Falsifiable Predictions of Evolutionary Theory
- 1 December 1973
- journal article
- Published by Cambridge University Press (CUP) in Philosophy of Science
- Vol. 40 (4) , 518-537
- https://doi.org/10.1086/288562
Abstract
Many philosophers have asserted that evolutionary theory is unfalsifiable. In this paper I refute these assertions by detailing some falsifiable predictions of the theory and the evidence used to test them. I then analyze both these predictions and evidence cited to support assertions of unfalsifiability in order to show both what type of predictions are possible and why it has been so difficult to spot them. The conclusion is that the apparent logical peculiarity of evolutionary theory is not a property of evolutionary theory; it is a property of our human-sized perspective on evolutionary theory.Keywords
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