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Editorial
A little bit more about Popper’s philosophy
  1. Fernando A M S Pompeu1,2
  1. 1 Physical Education Post-graduate Program, Rio de Janeiro Federal University, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
  2. 2 History and Philosophy Science Department (Visiting Scholar), Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK
  1. Correspondence to Dr Fernando A M S Pompeu; fpompeu{at}eefd.ufrj.br

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjsem-2018-000401

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    Background and aim

    Professor Robergs recently raised issues based on Popper’s philosophy about the Central Governor Model (CGM), whereby he concluded that the CGM is not a true scientific theory. Thus, he started his paper with Popper’s demarcation criterion and finished this showing several ad hoc hypotheses that changed the CGM.1

    Unhappily, Robergs made a few mistakes about Popper’s work. The most important problem happened when he mixed up Popper’s and Kuhn’s ideas and vocabularies.1 These philosophers had a very different understanding about the truth and consequently about the Science. Kuhn believed that truth was like an agreement among scientists about the best theory. For him, this agreement depended on the specific time and space circumstances.2

    On the other hand, for Popper, this interpretation was a misunderstanding about truth and certainty concepts. Moreover, Popper advised that if everyone had his/her own truth, according to the situation, the truth would lose its meaning. In addition, for Popper, when a scientist is satisfied with a ‘normal science’, we should feel sorry for his/her bad education.3

    Methods

    For Popper, the Science Failure springs …

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