That’s an interesting observation. I don’t think anyone is opposed to aiming for improved accuracy. But I’m wondering what exactly you mean by “science seems to take a different outlook?”
The scientific outlook is that all conclusions are tentative, so that we’re never finished testing. That’s why your concern about correct predictions being made by false hypotheses is misplaced.
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Jim my have been [ETA} alluding to the “Pessimistic Meta-induction”.
If all you want from science is better predictions, then there is no problem with fallibilism.
But scientific realists want to claim that our best science is telling us about unobservable aspects of reality. Yet how can we believe that the entities or structures in our best scientific theories are real, if we also believe that our best science can change?
Scientific realists do have ways of dealing with this issue.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/realism-theory-change/#ScieRealPessIndu
How can something be more or less accurate unless there is a standard for comparison, AKA “the truth”.
The attempt to limit the true/false to natural language does not help. If one wants scientific theories to be a source of knowledge about unobservable reality, then one is stuck with admitting that theories have semantic content, that is that they refer to some aspect of unobservable reality.
To avoid the pessimistic meta-induction, one needs to explain how our best theories can both refer correctly to some aspect of unobservable reality but at the same time still be fallible. In other words, one has to find some kind of continuity of reference despite theory change. So SEP link in my previous post for more on this.
BTW, rather than “more accurate”, I think one is better sticking with “Inference to Best Explanation”, where “Best” takes the place of your more accurate. See my upthread post on “best” and IBE in science.
ETA on style: I use the pedantic “one” instead of “you” to avoid even the appearance of putting words in someone’s mouth.
Yes, and in my experience, those who are quick to apply it to science are never very eager to apply it to the pseudoscience they simultaneously tout, such as IDCreationism.
I meant the scientific method as an approach to understanding aspects of reality. An example. Newtonian mechanics models the behaviour of mass under acceleration. This model predicts planetary motion accurately enough that it is still used to calculate space shots. Einstein came up with a model that is more accurate. I wouldn’t say that disproved Newton’s model or rendered it false.
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There is, I believe, reality. The reality we inhabit, experience and are part of. But we are limited by the abilities of our sensory inputs (albeit enhanced with the tools of science and technology) to appreciate that reality. We approach reality asymptotically. What is truth if not reality?
Unobservable reality is rather an oxymoron If some postulated phenomenon is utterly unobservable, however indirectly, then it is not real. I don’t mean things don’t exist, just that to all intents and purposes they could be imaginary.
As far as I understand you, I don’t disagree. 
Well, I’m not going to die on that hill. I just think my use of accuracy in this context is more accurate.
Perfectly reasonable, old chap! 
You said truth was a property of statements. Then the usual step is to say truth is a correspondence of a statement to reality, as in the nouns, adjectives, and verbs in a statement have a structure that somehow corresponds to the structure of real objects and their relations (AKA “state of affairs”).
For a more science-based treatment of this idea, substitute the structure of a scientific representation implied by a model or theory for the structure of a natural language proposition; then talk about correspondence between that represented structure with the state of affairs that obtains.
I don’t have any disagreement with saying communities of successful scientific inquirers approach truth asymptotically; that’s another way of expressing a modern version of the pragmatic approach to truth advanced by Peirce’s (not James’s) version of pragmatism. The Blackburn book linked upthread details Blackburn’s version of that idea.
If you mean accurate in that sense of converging on truth, that works for me.
I should have been more explicit by saying I was using the term ‘observable’ as typically used in the philosophy of scientific realism. There ‘observable’ means (roughly) available to unaided human perception, at least in principle (so living T Rex’s are observable, assuming either time travel or better Jurassic Park are possible in principle).
‘Unobservable’ refers to entities postulated by science, eg quarks, which are only observable by scientific measurement. So if you want to claim quarks are real, and not just fictions which make it easier to talk about collider experiments, then you are dealing with unobservables in that sense.
[ETA: Better wording for preceding paragraph would be to say “unobservables” are the theoretical entities postulated in theories which best explain scientific measurements; the end result of a measurement will be an observable in the everyday sense, eg a dial reading or the printout from some software]
As for observables [ie the everyday kind], if someone wants to claim they are not real, that is dealt with separately in philosophy, eg by the brain-in-vat stuff or by arguing about idealism.
But the mere “inference” elides the importance of testing predictions.
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As I noted upthread, that is part of “best” as IBE is used in science
Rather busy but will respond in a day or two.
That’s why falsification is so important. If a theory makes false predictions, then it is rejected.
That’s why theories are accepted tentatively and continuously tested.
The big question is how do you rule out natural causes?
How do you make a case for a supernatural entity?
I didn’t claim that you did, I’m pointing out that “IBE” is easily used as a weapon to deceive. And it is very commonly used by ID promoters who have never tested a prediction. It’s pretty safe to predict (pun intended) that they will never do so:
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Not disputing the tentative aspect. But I’m not sure you correctly understand my concern. What I’m saying is that predictions, though they undoubtedly have their place in science, on their own are not sufficient for confirming theoretical aspects of a theory. I think as @BruceS pointed out they can be part of the process of confirmation, but they are just one element of it, and are not themselves on their own sufficient for confirmation. Like in a cumulative case they can add support, but are not strong enough indication by themselves.
Wasn’t aware of such a thing. But thanks for the info.
As far as I can tell I don’t have any problem with what you’re saying here. That’s how I look at it myself. The more objective aspects of a theory are usually not in question except for maybe some slight corrections that are needed such as in the case of Newton. As far as I can tell he just didn’t realize that moving clocks slow down.
But my concern is with the more subjective aspects, namely the theoretical. This is where the real differences seem to be. It seems obvious to me that this is to be expected. I compare it with jury trials. Normally no one will dispute the evidence. But the inferences from the evidence is what is being debated.
And though I think we can generally have confidence in the jury system to be reliable, there’s always a possibility that they could, and sometime do, come to the wrong conclusion. That doesn’t surprise us since we realize the jury is making a subjective judgment based on the evidence. Why should it be any different with the subjective conclusions that scientists come to based on the evidence?
What exactly do you mean by falsification? And I’m not so sure that theories are always rejected when they can’t account for some new evidence, especially if they are well entrenched. It seems at times theories are simply modified to fit the new evidence.
I always figured the main reason for being accepted tentatively is because there’s so much that isn’t known that it’s quite likely that new evidence could completely change things? But I suppose that would be another reason.
If all the evidence that has been gathered over decades of research comes up empty for a natural cause, I would say that’s a good time to start looking around for alternative explanations.
Just like you make a case for a past event which, because of human limitations isn’t empirically accessible nor possible to reproduced experimentally; by using evidence and arguments. The rules of logic apply just the same outside of science as they do inside. So any form of reasoning can be used, including IBE with suitable criteria.
I’m pretty sure I do, as I understand that you are using a straw man fallacy.
It would be ridiculous to say that they are sufficient. What sort of idiot would bother to test the predictions of a hypothesis that was not already consistent with the extant data? Are you kidding?
What exactly are “theoretical aspects of a theory” and what are the other aspects of a theory, in your mind?
You said that already, but AFAIK, no one has claimed that it’s sufficient. Does repeating your straw man fallacy make it more valid, Jim? Since you repeated yourself, I’ll ask again: what sort of idiot would ignore whether a hypothesis is or is not consistent with known data, and only look at predictions?
Are you calling me that sort of idiot?
Testing predictions is not “just one element,” it is the most important one. It separates science from pseudoscience.
Do you think that repeating your straw man a third time makes it valid?
Because science is better. It tests predictions instead of only looking at existing evidence.
What do you think science is for? Science is the best process we have for testing the judgements of others about how the world works. Part of that process is finding the best way to ask the world itself for its input.
If you want to question scientific judgement, you have to do science. There is no better way. For if there was a better way, scientists would be using it.
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