Critical rationalism and scientific competition

Abstract: In order to understand how and why critical rationalism works within the instuitutional environment of modern science, it is necessary to understand the incentive problems in science. Much of scientific research, and most of basic science, is organized in the form of open (or academic) science. Open science exists because commercial (or proprietary) science cannot deal efficiently with the incentive problems in basic science. In other words, basic science is subject to market failure. Open science is competitive and decentralized but otherwise institutionally very different from markets. Specifically, it is characterized by „producer sovereignty“: quality standards cannot be enforced from the outside but emerge within scientific competition. This, of course, may also lead to problems. Quality standards in science are a matter of the methodology of science. Methodological proposals – rules and criteria for doing and evaluating research – are irrelevant if they cannot establish themselves in scientific competition. Whether this is possible depends on the incentive structure in open science but also on features of the methodology in question. In my talk, I explain the rationale of, and the incentives within, scientific competition in open science and the basic requirement for a methodology that can establish itself in scientific competition. I argue that the methodological proposals of critical rationalism satisfy this requirement. High-quality basic science is possible; however, there may (and do) exist academic areas where low-quality research prevails. Lastly, I criticize Michael Strevens‘ recent book („The Knowledge Machine“) for its failure to deal adequately with the problem of quality standards in scientific competition.