn. specter ; from Latin spectrum ),
13130-423: The person they had been while alive, and dressed in tattered gray rags. The vast majority of reported sightings were male. There were some reported cases of ghostly armies, fighting battles at night in the forest, or in the remains of an Iron Age hillfort, as at Wandlebury , near Cambridge, England. Living knights were sometimes challenged to single combat by phantom knights, which vanished when defeated. From
13260-415: The phenomena. His work was later extended by writers like Leon Denis , Arthur Conan Doyle , Camille Flammarion , Ernesto Bozzano , Chico Xavier , Divaldo Pereira Franco, Waldo Vieira, Johannes Greber , and others. Spiritism has adherents in many countries throughout the world, including Spain, United States, Canada, Japan, Germany, France, England, Argentina, Portugal, and especially Brazil, which has
13390-470: The popular classical expectation of how a ghost should look. In the 5th century AD, the Christian priest Constantius of Lyon recorded an instance of the recurring theme of the improperly buried dead who come back to haunt the living, and who can only cease their haunting when their bones have been discovered and properly reburied. Ghosts reported in medieval Europe tended to fall into two categories:
13520-467: The prediction. However, there is no need to require that falsifiers have two parts in the definition itself. This removes the requirement that a falsifiable statement must make prediction. In this way, the definition is more general and allows the basic statements themselves to be falsifiable. Criteria that require that a law must be predictive, just as is required by falsifiability (when applied to laws), Popper wrote, "have been put forward as criteria of
13650-543: The process to be more complete. This negative view of science was much criticized and not only by Johnson-Laird. In practice, some steps based on observations can be justified under assumptions, which can be very natural. For example, Bayesian inductive logic is justified by theorems that make explicit assumptions. These theorems are obtained with deductive logic, not inductive logic. They are sometimes presented as steps of induction, because they refer to laws of probability, even though they do not go beyond deductive logic. This
13780-443: The properties or values used in the falsifier were obtained correctly ( Andersson 2016 gives some examples). Popper says that despite the fact that the empirical basis can be shaky, more comparable to a swamp than to solid ground, the definition that is given above is simply the formalization of a natural requirement on scientific theories, without which the whole logical process of science would not be possible. In his analysis of
13910-555: The property where their memories and energy are strong. There are many references to ghosts in Mesopotamian religions – the religions of Sumer , Babylon , Assyria , and other early states in Mesopotamia . Traces of these beliefs survive in the later Abrahamic religions that came to dominate the region. The concept of ghosts may predate many belief systems . Ghosts were thought to be created at time of death, taking on
14040-445: The result of hallucinations . David Turner, a retired physical chemist, suggested that ball lightning could cause inanimate objects to move erratically. Falsifiability Falsifiability (or refutability ) is a deductive standard of evaluation of scientific theories and hypotheses, introduced by the philosopher of science Karl Popper in his book The Logic of Scientific Discovery (1934). A theory or hypothesis
14170-404: The result of quasi-induction, which does the same as induction, but has no inference rules to justify it. Philip N. Johnson-Laird , professor of psychology, also accepted Hume's conclusion that induction has no justification. For him induction does not require justification and therefore can exist in the same manner as Popper's quasi-induction does. When Johnson-Laird says that no justification
14300-405: The same time next year." The 5th-century BC play Oresteia includes an appearance of the ghost of Clytemnestra , one of the first ghosts to appear in a work of fiction. The ancient Romans believed a ghost could be used to exact revenge on an enemy by scratching a curse on a piece of lead or pottery and placing it into a grave. Plutarch , in the 1st century AD, described the haunting of
14430-408: The scientific nature of universal laws, Popper arrived at the conclusion that laws must "allow us to deduce, roughly speaking, more empirical singular statements than we can deduce from the initial conditions alone." A singular statement that has one part only cannot contradict a universal law. A falsifier of a law has always two parts: the initial condition and the singular statement that contradicts
14560-437: The semantic of the languages. According to Rynasiewicz , in this semantic perspective, falsifiability as defined by Popper means that in some observation structure (in the collection) there exists a set of observations which refutes the theory. An even stronger notion of falsifiability was considered, which requires, not only that there exists one structure with a contradicting set of observations, but also that all structures in
14690-623: The skeleton was given a proper reburial. The writers Plautus and Lucian also wrote stories about haunted houses. In the New Testament , according to Luke 24:37–39, following his resurrection , Jesus was forced to persuade the Disciples that he was not a ghost (some versions of the Bible, such as the KJV and NKJV, use the term "spirit"). Similarly, Jesus' followers at first believed he
14820-495: The soul was an exact reproduction of the body in every feature, even down to clothing the person wore. This is depicted in artwork from various ancient cultures, including such works as the Egyptian Book of the Dead , which shows deceased people in the afterlife appearing much as they did before death, including the style of dress. While deceased ancestors are universally regarded as venerable, and often believed to have
14950-483: The souls of the dead, or demons. The souls of the dead returned for a specific purpose. Demonic ghosts existed only to torment or tempt the living. The living could tell them apart by demanding their purpose in the name of Jesus Christ. The soul of a dead person would divulge its mission, while a demonic ghost would be banished at the sound of the Holy Name. Most ghosts were souls assigned to Purgatory , condemned for
15080-578: The spirit of a deceased person is known as necromancy , or in spiritism as a séance . Other terms associated with it are apparition, haunt, haint, phantom, poltergeist , shade , specter, spirit, spook, wraith, demon , and ghoul . The belief in the existence of an afterlife , as well as manifestations of the spirits of the dead, is widespread, dating back to animism or ancestor worship in pre-literate cultures. Certain religious practices—funeral rites, exorcisms , and some practices of spiritualism and ritual magic —are specifically designed to rest
15210-510: The spirits of the dead. Ghosts are generally described as solitary, human-like essences, though stories of ghostly armies and the ghosts of animals other than humans have also been recounted. They are believed to haunt particular locations , objects, or people they were associated with in life. According to a 2009 study by the Pew Research Center, 18% of Americans say they have seen a ghost. The overwhelming consensus of science
15340-412: The supernatural. Another widespread belief concerning ghosts is that they are composed of a misty, airy, or subtle material. Anthropologists link this idea to early beliefs that ghosts were the person within the person (the person's spirit), most noticeable in ancient cultures as a person's breath, which upon exhaling in colder climates appears visibly as a white mist. This belief may have also fostered
15470-423: The test. We come across a white swan. We cannot validly argue (or induce ) from "here is a white swan" to "all swans are white"; doing so would require a logical fallacy such as, for example, affirming the consequent . Popper's idea to solve this problem is that while it is impossible to verify that every swan is white, finding a single black swan shows that not every swan is white. Such falsification uses
15600-531: The valid inference modus tollens : if from a law L {\displaystyle L} we logically deduce Q {\displaystyle Q} , but what is observed is ¬ Q {\displaystyle \neg Q} , we infer that the law L {\displaystyle L} is false. For example, given the statement L = {\displaystyle L=} "all swans are white", we can deduce Q = {\displaystyle Q=} "the specific swan here
15730-403: The white-bodied form has a high relative fitness in an industrial area. A famous example of a basic statement from J. B. S. Haldane is "[These are] fossil rabbits in the Precambrian era." This is a basic statement because it is possible to find a fossil rabbit and to determine that the date of a fossil is in the Precambrian era, even though it never happens that the date of a rabbit fossil is in
15860-492: The word could denote the spirit of God, viz. the " Holy Ghost ". The now-prevailing sense of "the soul of a deceased person, spoken of as appearing in a visible form" only emerges in Middle English (14th century). The modern noun does, however, retain a wider field of application, extending on one hand to "soul", "spirit", " vital principle ", " mind ", or " psyche ", the seat of feeling, thought, and moral judgement; on
15990-472: The word in the naming of the creatures known as the Ringwraiths has influenced later usage in fantasy literature. Bogey or bogy/bogie is a term for a ghost, and appears in Scottish poet John Mayne 's Hallowe'en in 1780. A revenant is a deceased person returning from the dead to haunt the living, either as a disembodied ghost or alternatively as an animated (" undead ") corpse. Also related
16120-525: The world of the living. Periodically they were called upon to provide advice or prophecy, but they do not appear to be particularly feared. Ghosts in the classical world often appeared in the form of vapor or smoke, but at other times they were described as being substantial, appearing as they had been at the time of death, complete with the wounds that killed them. By the 5th century BC, classical Greek ghosts had become haunting, frightening creatures who could work to either good or evil purposes. The spirit of
16250-603: The world, the hero arranges for the burial of a dead man. Soon after, he gains a companion who aids him and, in the end, the hero's companion reveals that he is in fact the dead man . Instances of this include the Italian fairy tale " Fair Brow " and the Swedish " The Bird 'Grip' ". Spiritualism is a monotheistic belief system or religion , postulating a belief in God , but with a distinguishing feature of belief that spirits of
16380-447: Was a basic statement that was a potential falsifier for Newton's theory, because the position of the apple at different times can be measured. Popper's claims on this point are controversial , since Newtonian physics does not deny that there could be forces acting on the apple that are stronger than Earth's gravity. Another example of a basic statement is "The inert mass of this object is ten times larger than its gravitational mass." This
16510-688: Was a ghost (spirit) when they saw him walking on water . One of the first persons to express disbelief in ghosts was Lucian of Samosata in the 2nd century AD. In his satirical novel The Lover of Lies (c. 150 AD), he relates how Democritus "the learned man from Abdera in Thrace " lived in a tomb outside the city gates to prove that cemeteries were not haunted by the spirits of the departed. Lucian relates how he persisted in his disbelief despite practical jokes perpetrated by "some young men of Abdera" who dressed up in black robes with skull masks to frighten him. This account by Lucian notes something about
16640-438: Was doubted—that is all that science logically does. Popper distinguished between the logic of science and its applied methodology . For example, the falsifiability of Newton's law of gravitation, as defined by Popper, depends purely on the logical relation it has with a statement such as "The brick fell upwards when released". A brick that falls upwards would not alone falsify Newton's law of gravitation. The capacity to verify
16770-415: Was found undisturbed in the coffin. Days passed and the tree began to die. Several of the grounds crewmen tried to remove the Graveyard Elm or the "crying tree", as it was also known. None were successful, citing the weeping emanating from the tree. One man even tried to cut it down with an axe, but when striking the side, terrible wailing would sound as if Old Book himself was being chopped. In later years
16900-614: Was that changes in society cannot "be achieved by the use of legal or political means". In Popper's view, this was both testable and subsequently falsified. "Yet instead of accepting the refutations", Popper wrote, "the followers of Marx re-interpreted both the theory and the evidence in order to make them agree. ... They thus gave a 'conventionalist twist' to the theory; and by this stratagem, they destroyed its much advertised claim to scientific status." Popper's attacks were not directed toward Marxism, or Marx's theories, which were falsifiable, but toward Marxists who he considered to have ignored
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