Popper attempts to explain why science is given authority due to its rationality by describing a method of its own. The central point of Popper's theory is his assertion that what distinguishes science from pseudo-science is its capacity to be falsified. A theory is falsifiable if it can be proven to be incorrect; it has nothing to do with whether it is true or not. For example, the hypothesis that dolphins can fly is refutable because there are tests and experiments we can perform to determine if this is correct. Furthermore, the broader and more precise the scope of a theory, the more falsifiable, and therefore better, it is. The statement that "all metals conduct electricity" is more refutable than the statement that "copper conducts electricity" because there is evidence that would refute the former and not refute the latter. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Popper then includes the importance of falsifiability in his method that he uses to solve the problem of induction. The problem with an inductive inference is that the premises do not entail the conclusion; therefore, the argument is invalid. An example of an inductive argument is: The Twin Towers existed throughout the 1980s. The Twin Towers existed throughout the 1990s. Therefore, the Twin Towers will exist throughout the 2000s. It is logically possible for the conclusion of this argument to be false, even if its premises are true. . Popper sees that induction is epistemically precarious, but argues that this is not a problem for science since science uses only deductive reasoning. His idea of ​​a science is this: Start by posing a theory, a bold conjecture. From this conjecture, deduce a prediction concerning future observations. Test this prediction. If the theory passes the tests, it is supported. This means that it has passed the tests so far and only concerns the past performance of the theory. The theory is wrong if the predictions do not match the test results. The theory has been falsified and therefore must be rejected (avoid ad hoc cases, i.e. restricting the hypothesis to fit the data). According to Popper, there is no problem with induction since deduction is the dominant scientific theory. He claims that science tells us how the world is not, so we can implicitly describe how the world is. This seems to have the consequence that, according to Popper, it is just as rational to act on an untested and therefore unfalsified theory as it is on a well-tested but unrefuted theory. But that's absurd. (Study question: Can you come up with an untested and therefore unrefuted theory on which it would be absurd to act?) We could save Popper's account from absurdity by asserting that the more a theory is corroborated, the more we should trust him. But then we would need corroboration to inform us about the future performance of the theory. We would therefore reintroduce induction into Popper's account. A slightly more subtle point: induction is involved in Popper's account of a new test. The prediction that light would bend around massive objects like the sun was new in 1919 (see Brief History of Astronomy), but, of course, to contemporary scientists this prediction is not new at all . What counts as a new prediction then depends on the scientist's background knowledge, what they expect.