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- Mises and Popper on Epistemology: Confronting Apriorism and Fallibilism on the Problem of the Explanation of Action and SocialPhenomena, in Nuova Civilt delle Macchine, 2008, n. 2 (in corso dipubblicazione)
Francesco Di Iorio
APRIORISM AND FALLIBILISM:
MISES AND POPPER ON THE EXPLANATION OF ACTION
AND SOCIAL PHENOMENA
Many modern Austrians are inclined to read Popper as a rabid empiricist (). But, in fact, Popper took the philosophy of science in very Misesian directions. He not onlyinsisted that facts cannot prove theories, he also agreed, in rejecting the Baconian myththat theories are merely an inductive digest of experience, that theory is logically prior toexperience
Richard N. Langlois
Introduction
Comparing with precision Mises and Poppers ideas on the epistemology of social
sciences is not easy. This partly depends on lexical problems: these two authors often use a
vocabulary quite different. In addition, especially in Mises work certain key words or
concepts, namely that of a priori, have not an exclusive and rigorous meaning. This fact
contributes of course to make a comparison more difficult.
Many scholars underline an incompatibility more or less strong between
methodological fallibilism and apriorism1. This viewpoint is supported by the fact that, as
we will see, Mises and Popper reciprocally criticized themselves. In spite of this fact, in the
present article, I would like to exclude a radical incompatibility of their approaches and
claim for a fallibilistic interpretation of Mises work.
1 Consider, for instance, the following ones: Caldwell (2004), Bramoull (1995), Facchini (2007), Gordon
(1996), Hoppe (2007), Hulsmann (2003, 2007), Langueux (1996) Radnitzky (1995), Rothbard (1997), van
den Hauwe (2007).
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It is quite easy to show that Mises and Popper largely agree on several points: the
primacy of theory compared to experience; the anti-instrumentalist or realist conception of
science; the fact that empirical theories rest on non-empirical presuppositions; the idea that
both in natural sciences and in social sciences explanations are based on the determination
of causes by general laws; the awareness of incertitude of science; the methodological
individualism; the criticism of scientism, inductivism and holism in social sciences (see
Antiseri, 2006, Champion 2002, Di Nuoscio 2006 and Smith, 1996, 1998).
However, they seem to disagree on two aspects, which are interconnected: 1) the
foundations of methodological individualism; and 2) the relationship between theory and
experience (see Mises, 2002, pp. 70, 71, and 120; see also Popper, 1992b, p. 10; 1994, p.
172).
In this paper I will insist especially on these two last points. In my opinion, Mises
and Popper reciprocally and largely misunderstood themselves. Even though it is of course
impossible to claim a coincidence of their views, it is necessary, I would contend, to
consider the distance between them as comparatively small (Hayek, 1992, p. 148).
Concerning the first of their two points of disagreement, I will sustain that, even though
there is here an undeniable difference of approach, praxeology is not incompatible with the
idea, strongly claimed by Popper, that the explanation of action has an empirical nature.
Concerning the second point I will maintain that, in spite of some slight differences, the
contrast is in fact more apparent than real.
Moreover, I will argue that Mises and Poppers approaches can reciprocally enrich
each other. Consequently, I will defend a perspective which is in a sense similar to that of
Barry Smith, which claims a fallibilistic apriorism (see Smith, 1996, 1998).
I would like to thank Dario Antiseri, William N. Butos, Rafe Champion, Jrg
Guido Hlsmann, Mario J. Rizzo and Barry Smith who discussed with me the subject of
this article and for their valuable suggestions. Many thanks also to Gregory Campeau,
Sebastian Grevsmhl, Hlne Stora and Claudine Vergnes-Stora for having made my
English more understandable.
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1 Two Different Foundations of Methodological Individualism
According to Popper, Mises a priori theory of action is barren and scientifically
unacceptable (Popper, 1994, p. 172). Poppers criticism against Mises seems however
weak and partly based on a misunderstanding (see also Di Nuoscio 2004, 2006 and Nadeau
1993).
Popper claims that in order to elaborate empirical explanations about the reasons
which determine individual actions one needs to presuppose a non-falsifiable knowledge:
this irrefutable knowledge has to concern the necessarily rational structure of action
(Popper, 1994, p. 169). The way in which Popper argues the epistemological statute of
rationality is ambiguous and self-contradictory. Dealing with this issue, Popper considers,
on one hand, rationality as a methodological postulate (Popper, 1994, p. 169), but he
says, on the other hand, that the rationality principle is false because men can act
sometimes in a non-rational way that is not in conformity with perfect information about
the situation (Popper, 1994 p. 172; 1961, p. 140). Adopting this objective conception of
rationality, Popper denies the validity of Mises approach which considers the rationality
as an a priori characteristic of action: a principle that is not universally true is false. Thus
the rationality principle is false. I think there is no way out of this. Consequently, we must
deny that it is a priori valid (Popper, 1994, p. 172).
Apart from the fact that Mises approach rules out the use of an objective rationality
criterion, here there is a contradiction: if an assertion is falsified, then it is empirical. The
problem is that, in Poppers own words, methodological postulates do not play the role of
an empirical explanatory theory, of a testable hypothesis (Popper, 1994, p. 169). They are
non-falsifiable method rules which are justifiable from an epistemological point of view
because they are useful (Popper, 1959, p. 55) for increasing empirical knowledge.
Popper paradoxically advises scholars to elaborate empirical social theories using the
rationality principle even though it is a falsified theory.
Poppers position is contradictory compared to his own epistemology which
suggests ruling out falsified theories and is in opposition to instrumentalism. In the name
of realism, Popper has strongly fought against the idea that scientific theories are nothing
but instruments[] for prediction or practical application (Popper, 1994, p. 173): I []
am an anti-instrumentalist (or, as I may perhaps say, a realist). [] What do we anti-
instrumentalist assert? [] We assert that [scientific theories] are not merely instruments.
For we assert that we may learn from science something about the structure of our world.
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[] And we assert this is the crucially important point that science aims at truth, or at
getting near to the truth (Popper, 1994, p. 174; see also Popper 1969 pp. 71 ff).
Mises conception rules out all the contradictions and the weakness of Poppers
approach. He points out a set of logically necessary features of action which distinguish
it from reflex reaction. Mises affirms the existence of a priori categories of action namely
intentionality, rationality, economical evaluation and causality which are tautological or
analytical (Mises, 2002, p. 12). These categories, which are studied by what he calls
praxeology (Mises, 2004, p. 1), are implied in the concept of action: There is no action
in which the praxeological categories do not appear fully and perfectly (Mises, 2004, pp.
39-40). They are truth even if they are not subject to proof or disproof (Mises, 2004, p.
34). In other words, the statements and proposition of praxeology are not derived from
experience. They are, like those of logic and mathematics, a priori (Mises, 2004, p. 32).
Praxeolgical categories are fundamental presuppositions of common sense as well as of
science: Without them we should not be able to see in the course of events anything else
than kaleidoscopic change and chaotic muddle (Ibid.).
Consequently, Mises conceives, differently from Popper, rationality as a
tautological attribute of action. His approach is incompatible with an objective criterion of
rationality. Indeed, for him, rationality is a tautology because it is logically impossible to
think of an action which is,from the point of view of an actor, irrational. Only considering
the fact that Mises doesnt defend an objective criterion of rationality, it is possible to
understand in an appropriate and correct way his position: that is, why he states that the
distinction between a rational and non-rational action is nonsense; or, in other words, why
he maintains that the term rational action is [] pleonastic and must be rejected as
such (Mises, 2004, p. 18).
Mises says that there are two ways to consider objectively (and erroneously) an
action as irrational. The first way is to evaluate the nature of the ultimate ends of an action.
In opposition to this viewpoint, Mises states: The ultimate end of action is always the
satisfaction of some desires of the acting man. Since nobody is in a position to substitute
his own value judgements for those of the acting individual, it is vain to pass judgement on
another peoples aims and volitions. No man is qualified to declare what would make
another man happier or less discontented (Mises, 2004, pp. 18-19). According to Mises, it
is arbitrary to consider certain values or needs as rational and other ones as irrational.
The second way to evaluate if an action is objectively rational is to consider the
means chosen for the attainment of ends. In this case the terms rational and irrational
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imply a judgement about the expediency and adequacy of the procedure employed
(Mises, 2004, p. 20). Against this other modality to consider objectively the rationality,
Mises underlines the fact that men act always on the base of limited and fallible
knowledge: An action unsuited to the end sought falls short of expectation. It is contrary
to purpose, but it is rational, i.e., the outcome of a reasonable although faulty
deliberation and an attempt although an ineffectual attempt to attain a definite goal.
The doctors who a hundred years ago employed certain methods for the treatment of
cancer which our contemporary doctors reject were from the point of view of present day
pathology badly instructed and therefore inefficient. But they did not act irrationally;
they did their best. It is probable that in a hundred years more doctors will have more
efficient methods at hand for the treatment of this disease. They will be more efficient but
not more rational than our physicians (Mises, 2004, p. 20).
Unlike Poppers rationality principle, Mises apriorism give a solid base to
methodological individualism. If one denies rationality, one paves the way for anti-
individualistic explanations of action, which dont consider the latter as the outcome of a
rational calculation but as the deterministic effect of factors external to the individual (like
culture, social structure or crowd). Mises apriorism transforms rationality in an
unassailable principle which can be deduced analytically. Consequently, it offers the best
foundation for social research and a powerful anti-holistic antidote (see Di Nuoscio, 2004,
2006).
2 Praxeology and the Empirical Nature of the Explanation of Action
In spite of the contrast between Mises and Popper on the character of human action,
praxeology is not incompatible with the general principles of Poppers methodological
fallibilism. Mises a priori categories are non-empirical presuppositions to build empirical
theories about the contingent causes of particular historical actions. Mises thinks that,
although a priori, they are instrumental in the endeavors to construct any a posteriori
system of knowledge (Mises, 2002, p. 9; 1981b, p. 49. See also Kirzner 1976, pp. 177-
181).
Let us analyze more precisely the way the use of these unfalsifiable categories is
not in itself incompatible with Poppers epistemology. First, one has to contemplate that
Popper has strongly defended, against empiricism, the idea that all science is based on non-
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empirical theories which are a priori to experience. Consider, for instance, the regularity
principle: the expectation of finding regularities is not only psychologically a priori, but
also logically a priori: it is logically prior to all observational experience (Popper, 1969,
p. 48). Criticizing Hume, Popper states: Instead of explaining our propensity to expect
regularities as the result of repetition, I proposed to explain repetition-for-us as the result of
our propensity to expect regularities and to search for them (Popper, 1969, p. 46). Popper
considers regularity principle as an inborn or genetic expectation (Popper, 1969, p. 47).
Without principles like regularity, causality or realism which are deep-rooted in common
sense and are not testable, but rather metaphysical (Popper 1959, p. 248), science is,
according to him, impossible: they are constitutive of science (see also Mises 1957, p. 9;
2002, p. 1 ff; Antiseri, 2003, Champion 2002).
Moreover, this is not the only kind of non-empirical knowledge incorporated, for
Popper, by the empirical theories: according to him, logic is also a foundation of empirical
knowledge (See Popper, 1973, pp. 449 ff). Moreover, Popper defends, as does Mises, a
conception which made logic very much a realistic affair (Popper, 1973, p. 308; see also
Mises 2002, pp. 1-21). He says that the realist conception of logic he maintains is based on
the idea that logical consequence is truth transmission (Popper, 1973, p. 308).
Consequently, Popper doesnt deny the cognitive value of tautologies. He distinguishes the
demonstrative sciences (Popper, 1973, p. 305) from the empirical sciences (Ibid.).
According to him, in the demonstrative sciences logic is used in the main for proofs for
the transmission of truth (Ibid.). In other words, Popper maintains that a small part of
objective knowledge can be given anything like sufficient reasons for certain truth: it is
that small part [] which can be described as demonstrable knowledge and which
comprises [] the propositions of formal logic and of (finite) arithmetic (Popper, 1973, p.
139)2.
The compatibility between Mises praxeology and the general principles of
Poppers epistemology appears consequently as non-problematic (see also Di Nuoscio,
2006, pp. 129 ff). But then, Popper himself tries to build methodological individualism,
similarly to Mises, on a non-falsifiable theory of rationality. However, his attempt is, as we
see, neither satisfactory nor coherent. Also from a strictly Popperian point of view, Mises
praxeology seems to be a better approach. Popper misunderstood the nature of praxeology
because he did not understand that Mises adopts an anti-objectivist theory of rationality
and transforms this latter in an analytical feature of action.
2 For an analysis of Mises theory of the objectivity of logic see R. T. Long (2008), pp. 7 ff; (2004), pp. 20-
21.
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Speaking about the study of human action, Mises makes a distinction between two
fields:praxeology, which concerns the necessary and invariable features of human action
and thymology, an approach which is based on praxeology and which deals with the
content of human thoughts, judgements, desires, and actions (Mises, 2003, p. 266). In
other words, thymology concerns the Verstehen: the reconstruction ex postof what Popper
calls the situation logic of individual behavior (Popper, 1961, pp. 143 ff), that is, the
reconstruction of the reasons why a man acted in a certain way in a specific historical
situation (See Mises, 2002, pp. 46-52). These reasons are the ultimate data of history
(Mises 2003, p. 160). According to both Mises and Popper, the reconstruction ex postof
the motivations of an actor is an empirical problem in the sense that even though it is a
practice based on non-falsifiable knowledge, it demands the control of historical sources.
In other words, Mises doesnt deny that theories elaborated in the field of thymology have
to be founded both on an a priori knowledge and on an empirical knowledge not available
by pure reasoning. This empirical knowledge is indispensable to show the objective
validity of the hypothesis on the actors intentions (See especially Popper 1961, p. 138). It
can be acquired in different ways: for instance, by consulting historical documents such as
letters and juridical acts, or by doing interviews and using witness reports. According to
Mises the historians work is an example of the application of this kind of empirical
approach: What a historian asserts is either correct or contrary to fact, is either proved or
disproved by the documents available, or vague because the sources do not provide us with
sufficient information (Mises, 2004, p. 52).
Both for Mises and Popper, the theories that historians elaborate on the actors
motivations are not tautological. Consequently, both these scholars agree on the fact that
the absolute certitude and the infallibility are not a constitutive element of the
thymolological field. Nothing can rule out the possibility that new empirical proofs falsify
our hypothesis on other actors intentions. This is one of the reasons why, as Mises states,
the understanding of the past is in perpetual flux (Mises, 2003, p. 290; see also Di
Nuoscio 2006, pp. 129 ff).
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3 The Experimental Method and the Problem of the Validity of Empirical Laws in
Poppers Thought
The second disagreement between Mises and Popper concerns the relationship
between theory and experience. Before analyzing in detail this point, it is necessary to
outline briefly what Poppers conception of experimental or scientific method is3.
Like Mises, Popper is an anti-inductivist and maintains that theories are prior to
experience. According to him, our mind is a biological and cultural memory, full of inborn
or learned theories and expectations. Because of that he believes that science doesnt begin
with nave observations: science always begins [] with problems (Popper, 1994, p.
155), created, for instance, by the disappointment of an expectation. Problems can start
because of internal difficulties of a theory or when there is a contradiction between two
theories or between a theory and a statement which describes a fact. The formulation of a
new theory is never the outcome of observations, but an attempt to solve a certain
problem (Popper, 1994, p. 157).
Popper thinks induction is false not only for the primacy of theory compared to
experience, but also for logical reasons. Induction is logically impossible because of what
he calls Humes problem, that is because we are not justified in inferring universal
statements from singular ones, no matter how numerous. For any conclusion drawn in this
way may always turn out to be false: no matter how many instances of whites swans we
may have observed, this does not justify the conclusion that all swans are white (Popper,
1959, p. 27). A general law can never be inductively verified because the gap between the
observed cases and the observable cases is always infinite.
As Popper underlines, Humes problem is strictly linked with another one: to
provide a suitable criterion of demarcation to distinguish between the empirical sciences
(the sciences which are based on factual control) on one hand and non-empirical
knowledge (mathematic and logic as well as metaphysical systems) on the other (Popper,
1959, p. 34)4. Because of the impossibility of induction, inductive verifiability cannot be
used as a useful criterion to define the statute of empirical science. Popper proposes a new
solution. This solution is based on the fact that while it is impossible to prove or verify
general statements, it is possible to try to refute them. Indeed, millions of confirmations
cannot verify a theory, yet only one contrary fact is logically sufficient to falsify it.
Consequently, Popper maintains that a theory is empirical not if verifiable, but, to the
3 For a more detailed introduction to Poppers epistemology see Antiseri (1997).4
Aw we will see further this criterion of demarcation is not a meaning criterion as the neo-positivist one.
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contrary, if falsifiable. In other words, he considers a theory scientific if it is possible to
drive from it observable consequences which can contradict it. In this case it is possible to
establish its (provisional) validity by the lack of contradictory facts.
Consequently, Popper considers science a knowledge which can be controlled by
experience, but which cannot be absolutely proved. For him, scientific theories are true if
they are falsifiable and not falsified. But they will never be certain as tautologies are.
Popper doesnt deny that the fact that a theory has been confirmed by many observations is
very important: it means that that we can consider it well corroborated and certain for all
practical purposes (Popper, 1973, p. 78). However, he underlines that from a strictly
logical point of view we cannot be sure of its truth: the degree of corroboration of a
theory at the time tsays nothing about the future (Popper, 1973, p. 19). Getting around
Humes problem is impossible.
But then, the history of science is full of theories corroborated by innumerable
observations which have been strikingly falsified. Consider the following theories: 1) the
sun will rise and set once in 24 hours; 2) every creature is bound to decay and to die; 3)
bread nourishes; 4) all swans are white. All these theories have been falsified. The first
was refuted Popper writes when Pytheas of Marseilles discovered the frozen sea and
the midnight sun (Popper, 1973, p. 10); the second was refuted by the discovery that
bacteria are not bound to die, since multiplication by fission is not death (Ibid.); the third
was refuted when people eating their daily bread died of ergotism (Popper, 1973, p. 11);
the fourth when black swans were discovered in Australia.
According to Popper, since empirical statements cannot be shown to be certain if
scholars want to increase and improve scientific knowledge, they have to reject any kind of
dogmatism. More precisely, he maintains that the most characteristic of science is that of
error-elimination through criticism (Popper, 1994, p. 159). This is the instrument of
scientific progress. A scientist doesnt have the power to verify but he has the possibility to
find logical and empirical contradictions which can refute theories. If he wants scientific
progress, he has to profit from this possibility. If no contradictions are found, theories can
be considered (provisionally) confirmed. But if contradictions are found, a scientific
problem arises and scholars are led to find new theories. Criticism allows scientists to
discover errors and to try to avoid them.
Consequently, Popper thinks that the scientific method may be summed up by these
three steps: 1) problems; 2) conjectures elaborated in order to solve them; 3) critical
discussion (Popper, 1969). The experimental approach is based on learning by trials and
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errors, and its essence is nothing but a comparison of the merits and demerits of two or
more theories (usually more than two) (Popper, 1994, p. 160). In other words, the
method of science is the method of bold conjectures and ingenious and severe attempt to
refute them (Popper, 1973, p. 81).
I must add a last remark about Poppers theory of scientific method: It is important
to consider the fact that he distinguishes between a logical falsificationism and a
methodological one. This means that, according to him, a fact which is contrary to a theory
does not allow us to reject immediately the theory. Indeed, Popper thinks that when we test
empirically a theory by searching for a counter example, we rely upon the acceptance of a
considerable amount of common background knowledge (Popper, 1969, p. 238).
Consequently, sometimes the falsification can depend not on the falsity of the statement we
test, but on the fact that a part of the background knowledge we use is false (for instance,
by the falsity of a protocol, that is, of a statement which describes an observation). All that
this means is that, while a falsification is always certain from a logical point of view, it is
not absolutely certain from a methodological point of view (Popper, 1969, pp. 238-240).
4 Mises and Poppers Agreement on the Uncertainty of Science
In order to analyze Mises and Popper disagreement on the problem of empirical
control, it is initially necessary to point out that for both science is not absolutely certain
but subject to error. Mises doesnt deny in substance the validity of this fundamental idea
of Poppers approach: All theories are hypotheses; all may be overthrown (Popper, 1973,
p. 29). Indeed, Mises states: Man is not infallible. [] He can never be absolutely certain
that his inquiries were not misled and that what he considers as certain truth is not error.
All that man can do is to submit all his theories again and again to the most critical re-
examination. [] It cannot be contended that this procedure is a guarantee against error.
But it is undoubtedly the most effective method of avoiding error (Mises, 2004, p. 68).
Consequently, even economic theory is not perfect []. The most elaborate theory
that seems to satisfy completely our thirst for knowledge may one day be amended or
supplanted by a new theory. Science does not give us absolute and final certainty. It only
gives us assurance within the limits of our mental abilities and the prevailing state of
scientific thought. A scientific system is but one station in an endlessly progressing search
for knowledge. It is necessarily affected by the insufficiency inherent in every human
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effort (Mises, 2004, p. 7); economics is a living thing and to live implies both
imperfection and change (Ibid.).
Criticizing the inductivist approach, Mises underlines a difference between two
fields in social science: on the one hand the field which he calls theory which is, as he
says, a priori to experience and on the other hand the field he calls history. This latter is
the field in which one applies the a priori theories to explain particular historical events.
Mises is not always extremely clear and rigorous speaking about the content of the field he
calls theory5. However, it is possible to summarize his thought saying that he considers
this field to be composed by two different kinds of a priori. The first kind is the tautological
knowledge of the categories of human action, which is the fundamental presupposition to
studing social phenomena: the unquestionable and certain ultimate basis (Mises, 2004, p.
68) of economic and social theories. As we already pointed out, this knowledge is
analytical a priori. The second kind of a priori concerns all the economic theorems (theory
of capital, theory of credit, theory of monopoly et cetera), which are built deductively on
this analytical and absolutely certain knowledge. This second kind of a priori is not
analytical: Economics, Mises writes, does not follow the procedure of logic and
mathematics. It does not present an integrated system of pure aprioristic ratiocination
severed from any reference to reality (Mises, 2004, p. 66). This second kind of a priori is
a knowledge which is synthetic. Mises conceives it as a priori compared to experience, but
not as a priori valid. It is established deductively and imposed to reality (Mises, 2004, p.
41), but it is not absolutely certain and infallible like the tautological a priori knowledge.
Consequently, Mises position on empirical laws, in spite of the fact that he uses a partly
Kantian vocabulary, is different from Kants.
Mises, as well as Popper, doesnt rule out the possibility that experience can force
us to change theories6. He says in science one cannot be too cautious. If the facts do not
confirm the theory, the cause perhaps may lie in the imperfection of the theory. The
disagreement between the theory and the facts of experience consequently forces us to
think through the problems of the theory again. But so long as a re-examination of the
theory uncovers no errors in our thinking, we are not entitled to doubt its truth (Mises,
1981b, p. 27). According both to Mises and Popper, economics is an empirical science: its
5 Precisely because of this absence of precision in Mises work, there are many different interpretations of his
apriorism. See on this point Antiseri (2003). On this point see also Gordon (1994).6 Kant considered Newtonian physics synthetic a priori valid. Mises doesnt adopt the same fallaciousconception of the empirical laws as Kant. The philosophy of this latter is problematic because it is unable to
explain the fact that Newtonian physics has been falsified by experience (see Popper 1973, pp. 159-16; see
also Antiseri 1997, 2003).
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theories are established deductively, but they can contrast with experience and this fact can
push scholars to rethink them.
On the other hand, a theory that does not appear to be contradicted by experience,
Mises states, is by no means to be regarded as conclusively established. The great logician
of empirism, John Stuart Mill, was unable to find any contradiction whatever between the
objective theory of value and the facts of experience. Otherwise he would certainly not
have made the statement, precisely on the eve of a radical change in the theory of value
and price, that as far as the laws of value were concerned, there remained nothing more to
be explained either in the present or in the future: the theory was quite perfect. An error of
this kind, Mises writes, on the part of such a man must ever stand as a warning to all
theorists (Ibid.)7.
Consequently, Mises and Popper agree on two points: on the one hand, that theories
cannot be distilled from experience inductively because they are always the outcome of
intuition and reasoning, and, on the other hand, that scientific knowledge, namely
empirical knowledge, is not absolute certain. They consider as certain only the tautological
statements.
5 Mises criticisms of Popper
Even though Mises denies the certainty of science and admits that in social science
also it is impossible to abstract from empirical experience reducing all the reasoning to a
system of tautologies, he disagrees with methodological fallibilism. Misess negative
judgement of the latter is largely conditioned by a strong misunderstanding of Poppers
thought (see Cubeddu 1996, pp. 227-228). Indeed, Mises thinks that methodological
fallibilism is simply a variant of the experimental method as intended by positivists and
that it is based on the pillars of the inductivist approach. According to Mises, Popper and
positivists are wrong because they want to apply the approach of the natural sciences to the
social sciences, misrepresenting the specificity and the autonomy of the latter. While the
7 Following Lakatos, Mario J. Rizzo interpret Mises approach as a very sophisticated
methodological falsificationism (Rizzo, 1982, pp. 53-73). Rizzos proposal is of course interesting and in a
sense appropriate. However, it is necessary to underline that Mises has largely misunderstood Popper andthat Poppers falsificationism, if analyzed in a careful way, appears not so much like a nave affair (See
Champion 2002).
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inductivism and the idea that scientific truth is given only by experimental tests instead of
the theoretical problems they involve, didnt call into question the success of natural
science, it could have, Mises thinks, leading to catastrophic consequences for the social
sciences.
More precisely, Mises maintains that the falsifiability criterion intended as a
criterion of demarcation between science and non-science is not valid for social science:
The positivistic principle of verifiability as rectified by Popper is unassailable as an
epistemological principle of the natural sciences. But it is meaningless when applied to
anything about which the natural sciences cannot supply any information (Mises, 2002,
pp. 70-71).
The impossibility of applying the falsifiability criterion in order to establish the
scientific nature of a social theory depends for Mises on two reasons. The first one is
linked to the necessity to found social science on the ground of a tautological knowledge:
If one accepts the terminology of logical positivism and especially also that of Popper, a
theory or hypothesis is unscientific if in principle it cannot be refuted by experience.
Consequently, all a priori theories, including mathematics and praxeology, are
unscientific. This is merely a verbal quibble. No serious man wastes his time in
discussing such a terminological question. Praxeology and economics will retain their
paramount significance for human life and action however people may classify and
describe them (Ibid.). In other words, Mises underlines that the non-falsifiability of the
tautological categories of action doesnt call into question their objective validity as well as
that of economics. In fact, nothing is more certain for the human mind than what the
category of human action brings into relief (Mises, 2002, p. 71).
The second reason is that, according to Mises, the falsifiability by experimental test
is available only in natural science: methodological fallibilism cannot refer in any way to
the problems of the sciences of human action. There are in this orbit no such things as
experimentally established facts" (Mises, 2002, p. 70). On one hand, Mises underlines that
especially in social science it is fundamental to understand that facts of experience are not
given and neither are objective data as nave empiricism supposes, but theoretical
constructions, instead. He states: The positivist doctrine implies that nature and reality, in
providing the sense data that the protocol sentences register, write their own story upon the
white sheet of the human mind. The kind of experience to which they refer in speaking of
verifiability and refutability is, as they think, something that does not depend in anyway on
the logical structure of the human mind. It provides a faithful image of reality (Mises,
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2002, 70). This is false because both in social and natural science facts are already
theories; hence the vexatious impasse created when supporters of conflicting doctrines
point to the same historical data as evidence of their correctness (Mises, 2002, 62). The
same historical events and the same statistical figures are claimed as confirmations of
contradictory theories (Mises, 1947, p. 37). What is considered as a datum depends then
on the a priori theory one uses.
According to Mises, this doesnt mean that experience is epistemologically
irrelevant, only that the positivistic conception of experience is unable to help us to
understand how we can establish the scientific truth. It is not the observation or
accumulation of neutral and atheoretical data which allows us to elaborate a theory or say
which theory among several is the good one. Since theory is elaborated not by observation
but deductively, and since it influences our interpretation of reality, reflection and
theorisation are prior to any experience. Consequently, if there is a contradiction between
experience and our theory or a contrast between our theory and alternative theories, the
problem cannot be solved by abstracting from the fact that reality is interpreted
theoretically: Historical experience never comments upon itself. It needs to be interpreted
from the point of view of theories constructed without the aid of experimental observations
[...]. Every discussion of the relevance and meaning of historical facts falls back very soon
on a discussion of abstract general principles, logically antecedent to the facts to be
elucidated and interpreted (Mises, 1947, p. 37). The answer to a scientific problem
demands first of all reasoning and can never be found accumulating inductively neutral
data. In other words, disagreements concerning the probative power of concrete historical
experience can be resolved only by reverting to the doctrines of the universally valid
theory, which are independent of all experience (Mises, 2002, p. 63). However, this
doesnt mean, as we already pointed out, that this deductive approach is valid, according to
Mises, apart from any reference to experience and that experience cannot lead us to revisit
our conclusions: The disagreement between the theory and the facts of experience []
forces us to think through the problems of the theory again (Mises, 1981b, p. 27).
On the other hand, Mises thinks that the positivists and Popper dont understand
another problem concerning the nature of the experience in social science. They dont
understand that experience in this field is very different from laboratory experience which
is used in order to verify or falsify theories of natural science: in the field of purposive
human action and social relations no experiments can be made and no experiments have
ever been made. The experimental method to which the natural sciences owe all their
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achievements is inapplicable in the social sciences. The natural sciences are in a position to
observe in the laboratory experiment the consequences of the isolated change in one
element only, while other elements remain unchanged. Their experimental observation
refers ultimately to certain isolable elements in sense experience. What the natural sciences
call facts are the causal relations shown in such experiments. Their theories and hypotheses
must be in agreement with these facts.
But the experience with which the sciences of human action have to deal is
essentially different. It is historical experience. It is an experience of complex phenomena,
of the joint effects brought about by the co-operation of a multiplicity of elements. The
social sciences are never in a position to control the conditions of change and to isolate
them from one another in the way in which the experimenter proceeds in arranging his
experiments. They never enjoy the advantage of observing the consequences of a change in
one element only, other conditions being equal. They are never faced with facts in the
sense in which the natural sciences employ this term. Every fact and every experience with
which the social sciences have to deal is open to various interpretations. Historical facts
and historical experience can never prove or disprove a statement in the way in which an
experiment proves or disproves (Mises, 1947, p. 37).
6 Mises Misunderstanding of Poppers Criterion of Demarcation and of his
Conception of Empirical Data
Mises criticisms of Popper are largely based on misunderstandings which show the
fact that he had a rather superficial knowledge of Poppers thought. Namely, Mises
embraces the erroneous idea that Poppers epistemology is a variant of that of the neo-
positivists. On the contrary, methodological fallibilism is radically different from the neo-
positivist approach and it is rather close to that of Mises. A careful analysis shows that
differences between Mises and Popper are above all differences of nuance.
Let us consider the different points in which Misescriticism of Popper is
articulated. First, according to Mises, Popper criterion of demarcation would bring into
discussion the scientific nature and the objectivity of social science because of the fact that
this latter is founded on a non-empirical knowledge, the analytical a priori categories of
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action. As we already established, Popper, differently from neo-positivists, recognizes the
cognitive value of non-empirical knowledge and maintains that all science are based on
non empirical presuppositions. Moreover, he doesnt consider tautological knowledge
arbitrary, but rather as having a content of objective truth. In other words, Popper doesnt
propose, as neo-positivists do, a criterion to distinguish between what is empirical and
meaningful and what is non-empirical and meaningless. Popper proposes only a criterion
which allows us to make a distinction between empirical science on the one hand and non-
falsifiable knowledge (demonstrative sciences and metaphysics) on the other hand: Note
that I suggest falsifiability as a criterion of demarcation, but not of meaning []. It is
therefore a sheer myth [] that I ever proposed falsifiability as a criterion of meaning.
Falsifiability separates two kinds of perfectly meaningful statements: the falsifiable and the
non-falsifiable. It draws a line inside meaningful language, not around it (Popper, 1959, p.
40 n. *3). But then, it is impossible to consider Poppers criterion of demarcation as a
variant of the neo-positivists one because Popper formulated it in 1919, years before the
Vienna Circles birth (Popper, 1959, pp. 311-312). The error of Mises is probably better
understandable if one considers that many epistemologists (among which are some famous
neo-positivists like Carnap and Hempel) judged initially and erroneously Poppers criterion
to be a new sophisticated version of the neo-positivists criterion, creating the myth Popper
speaks about (See Boniolo & Vidali, 1999 pp. 359-360). Finally, methodological
fallibilism is not only compatible with the use of non-falsifiable knowledge in science, but,
as we already pointed out, it also underlines its necessity as a foundation of all empirical
research.
The second of Mises criticism of Popper concerns the inexistence in social science
of given and neutral data as intended by the nave empiricist approach. According to
Mises, Popper would consider the empirical test as being based on data as intended by neo-
positivist. In short, Mises blames Popper for not understanding the theoretical nature of the
facts of social sciences.
In this case, too, Mises charges are unfair. As we already established, Popper
criticizes inductivism not only logically but also epistemologically. He attacks what he
calls observativism, that is the idea that the human mind is a blank sheet of paper and
that there is something like neutral and atheoretical data as positivists standard view
supposes.
Popper claims a unity of the scientific method, but he does it on the basis of ideas
completely different from those of the Vienna Circle members. He doesnt sustain the
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fundamental unity of the method in the name of Scientism (Popper, 1961, p. 60).
According to Popper, the methods appropriate to the social sciences are totally different
from the methods of natural sciences as they are usually described by textbooks, by
tradition, and by majority of natural and social scientist. But this is so merely because all
these textbooks and these traditions and these scientists are totally mistaken about the
methods of the natural sciences. Once we get a proper understanding of the methods of the
natural sciences, we can see that there is a great deal in common between them and the
methods of the social sciences.
The main misunderstanding about the natural sciences,he states,lies in the belief
that science or the scientist starts from observation and the collection of data or facts
or measurements, and thence proceeds to connect or correlate these, and so to arrive
somehow at generalizations and theories (Popper, 1994, p. 155, emphasis added).
More specifically, concerning the studies on society, Popper writes that in social
sciences it is even more obvious than in the natural sciences that we cannot see and
observe our objects before we have thought about them. For most of the objects of social
sciences, if not all of them, are abstract objects; they are theoretical constructions
(Popper, 1961, p. 135). Consequently, Popper maintains, as does Mises, that the study of
society is based on reasoning and not on nave experience; only the reasoning allows
defining the theoretical constructions used to interpret our experience (Ibid.).
Moreover, Popper points out, It is undoubtedly true that we have a more direct
knowledge of the inside of human atom than we have of physical atoms (popper, 1961,
p. 138); in other words, we certainly use our knowledge of ourselves in order to frame
hypothesis about some other people (Ibid.). This knowledge is necessary to understand the
action. The physicist [] is not helped Popper says by such direct observation when
he frames his hypothesis about atoms (Ibid.).
Both according to methodological fallibilism and Mises apriorism, the control of a
theory is always characterised by the primacy of reasoning and conjectural dimension
precisely because of the theoretical nature of the facts. Not differently from Mises,
Popper sustains that the meaning of a fact depends on the theory which allows us to
interpret it and which is acquired by a pure deductive approach, without induction from
past experience. Precisely because of the possibility of interpreting a fact in light of
different theories, and considering also the distinction between logical falsification and
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methodological one, Popper underlines that in order to establish if experience really
falsifies a theory it is necessary to consider very carefully how experience is built8.
7 Why Popper doesnt Underestimate the Problem of Complexity
The third of Mises criticism of Poppers epistemology concerns the impossibility
of applying the experimental approach as it is generally used in the laboratory to the field
of social science. Even in this case, Mises shows himself to have misunderstood Popper.
According to Mises, Poppers fallibilism is based on the idea that the scientific
validity of a theory can be established only if it is possible to do a laboratory test.
Criticizing Popper, Mises underlines that in the field of social science it is impossible to
observe the consequences of the isolated change in one element only, while other elements
remain unchanged (Mises, 1947, p. 37). In other words, Mises maintains that Popper is
unable to understand the complexity of social phenomena (see also Mises, 2004).
Actually Popper doesnt deny at all the problem of complexity of social sciences,
neither the impossibility to apply the laboratory approach to the analysis of social
phenomena. However, he holds that this fact depends largely on the difference between
artificial phenomena and concrete phenomena a difference which concerns both social
and natural sciences. In any case, Popper admits that only in the laboratory is there the
possibility of predicting with precision and testing on the basis of a perfect forecast or
measurement a theory. There is no doubt, Popper states, that the analysis of any
concrete social situation is made extremely difficult by its complexity. But the same holds
for any concrete physical situation (Popper, 1961, p. 136). In general the perfect prevision
is given only by the use of artificial experimental isolation [] (The solar system is an
exceptional case one of natural, not artificial isolation; once its isolation is destroyed by
the intrusion of a foreign body of sufficient size, all of our forecasts are liable to
breakdown). We are very far from being able to predict, even in physics, the precise results
of a concrete situation, such an thunderstorm, or a fire (Popper, 1961, p. 139). According
8In addition, for both Mises and Popper, the criticism of observativism doesnt involve scepticism
or relativism. In other words, both maintain, differently from Kuhn and the so-called New Philosophy ofScience, that the theoretical nature of facts involves neither an incommensurability of alternative theories
nor an impossibility to catch the truth. In particular, Popper underlines that two or more alternatives theories
always share a common meaning because they are attempts to solve the same problem; he considersconsequently alternative theories always comparable in light of their common problem (Popper, 1994 pp. 33
ff).
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to Popper, the widely held prejudice that social situations are more complex than physical
ones seems to arise from two sources. One of them is that we are liable to compare what
should not be compared: I mean on the one hand concrete social situations and on the other
hand artificially insulated experimental physical situations (The latter might be compared,
rather, with an artificially insulated- such a prison or an experimental community). The
other source is the old belief that the description of a social situation should involve the
mental and perhaps even physical states of every body concerned (or perhaps that it should
even be reducible to them). But this belief is not justified; it is much less justified even
than the impossible demand that the description of a concrete chemical reaction should
involve that of the atomic and subatomic states of all the elementary particles involved
(although chemistry may indeed be reducible to physics (Popper, 1961, p. 140).
Moreover, Popper underlines that also in the case of experiments done in natural
sciences, we cannot isolate a piece of apparatus ofall influences; for example, we cannot
know a priori whether the influence of the position of the planets or of the moon upon a
physical experiment is considerable or negligible (Popper, 1961, p. 94). In other words,
Popper maintains that the ceteris paribus clause is always only approximately applied by
scientists because it is always impossible both in natural and in social science to
perfectly control all the border conditions. However, Popper underlines that, while in the
case of experimental phenomena it is possible to better approximate this clause, in the
case of concrete phenomena it is more problematic to apply it. Moreover, he maintains
that the physicist has sometimes similar problems to those of a social scientist in applying
it: Thus the possibilities of carrying out experiments in varying gravitational fields, or
under extreme temperature conditions, are very limited (Popper, 1961, p. 97).
In any case, Popper doesnt deny that there are explanation problems which
concern exclusively the social sciences. These problems are precisely those underlined by
Mises. In particular, Popper states that in the field of social sciences there are specific
difficulties connected with the application of quantitative methods, and especially methods
of measurement []. In physics, for example, the parameters of our equations can, in
principle, be reduced to a small number of natural constants a reduction which has been
successfully carried out in many important cases. This is not so in economics; here the
parameters are themselves in the most important cases quickly changing variables. This
clearly reduces the significance, interpretability, and testability of our measurements
(Popper, 1961, pp. 142-143). Following Hayek, Popper underlines that the continuous
changing of personal preferences and knowledge and the emergence of unintentional
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consequences of human action involves serious problems for the economic and politic
theory of totalitarianism: The holistic planner overlooks the fact that it is easy to
centralize power but impossible to centralize all that knowledge which is distributed over
many individual minds, and whose centralization would be necessary for the wise wielding
of centralized power (Popper, 1961, p. 90).
Popper maintains that, because of the impossibility to approximate enough the
ceteris paribus clause, it is impossible to predict the precise result of any concrete situation
both in natural and in social phenomena. According to Popper, theories about this kind of
phenomena can never do more than exclude certain possibilities (Popper, 1961, p. 139).
Consequently, he maintains, as does Hayek, that it is only possible to make negative
forecasts about the non-experimental phenomena (Ibid.; see also Hayek, 1967, and O
Driscoll & Rizzo, 1996). It is precisely the fact that a theory about concrete phenomena
excludes certain possibilities which allows considering it, both in natural and social
sciences, as empirically controllable and scientific in light of Poppers criterion of
demarcation.
Consider, for instance, the following law: the passage from autarkic production to
division of labour allows a growth of productivity. It doesnt allow quantitative previsions,
but it is logically refutable by contrary historical facts. This law is consequently empirical
and it is concerned by Humes Problem like all empirical laws. Consider now this other
law: the increase of the demand of a good involves an increase of its price. Even this law
doesnt allow quantitative or precise previsions, but it gives an explanation of principle
which can, however, logically contrast with observable facts. In natural science it is not
difficult to find theories which allow only negative previsions. Let us consider, for
example, the theory of biological evolution by genetic variation and environmental
adaptation. This theory is unable to forecast the structure or the dimensions of the animals
of the future. However, it rules out certain possibilities: if suddenly we observe that dogs
start to give birth to cubs with wings, we would have a fact which contradicts it (see
Hayek, 1967).
As it is implicit in what we already stressed, Popper considers that both the laws of
natural science and social science are not valid unconditionally; that is without the
application of the ceteris paribus clause. Mises is sometimes slightly ambiguous on this
point. However, his statements seem to be more a criticism against mathematical
economics, which avoid the change in the market data and the time element, than a
negation of the necessity to apply the ceteris paribus clause in itself. By the way, Mises
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explicitly denies the possibility of doing social research without using the clause other
things being equal. Speaking about mental experiments, he writes: There is no means of
studying the complex phenomena of action other than first to abstract from change
altogether, than to introduce an isolated factor provoking change, and ultimately to analyze
its effects under the assumption that other things remain equal (Mises, 2004, p. 248).
In order to clarify Poppers idea that laws are applicable only ceteris paribus we
can give an example using the above mentioned law which states: the passage from
autarkic production to division of labour allows a growth of productivity9. This law is
valid in spite of the continuous change of the data that mathematical economics consider
constant. But it is not valid in the sense that the introduction of the division of labour will
have as a necessary and unconditional consequence the growth of productivity. Imagine,
for instance, that the inhabitants of a remote part of the earth who live in an autarkical way
learn that division of labour increases physical production. Imagine also that they decide to
introduce a system of division of labour and they create together a set of rules and
institutions bound to fulfill this aim. This fact doesnt mean that 30 or 40 years later their
society will be necessarily and unconditionally richer than before. We can imagine many
variations of the border conditions which could impede that. We can imagine, for instance,
that a war reduces strongly the productivity of the society or that a foreign invader
transforms its inhabitants into slaves. We can even imagine that a virus or a meteorite
sweeps them away from the surface of the earth.
We can give other examples. Consider this quote from Mises: If a businessman
does not strictly obey the orders of the public as they are conveyed to him by the structure
of market prices, he suffers losses, he goes bankrupt, and is thus removed from his eminent
position at the helm (Mises, 2004, p. 270). Also, this law is true only under certain
conditions, namely the absence of government financial aids for firms in loss.
Consider also Mises criticism of the planned economy. Mises states that the
abolition of private property involves a radical collapse of the productivity because of the
impossibility of economic calculation. Now, is the fact that the Soviet Union survived a
long time and was able to build a strong empire, considered as a danger by the West, partly
in contradiction with Mises theory? The answer is no. As Mises underlines, even the
application of this theory demands the ceteris paribus clause. In Soviet Union there was a
9 I take this law as example following Hulsmann (Hulsmann, 2003, pp. 74-75). I agree with Hulsmannsarguments against the possibility of applying the ceteris paribus clause as intended by mathematical
economics, but I think that he is wrong when he states that social sciences, unlike natural sciences, are not
based on the use of the principle other things being equal.
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black market and limited and localized forms of property. Moreover, as Mises underlines
this country had the possibility to copy the prices used in the capitalistic economies in
order to establish internal prices (Mises, 1947, p. 41). According to him, his theory is fully
valid only under certain conditions: The Soviets, he writes, are operating within a world
the greater part of which still clings to a market economy. They base the calculations on
which they make their decisions on the prices established abroad. Without the help of these
prices their actions would be aimless and planless. Only as far as they refer to this foreign
price system are they able to calculate, keep books and prepare their plans. In this respect
one may agree with the statement of various socialist and communist authors that socialism
in one or a few countries only is not yet true socialism. Of course, these authors attach a
quite different meaning to their assertion. They want to say that the full blessings of
socialism can be reaped only in a world-embracing socialist community. Those familiar
with the teachings of economics must, on the contrary, recognize that socialism will result
in full chaos precisely if it is applied in the greater part of the world (Ibid.).
8 Commonsense Knowledge and Experimental Approach
There is another reason which explains why Mises criticisms of Popper are unfair.
Popper maintains, as well as Mises, that social sciences are largely based on a
commonsense knowledge concerning human action and social life. Both think that this
knowledge consists of theories and expectations which are prior to observation and which
are often very trivial, but nonetheless fundamental both in social science and in everyday
life.
We can consider the following quotation from Mises in order to show the
importance of the commonsense knowledge laws in the explanation of social phenomena
and also to stress the fact that our mind is able to understand reality only because it is full
of theories: It is impossible to speak of war and peace unless one has a definite conception
of war and peace before one turns to the historical sources. Nor can one speak of causes
and effects in the individual case unless one possesses a theory that treats certain
connections between cause and effect as having a universal range of applicability. The
reason why we accept the sentence, The king defeated the rebels and therefore remained
in power, but are not satisfied with the logically contradictory sentence, The king
defeated the rebels and therefore fell from power, is that the first conforms to our theories
about the results of military victory, while the latter contradicts them (Mises, 1981b, p.
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38). Here Mises refers in particular to a very trivial commonsense law which is used, like
all the commonsense laws, implicitly and unconsciously: Every time that the political
leader of a country wipes out an attempt of rebellion holds the power.
Against nave empirism, Mises underlines consequently that the human mind is not
a blank sheet of paper. Only because it is full of commonsense trivial laws can it give
meaning to experience. Thanks to these laws it can understand how certain facts are
interconnected and consequently what is logical and what is not (see Hulsmann, 2003, pp.
69 ff and Smith, 1986, p. 19 ad ff; 1994, pp. 323 ff).
Of course, neither Popper nor Mises believe that the aim of social science is limited
to the use of commonsense knowledge. They agree on the fact that this aim is also to
enrich it or to make it more coherent and also to correct it. Both maintain that the majority
of these laws are not tautological and also on the fact that it is impossible to avoid the
possibility that experience can force us to rethink the synthetic ones.
They even agree on the fact that when this knowledge has an empirical nature it is
in a sense unproblematic (Popper, 1992a, p. 117) and that it is unnecessary or useless to
do observation to test it. They state that it is rather necessary to use it. Mises shows himself
not interested in analyzing carefully the way in which the empirical part of the
commonsense knowledge was acquired and why it is so reliable. On the contrary, Popper
takes care of that. For him, the reliability of this knowledge depends on the fact that it has
been largely corroborated by a process of trials and errors in the course of the process of
cultural evolution.
According to Popper, the empirical part of this commonsense knowledge has been
acquired in a sense experimentally. Of course, he doesnt mean here by observations.
Popper points out that we can use the term experiment in two different ways. On the one
hand we can use it to denote a means of acquiring knowledge, by comparing the results
obtained with the results expected (Popper, 1961, p. 85); on the other hand, we can use it
synonymously with an action whose outcome is uncertain (Ibid.). For Popper, making
this distinction allows us to understand the fact that, even though experiments like those in
a laboratory, are impossible in human sciences, we posses a very great deal of
experimental knowledge of social life (Ibid.). This knowledge has been learned by a
process of trials and errors in the course of human history and it is incorporated in our
practical skills. Acting men discover things: There is a difference between an experienced
and an inexperienced business man, or organizer, or politician, or general. It is a difference
in their social experience; and in experience gained not merely through observation, or by
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reflecting upon what they have observed, but by efforts to achieve some practical aim
(Ibid.). In a sense experiments are thus possible in social science: A grocer who opens a
new shop is conducting a social experiment; and even a man who joins a queue before a
theatre gains experimental technological knowledge which he may utilize by having his
seat reserved next time, which gain in a social experiment. And we should not forget that
only practical experiments have taught buyers and sellers on the markets the lesson that
prices are liable to be lowered by every increase of supply, and raised by every increase of
demand (Popper, 1961, p. 86).
Examples of experiments on a somewhat larger scale would be the decision of a
monopolist to change the price of his product; the introduction, whether by a private or a
public insurance company, of a new type of health or employment insurance; or the
introduction of a new sales tax, or of a policy to combat trace cycles. All these experiments
are carried out with practical rather than scientific aims in view. Moreover, experiments
have been carried out by some large firms with the deliberate aim of increasing their
knowledge of the market (in order to increase profits at a larger stage, of course) rather
than with the aim of increasing their profits immediately (Ibid.).
In order to elaborate his explanations the social scientist uses a lot of
commonsense knowledge which has been cumulated in the course of a long time by trials
and errors. In a sense the social sciences have advanced by the same practical methods by
which our technological knowledge in matters such as the building of ships or the art of
navigations was first acquired (Ibid.). According to Poppers view, there is no clearly
marked division between the pre-scientific and the scientific experimental approaches,
even though the more and more conscious application of scientific, that is to say, of critical
methods, is of great importance. Both approaches may be described, fundamentally, as
utilizing the method of trial and error. We try; that is, we do not merely register an
observation, but make active attempts to solve some more or less practical and definite
problems. And we make progress if, and only if, we are prepared to learn from our
mistakes: to recognize our errors and to utilize them critically (Popper, 1961, p. 87) 10.
Consider again this quotation from Mises: If a businessman does not strictly obey
the orders of the public as they are conveyed to him by the structure of market prices, he
suffers losses, he goes bankrupt, and is thus removed from his eminent position at the
10 Sometimes Mises seems to admit implicitly the fact that attempts to solve practical problemsinfluenced the formation of economic concepts. Consider his analysis of concepts like market, capital,
accountancy or division or labour (see Mises, 2004, pp. 143 ff.).
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helm (Mises, 2004, p. 270). Even if this law is falsifiable because contradictory
observations are logically possible, it would seem ridiculous to us to start research bound
to test it empirically. Its truth appears to us as self-evident. This doesnt depend on the fact
that its nature is fundamentally different from that of the laws of the natural sciences. This
depends rather on the fact that this law is incorporated in commonsense and by the fact that
commonsense is composed of a knowledge which is well corroborated by the past
experience of our ancestors. By the way, many laws which deal with natural phenomena
are incorporated in the common sense and appear to us as self-evident like, for instance,
the law which states that every time wood comes in contact with fire it burns.
9 The Explanation of History
Following Hempel, Popper underlines that social sciences laws are often not only
commonsense laws, but also tendential or probabilistic (Popper 1992a, p. 117; see also
Hempel 1996 and Di Nuoscio 2004). In particular, he stresses the fact that, because of the
indeterminism of human action, all the empirical laws concerning it are not necessarily
true, in the sense that sometimes they are, ceteris paribus, false. Consider this example:
John has been beaten by Carl because John insulted Carl. The empirical covering law
which founds this explanation is false because sometimes people who are insulted dont
beat the person that insults them. The two events are not necessarily linked.
Popper points out that because of the their unproblematic and probabilistic nature,
on one hand and, and because of the necessity to use a non empirical theory about the
rationality of action, on the other hand, the explanation of the action is based on an
approach which is different compared to that of pure physics. Namely, he maintains that
the study of action doesnt deal with the production and the test of laws. By the way, he
consider it impossible, as does Mises, to reduce the mental to the physical (see Popper
Eccles C. & Popper K. R, 1997; see also Mises, 2002, pp. 102-104)
Popper develops these considerations dealing with the approach of history. Like
Mises, Popper considers history not as a science bound to invent and test laws, but as
science which only uses laws (taken especially from the commonsense, but also from all
other sciences). While the theoretical sciences are mainly interested in finding and testing
universal laws, the historical sciences take all kinds of universal laws for granted and are
mainly interested in finding and testing singular statements (Popper, 1961, pp. 143-144).
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Consequently, like Mises, Popper believes that the burning interest in questions of origin
shown by some evolutionists and historicists, who despise old-fashioned history and whish
to reform it into a theoretical science, is somewhat misplaced (Popper, 1961, p. 144).
Popper insists on the fact that the possibility of interpreting historical facts depends
on a mind full of theories: a singular event is the cause of another singular event which
is its effect only relative to some universal laws. But these laws may be so trivial, so
much part of our common knowledge, that we need not mention them and rarely notice
them. If we say that the cause of the death of Giordano Bruno was being burnt at the stake,
we do not need to mention the universal law that all living things die when exposed to
intense heat. But such a law was tacitly assumed in our causal explanation (Popper, 1961,
p. 145). The study of history is based on an approach similar to that of applied physics
rather than that of pure physics: both in applied physics and history are we interested only
in the causal explanation of a singular event (Popper, 1961, p. 144) and we take for
granted the theories we use.
Among the theories which the political historian presupposes, Popper points out,
are, of course, certain theories of sociology the sociology of power, for example. But the
historian uses these theories, as a rule, without being aware of them. He uses them in the
main not as universal laws which help him to test his specific hypotheses, but as implicit in
his terminology. In speaking of governments, nations, armies, he uses, usually
unconsciously, the models provided by scientific or pre-scientific sociological analysis
(Popper, 1961, p. 145). Mises develops a similar reasoning underlining that the study of
history is based on theoretical presuppositions and the fundamental cognitive value of the
common sense: The study of history always presupposes a measure of universally valid
knowledge. This knowledge, which constitutes the conceptual tool of the historian, may
sometimes seem platitudinous to one who considers it only superficially. But closer
examination will more often reveal that it is the necessary consequence of a system of
thought that embraces all human action and all social phenomena. For istance, in using an
expression such as land hunger, lack of land, or the like, one makes implicit reference
to a theory that, if consistently thought through to its conclusion, leads to the law of
diminishing returns, or in more general terms, the law of returns (Mises, 1981b, p. 38).
Popper maintains that the empirical control in history concerns exclusively what he
calls the reconstruction of the situational logic (Popper, 1961, p. 147), viz. of the
reconstruction of the initial conditions of the explanation. The initial conditions are the
causes of a phenomenon. According to the deductive-nomological model claimed by
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Popper, we can find a cause only on the basis of a general law. Consider for instance this
fact: a little boy asks to his mother, Why did you drink a glass of water?. His mother
answers, Because I was thirsty. I was thirsty is in this case the initial condition of the
explanation. The mother points to it by using implicitly a trivial commonsense law:
People which are thirsty are inclined to drink. Note, in addition, that the use of this law,
too, entails the application of the ceteris paribus clause: it cannot be applied if there is
nothing to drink.
Like Hempel, Popper maintains that the reconstruction of the initial conditions has
to be more careful in history than in applied physics because of the fact that the majority of
the laws used in social science (not only the empirical laws concerning human action) are
tendential or probabilistic laws (Popper, 1992a, p. 117; see also Nadeau 1989). When it is
impossible to use deterministic laws, the phenomenon we want to explain can be
compatible with different causes. Consider, for instance, the explanation given by
Thucydides about the re-election of Pericles in spite of the negative trend of the war
against Persians. This fact is compatible with different tendential laws. Athenians could be
obliged to re-elect him by the use of force or they could be deceived. Thucydides rules out
these hypotheses precisely by analysing carefully, as a detective, the initial conditions. He
shows that Pericles was beloved by Athenians and he was able to convince them that it was
right to re-elect him (see Di Nuoscio, 2004, p. 232).
Popper also agrees with Hempel on the fact that when we use probabilistic laws
explanation it is less certain because there is not necessarily logical deduction of the
explanandum (the phenomenon we want to explain) from the explanans (the set of initial
conditions and laws which founds our explanation). However, both Popper and Hempel
underline that the use of tendential laws is not exclusive of social sciences. It is only more
frequent in this field. Probabilistic laws are used also in natural sciences. Clinic medicine
shows to us examples of laws of this kind: certain treatments against cancer are valid only
in X% of cases. Examples of tendential laws can be taken also from meteorology and other
natural sciences (see Di Nuoscio, 2004, p. 212; 2006, p. 41).
All of this allows us to understand other reasons why Mises is wrong when he
attacks Poppers theory of the empirical foundation of social science. Moreover, because of
Poppers theory on the part played by commonsense laws, it is difficult to consider
Poppers epistemology as being unable to deal with something different from laboratory
tests of general statements.
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A last remark is necessary. Popper underlines that, even though in the field of
history we use the situational analysis and we do not test laws, the principle of fallibility
is no less fundamental than in natural sciences. According to him, even in this field it
allows us to distinguish between scientific explanations and simple interpretations (which
can be philosophical, theological or ideological) ( see Di Nuoscio, 2004, p. 267). In other
words, he holds that also an historical explanation doesnt have to be founded on laws
which are, from a logical point of view, not falsifiable. Let us consider, for instance, the
case of a theory which considers historical events as the outcome of divine providence.
This theory is based on the following covering law: Every historical fact is the product of
Gods will. This assertion is not falsifiable because from a logical point of view it is
impossible to deduce from it contradictory observations. It is in virtue of this fact that we
can understand that the mentioned theory is a theological interpretation and not a scientific
explanation. Consequently, the popperian principle of demarcation is an indispensable and
precious tool which allows us to distinguish between science and ideology as well as in the
field of history (Ibid.).
10 Conclusive Remarks on the Empirical Controllability of General Theories in
Social Sciences
As we alredy pointed out, Popper and Mises agree on the fact that experience can
force us to change an empirical theory. Consequently Mises criticism against Popper
doesnt concern this point. It is based on the misunderstanding that fallibilism considers
experience as neo-positivists do, as a set of neutral and atheoretical data. As we know, this
is not Poppers position. In fact, the distance between these two authors is not radical: both
consider science as uncertain and fallible.
As Hayek wrote, Mises emphasis on the a priori character of theory sometimes
gives the impression of a more extreme position than the author in fact holds (Hayek,
1992, p. 148); his critical efforts are directed against the view that theory can, as it were,
be distilled from historical experience, and his main contention, now more familiar than
when he first advanced it, is that logically the statements of theories are independent of any
particular experience (Ibid.). Moreover, Hayek underlines that Mises doesnt maintain
that in social science it is possible to abstract from experience: Thus, on examination, the
difference between the views which Professor Mises has long held and the modern
hypothetico-deductive interpretation of theoretical science (e.g., as stated by Karl Popper
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in 1935) is comparatively small, while both are separated by a wide gulf from the nave
empiricism which has long been predominant (Ibid.).
It is necessary to point out that the propagation of the theory of a strong difference
between Mises position and Poppers has been supported by the latter itself: Not only
because Popper misled the character of praxeology, but also because he was in turn unable
to understand correctly Mises view on empirical laws. In an article published in 1992
Popper writes: I was always very conscious of Mises absolutely fundamental
contribution, and I admired him greatly. I wish to emphasize this point since both he and I
were aware of a strong opposition between our views in the field of the theory of
knowledge and methodology. I think that Mises saw in me a dangerous opponent perhaps
one who had robbed him of the complete agreement of his greatest pupil, Hayek. Mises
epistemology [] led him to claim absolutely certain truth for the principles of economic
science. My methodology [] led to the view that science is fallible and grows by the
method of self-criticism and self-correction; or, to put it more elaborately, by the method
of conjectures and attempted refutation. I respected Mises, who was much older, far too
much to begin a confrontation with him. He often talked to me, but he never went beyond
allusions of dissent: he never really opened a discussion by direct criticism. Like myself,
he appreciated that there was some common ground, and he knew that I had accepted his
most fundamental theorems and that I greatly admired him for these. But he made it clear,
by hints, that I was a dangerous person although I never criticized his view even to
Hayek: and I would even now not wish to do so. However, I have by now mentioned to
several people the fact that of my disagreement, without entering into critical arguments.
So much about those distant days (Popper, 1992b, p. 10).
Poppers interpretation of Mises epistemology is in fact simplistic and erroneous.
As we already established, even though Mises uses a Kantian vocabulary, he doesnt make
the same mistake that Kant did: for him, the laws are always a priori compared to
experience, but there are not synthetic laws which are a priori valid in the sense that they
are absolutely certain. According to Mises only analytical laws are certain. Kants position
is problematic and unable to explain the growth of science. According to Kant, a large part
of Newtonian physics was absolutely certain because it was composed by synthetic laws
which were a priori valid. But experience falsified Newtons theories and today scientists
use different approaches (see Popper 1973, pp 159-161; see also Antiseri, 1997).
Mises doesnt deny the fallibility of empirical laws and the fact that experience can
force us to correct our theories: If the facts do not confirm the theory, the cause perhaps
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may lie in the imperfection of the theory. The disagreement between the theory and the
facts of experience consequently forces us to think through the problems of the theory
again (Mises, 1981b, p. 27).
As well as Popper, Mises claims a modified essentialism (Popper, 1973, p. 197),
able to combine realism with the idea that knowledge is fallible and that we can never
attaint absolute truths. Even though Mises gives less emphasis than Popper to the empirical
controllability of social theories, he doesnt deny it. By contrast, he seems to give more
emphasis than Popper to the difference we already analyzed between logical falsification
and methodological falsification, viz. to the fact that, from a methodological point of view,
contradictory experience doesnt necessarily mean falsification.
An example of a contrast between a theory and its observable consequences is
given by Menger in his Principles of Economics. Criticizing the labour theory of value
Menger shows an empirical fact which is in contradiction with a consequence of this
theory, namely the idea that the value is unconnected with utility: When, in 1862, the
American Civil War dried up Europes most important source of cotton, thousand of other
goods that were complementary to cotton, Menger states, lost their goods-character
(Menger, 2004, p. 62). This fact cannot be understood in the light of the labour theory of
value. It can be explained only on the basis of a theory which claims that value depends on
its utility: the other goods that were complementary to cotton lost their goods-character
because they lost their utility. Menger shows here empirically the fallacy of the labour
theory of value and the validity of his point of view. As it is well known, he maintains
precisely that economic value and good character depend on human need.
It is not difficult to find other examples of empirical falsification of laws in social
science. Following Raymond Boudon, we can quote, for instance, the following two cases:
the first one is from sociology, the second one from economics.
In the 1950s, Talcott Parsons elaborated this law: The industrialization of society
implies a tendency towards the nuclearization of families. This law is contradicted by
experience: What indicated that this is a non sequitur is simply the fact that in certain
societies, as Japan, industrialization has occurred with, rather than against, the extended
family and has tended to strengthen it, at least over a long period (Boudon, 1991, p 22).
Consider now the second example. In the 1960s Nurkses theory of the vicious
circle of poverty was very important. This theory affirms that in absence of any foreign aid
a poor country is bound to remain poor, since poverty implies a negligible savings and
investment capacity and consequently an almost total inability to increase productivity.
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Since the latter cannot increase, poverty will necessarily persist (Boudon, 1991, p. 16). In
this case, too, it is possible to find contradictory facts which are not compatible with the
theory and which falsify