falsification

Question 1

Falsification

Answer 1

Karl popper suggests that claims have to be falsifiable to be considered meaningful and valid, they must be able to be proven false and thus must be able to be emperically measured and tested to see if it is true or false, scientific claims about the universe can only be verifiable if they can be falsified.

Question 2

Flew

Answer 2

-Argues for falsification in principle, statements need to be able to be falsified now or in the future, religious language is not falsifiable at all because religious believers will never accept that anything counts against their religious belief, there is nothing that can falsify religious statements like God is Good, religious believers will not reject their belief upon contradictory evidence, they will just qualify or slightly change their belief in a way which subtly undermines their original assertion.

Question 3

Realist response

Answer 3

Realist response-Eschatological verification-Religious language can be cognitively falsified and proven to be true or false in principle as after death belief in God will proven to be true or false,
C: Can only be verified if it is true, it is possible religious language can never be falsified if it is untrue as we will not be conscious to be able to tell if it is true or false, religious language cannot be falsified-weak argument-the idea religious language will be falsified also isn’t falsifiable thus is meaningless and cannot undermine the argument.

Question 4

Strength: Objectivity, gardner parable

Answer 4

+Religious language is unfalsifiable-as demonstrated by the parable of the gardner and the dying child-problem of evil etc-believers will never abandon their belief in God despite contrary evidence and there is proof they do qualify their beliefs-strong argument.

+Scientific, strong criteria of meaning

Question 5

Hare

Answer 5

Mitchell-Religious language is falsifiable because believers acknowledge that there is evidence which is able to falsify their beliefs, their beliefs are falsifiable however their faith in God prevents their belief from being falsified, their faith in God gives them good reason to question evidence that falsifies their belief as they have trust in their belief in God, they can accept evidence potentially falsifies their faith thus religious language is meaningful and falsifiable
C: Refusing to accept counter evidence because of faith means believers qualify their belief, faith prevents beliefs from being falsiifed even from valid counter evidence thus is infalsifiable