Karl Popper on infinite regress
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Alan Forrester
Mar 23, 2013, 7:32:45 AM3/23/13
to beginning-of-infinity@googlegroups.com Infinity
From "Realism and the Aim of Science", pp. 28-29:
> I am prepared to admit that in our criticisms we often work with unjustifiable and non-demonstrable presuppositions. Thus our criticism is, indeed, never conclusive. But non-demonstrability of any kind never worries the critical rationalist. For his critical arguments - just like the theories which he is criticising in terms of them - are conjectural. The difference is very simple. Justificational argument, leading back to positive reasons, eventually reaches reasons that cannot themselves be justified (otherwise the argument would lead to an infinite regress). And the justificationist usually concludes that such 'ultimate presuppositions' must in some sense be beyond argument, and cannot be criticized. But the criticisms, the critical reasons, offered in my approach are in *no* sense ultimate; *they too are open to criticism*; they are conjectural. One can continue to examine them infinitely; they are infinitely open to reexamination and reconsideration.Yet no *infinite regress* is generated: for there is no question of proving or justifying or establishing anything; and there is no need for any *ultimate* presupposition. It is only the demand for proof or justification that generates an infinite regress, and creates the need for an ultimate *term* of the discussion. This is the heart of the difference between justification and criticism.
> I am prepared to admit that in our criticisms we often work with unjustifiable and non-demonstrable presuppositions. Thus our criticism is, indeed, never conclusive. But non-demonstrability of any kind never worries the critical rationalist. For his critical arguments - just like the theories which he is criticising in terms of them - are conjectural. The difference is very simple. Justificational argument, leading back to positive reasons, eventually reaches reasons that cannot themselves be justified (otherwise the argument would lead to an infinite regress). And the justificationist usually concludes that such 'ultimate presuppositions' must in some sense be beyond argument, and cannot be criticized. But the criticisms, the critical reasons, offered in my approach are in *no* sense ultimate; *they too are open to criticism*; they are conjectural. One can continue to examine them infinitely; they are infinitely open to reexamination and reconsideration.Yet no *infinite regress* is generated: for there is no question of proving or justifying or establishing anything; and there is no need for any *ultimate* presupposition. It is only the demand for proof or justification that generates an infinite regress, and creates the need for an ultimate *term* of the discussion. This is the heart of the difference between justification and criticism.
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