Falsification

• Karl popper- Science through falsification not verification
• Anthony Flew- Negative atheist
• Karl Popper was an austrian british philosopher of science
• "test the hypothesis"- Karl Popper
• Karl Popper devised the falsification theory as a test for what is science and what is merely pseudo science
• Karl Popper was particularly damning of Freud's Oedipus complex, claiming it was instead a pseudoscience
• If you want to make a factual, cognitive claim, you should be able to specify what it is that could falsify that claim
• The argument about the use of evidence to attempt to prove the existence of God (through language) comes from the parable of the Gardener
• The Parable of the Gardener was originally written by John Wisdom, but adapted by Anthony Flew
• Anthony Flew was an english philosopher who wrote an article in Mitchell's The Philosophy of Religion which is known as the "University Debate"
• Parable of the Gardener

  • Gardener stands for God
  • The first explorer is the believer
  • The second is the sceptic
  • The garden is the world
  • The fence, bloodhounds, keeping watch, etc are to show that empirical evidence cannot be found
• According to Flew, the believer will stop at nothing to conclude that there must be a God. Flew says the believer will allow nothing to falsify his belief
• Falsification- a sentence is factually significant if, and only if, there is some form of evidence which could falsify it
• Flew addresses the claim: "God loves us as a father loves his children"

  • People may not always have positive relationships with their fathers
  • If a child is ill, it is not their father's fault, but it is God's fault
• Flew does not suggest religious language is meaningless, but that they are not genuine assertions
• Strengths

  • Flew points to the excuses some may make for God when facing serious challenges to belief, e.g. dying children and evil.
• Weaknesses

  • Flew's ideas are too rigid
  • Scientific fact are not in the same category as human experience
• Anthony Flew changed his mind at the end of his life after Einstein's view of the universe implied there was an intelligent designer
• Flew did not end up believing in a Christian God, but simply a designer