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A sentence is verifiable just if there is a procedure for determining whether it is true or false. The sentence ‘there are one hundred pages in this book’ is verifiable because there is a procedure for determining whether it is true or false. A sentence is falsifiable just if there is a procedure which could determine that it is false. Some sentences are falsifiable but not verifiable. For example, the sentence ‘all swans are white’ can not be verified, because no matter how many swans one examines and finds to be white there is always the possibility that the next one will not be white, that not all swans are white. But the sentence ‘all swans are white’ can be falsified by the discovery of a non-white swan.
Some have endorsed the verification principle, holding that a sentence is meaningful only if it is analytic (that is, true solely in virtue of its meaning) or empirically verifiable (that is, there is an empirical test determining whether it is true or false). Popper rejected this principle, and argued that a hypothesis is scientific only if it is falsifiable. AJ
See also verification principle.Further reading A.J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic. |
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