Conjectures and refutations : the growth of scientific knowledge. / Karl Popper.

Originally published: London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963.

Preface -- Acknowledgements -- Preface to the Second Edition -- Preface to the Third Edition -- Introduction: On the Sources of Knowledge and of Ignorance -- Conjectures -- 1. Science: Conjectures and Refutations -- Appendix. Some Problems in the Philosophy of Science -- 2. The Nature of Philosophical Problems and their Roots in Science -- 3. Three Views Concerning Human Knowledge -- 1. The Science of Galileo and Its Most Recent Betrayal -- 2. The Issue at Stake -- 3. The First View: Ultimate Explanation by Essences -- 4. The Second View: Theories as Instruments -- 5. Criticism of the Instrumentalist View -- 6. The Third View: Conjectures, Truth, and Reality -- 4. Towards a Rational Theory of Tradition -- 5. Back to the Presocratics -- Appendix. Historical Conjectures and Heraclitus on Change -- 6. A Note on Berkeley as Precursor of Mach and Einstein -- 7. Kant's Critique and Cosmology -- 1. Kant and the Enlightenment -- 2. Kant's Newtonian Cosmology -- 3. The Critique and the Cosmological Problem -- 4. Space and Time -- 5. Kant's Copernican Revolution -- 6. The Doctrine of Autonomy -- 8. On the Status of Science and of Metaphysics -- 1. Kant and the Logic of Experience -- 2. The Problem of the Irrefutability of Philosophical Theories -- 9. Why are the Calculi of Logic and Arithmetic Applicable to Reality? -- 10. Truth, Rationality, and the Growth of Scientific Knowledge -- 1. The Growth of Knowledge: Theories and Problems -- 2. The Theory of Objective Truth: Correspondence to the Facts -- 3. Truth and Content: Verisimilitude versus Probability -- 4. Background Knowledge and Scientific Growth -- 5. Three Requirements for the Growth of Knowledge -- Appendix. A Presumably False yet Formally Highly Probable Non-Empirical Statement -- Refutations -- 11. The Demarcation Between Science and Metaphysics -- 1. Introduction -- 2. My Own View of the Problem -- 3. Carnap's First Theory of Meaninglessness -- 4. Carnap and the Language of Science -- 5. Testability and Meaning -- 6. Probability and Induction -- 12. Language and the Body-Mind Problem -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Four Major Functions of Language -- 3. A Group of Theses -- 4. The Machine Argument -- 5. The Causal Theory of Naming -- 6. Interaction -- 7. Conclusion -- 13. A Note on the Body-Mind Problem -- 14. Self-Reference and Meaning in Ordinary Language -- 15. What is Dialectic? -- 1. Dialectic Explained -- 2. Hegelian Dialectic -- 3. Dialectic After Hegel -- 16. Prediction and Prophecy in the Social Sciences -- 17. Public Opinion and Liberal Principles -- 1. The Myth of Public Opinion -- 2. The Dangers of Public Opinion -- 3. Liberal Principles: A Group of Theses -- 4. The Liberal Theory of Free Discussion -- 5. The Forms of Public Opinion -- 6. Some Practical Problems: Censorship and Monopolies of Publicity -- 7. A Short List of Political Illustrations -- 8. Summary -- 18. Utopia and Violence -- 19. The History of Our Time: An Optimist's View -- 20. Humanism and Reason -- Addenda: Some Technical Notes -- 1. Empirical Content -- 2. Probability and the Severity of Tests -- 3. Verisimilitude -- 4. Numerical Examples -- 5. Artificial vs. Formalized Languages -- 6. A Historical Note on Verisimilitude (1964) -- 7. Some Further Hints on Verisimilitude (1968) -- 8. Further Remarks on the Presocratics, especially on Parmenides (1968) -- 9. The Presocratics: Unity or Novelty? (1968) -- 10. An Argument, due to Mark Twain, against Naive Empiricism (1989) -- Index of Mottoes -- Index of Names -- Index of Subjects.