Greetings all. Limited time to write these days so these posts might be few and far between but I still hope to provide value with conciseness.
An interesting topic came up on the All In Podcast during the discussion of LK-99, the potential room temperature superconductor that has taken the scientific world by storm over the past few weeks, as many try to replicate the experiment.
The thesis statement here is that there is no financial incentive in following what we have traditionally referred to as “the scientific method”. As you know from previous articles, I am a big proponent of the philosopher Karl Popper, whose main contribution to the field was his rejection of induction, instead favoring empirical falsification.
Induction is taking a series of “truths” and building or “inducing” a theory or hypothesis on top of it. Popper said that without empirical falsification, or the ability to objectively disprove a hypothesis, then said hypothesis had no scientific validity. The famous example is the black swan theory, which states that “a million white swans does not disprove the existence of a black swan”.
“Via Negativa” is the Latin phrase that describes the process of explaining what God is by showing what God is not.
This plays out in science as big, audacious projects rarely get funding. Things like cold fusion, which have been theorized for decades, lay dormant as other projects get inches along. The reason for this is the degradation of Popperism, due to another theme that seems to be woven into every segment of the economy.. regulatory capture.
State officials, regulators, school administrators, CEOs, bureaucrats, editors of science journals, congresspeople.. they all consolidate power and build a responsibility moat around themselves. This is evidenced by the average age of these roles increasing over time. (Credit to Chamath’s X account)
Scientists receive accolades by compounding research over many decades. Inducing, inducing, inducing, until one day the theory seems indestructible. There are no accolades for Via Negativa thinkers who employ empirical falsification. No one likes the guy who disproves a 50-year working theory, least of all the theorists who were holding out their entire careers for a Nobel prize. Same applies to blossoming politicians who point out that the incumbents have never kept any of their promises.
“So have I become your enemy by telling you the truth?”
Galatians 4:16 is a popular bible passage, adopted by Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock on their recent tour together, lamenting the backlash that wokism was spreading against comedy and free speech. I liked the concept so much I bought the shirt (but also I am a big Fear of God fan).
“Negative” scientists don’t get much credit in scientific research, as there is no incentive to do so (other than integrity, or love of the game), yet they are the only ones who can actually prove what the “positive” scientists are trying to do. Similarly, such Poppers aren’t always highly valued in the work environment as they are seen as disruptive or not team players, yet their ability to objectively prove counterfactuals is what allows the ball to move forward with confidence.
This creates the large deficit in the ability to fund audacious research, because the more audacious the hypothesis, the more Negativa you will need, which is expensive. Thus, people continue to work on high probability research, only solving incremental problems, slowing scientific discovery, but increasing the chances for a tenured academic to achieve accolades. Once again, this plays into political and career advancement as market participants refuse to rock the boat, as continuity has more value than change in their eyes.
Non-Popper, unscientific thinkers begin to proliferate in this society, so much so that Popperism itself is seen in a scornful way, or even worse, completely forgotten about.
There are a few things happening that do attempt to provide balance in the universe. The entire concept of VC/startup culture is to take an audacious bet, fail fast and quickly (a very Popper thing to do), and prove that a complex problem can be solved.
Bug bounty programs are another example in which there is a financial incentive for fixing problems. These usually exist in the open source space, paid for out of a community chest. Unlike some corporations, where complexity is rewarded, open source or “public goods” can reward Via Negativa thinking.
I don’t have a solution to the problem of people in power doing whatever it takes to stay in power. It has been going on since the beginning of society. Any large scale Via Negativa efforts would have to be publicly funded or require a benevolent billionaire, but they couldn’t just stop at the donation level. A Popper type thinker would have to exist at every level of the organization. The reason homelessness isn’t solved is because there is no incentive for the people whose job it is to solve it, to solve it. If they did, they would be out of a job.
As science continues to be debated in the public sphere (remember Covid?), and technological advancement slows down (remember the moon landing?), humans become less and less Popper every day. Everyone wants to just sit around pontificating opinions without facts, or performing experiments where a counterfactual cannot be proved. It’s not a problem that can be fixed with companies focused on bits or atoms, but must be fixed with the proliferation of ideas.
Excellent post, as always, Brian.
Your, correct, observation on regulatory capture reminded me of this line from Matt Ridley's The Rational Optimist:
Each empire was the product of trading wealth and was itself the eventual cause of that wealth’s destruction. Merchants and craftsmen make prosperity; chiefs, priests and thieves fritter it away.
It really is a tragedy that Popper's philosophy is so unknown these day. I myself, despite being subject to three years of philosophy classes in high school, never heard of him till last year, thanks to Brett Hall's work in popularizing David Deutsch's work, who in turn builds upon Popper.
I suspect one reason for Popper being out of the main stream is that, at its core, fallibilism is hard work. One has to come to terms with one's omnipresent ignorance. And the whole point of falsification is that one has to come up with experiments and counterfactuals.
It's much easier to run observation studies, collect the data, and say it "suggests X" and that "more research is needed." As a matter of fact, and I only realize it now, this is the same problem of incentives that you mention in the context of homelessness. When the game is publish or perish, what better way to keep publishing than to never make progress, only make more observations?
I found it pretty incoherent. It is a series of non sequiturs. Like going from the idea of saying what something Iis by saying what it is not to why stuff like cold fusion doesn't get a lot of funding. That's quite a leap