Oseni Afisi

This paper examines the liberal society that Popper lauds, that aims to be truly open, and discusses why another, more communitarian kind of society, particularly societies in Africa, may also reflect the quest for intellectual openness that is Popper’s ideal. Moreover, this paper avers reasons why Popper should be comfortable with such a liberal-communitarian mix. The inter-subjectivity in his critical rationalism is a balance of an explicit individualism, and an implicit social element (Afisi, 2016a). Popper is indeed an author of such a balance. For a society to be truly open requires the careful recognition and protection of individual freedom. However, the extent to which individuals are free to perform actions that they desire without external constraints, and the level of their individuality in relation to others when performing such actions, remain a contentious issue between liberals and more communitarian thinkers. Popper’s critical rationalism provides the necessary impetus to this contention through his view of freedom that I contend can best be viewed as carefully balanced, a view which combines individuality with a social element that upholds community values necessary for openness of society. With this combination, Popper’s politics of liberalism provides an effective model of how a truly open society can be achieved. The values inherent to Popper’s liberalism including those concerning intellectual openness, individual freedom, mutual respect, measured self-respect, welfarism, humanitarianism, accountability, critical debates and feedback from the citizens, together concern the conditions for a society to be truly open. There are many competing thoughts as to what openness might be in Popper’s philosophy. The present study of Popper does not presume to address them all. The focus here is specifically on using Popper’s idea of critical rationalism to balance relations between liberal politics of individual rights and freedom, and communitarian politics of the common good, as it relates to situations about how socio-economic and political conditions in Africa societies should be structured. While I contend that Popper’s works in political philosophy focused centrally on Western political tradition, and not about Africa in its strict sense, significant lessons can be distilled from Popper that can offer suggestions on social reforms in Africa. This paper explores Popper’s project of the open society across the plurality and differences of societies, so that his liberal ideas of individual freedom are not undermined, and the progress of the communitarian idea of the common good, that Africa societies are built upon, is also well enhanced. Liberal individualism and community values inherent to communitarianism are both well accommodated within Popper’s critical rationalism.

This paper examines the liberal society that Popper lauds, that aims to be truly open, and discusses why another, more communitarian kind of society, particularly societies in Africa, may also reflect the quest for intellectual openness that is Popper’s ideal. Moreover, this paper avers reasons why Popper should be comfortable with such a liberal-communitarian mix. The inter-subjectivity in his critical rationalism is a balance of an explicit individualism, and an implicit social element (Afisi, 2016a). Popper is indeed an author of such a balance. For a society to be truly open requires the careful recognition and protection of individual freedom. However, the extent to which individuals are free to perform actions that they desire without external constraints, and the level of their individuality in relation to others when performing such actions, remain a contentious issue between liberals and more communitarian thinkers. Popper’s critical rationalism provides the necessary impetus to this contention through his view of freedom that I contend can best be viewed as carefully balanced, a view which combines individuality with a social element that upholds community values necessary for openness of society. With this combination, Popper’s politics of liberalism provides an effective model of how a truly open society can be achieved. The values inherent to Popper’s liberalism including those concerning intellectual openness, individual freedom, mutual respect, measured self-respect, welfarism, humanitarianism, accountability, critical debates and feedback from the citizens, together concern the conditions for a society to be truly open. There are many competing thoughts as to what openness might be in Popper’s philosophy. The present study of Popper does not presume to address them all. The focus here is specifically on using Popper’s idea of critical rationalism to balance relations between liberal politics of individual rights and freedom, and communitarian politics of the common good, as it relates to situations about how socio-economic and political conditions in Africa societies should be structured. While I contend that Popper’s works in political philosophy focused centrally on Western political tradition, and not about Africa in its strict sense, significant lessons can be distilled from Popper that can offer suggestions on social reforms in Africa. This paper explores Popper’s project of the open society across the plurality and differences of societies, so that his liberal ideas of individual freedom are not undermined, and the progress of the communitarian idea of the common good, that Africa societies are built upon, is also well enhanced. Liberal individualism and community values inherent to communitarianism are both well accommodated within Popper’s critical rationalism.

This edited volume on Karl Popper’s philosophy adds to the existing literature in the study and the research of the central ideas of critical rationalism. What makes this multi-authored volume unique is not only about how Popper’s ideas have been extensively discussed, but about how the ideas in Popper’s philosophy have been used as contextualisation to the issues and problems of knowledge, politics and development in Africa. This volume will do best as a literature on an advanced political philosophy course as well as a course on cross-cultural philosophy, especially in a comparative philosophy course on African and post-analytic philosophy. It would do best in a course which compares European and African philosophical perspectives. The various discussions in this volume centre on Popper’s systematic ideas on critical rationalism, emphasising on issues that bother not only on both his philosophy of science and political philosophy, but also on his philosophy of life, as they apply to the condition of developments in Africa.

The essays in the present volume on Popper and Africa have made essential contributions to the cross-cultural study of Western and African philosophical traditions. This is made especially interesting by the critiques of Popper’s philosophy undertaken by the different African philosophers that have contributed to this volume. These scholars interrogated Popper’s discussions of closed and open societies, piece-meal engineering, critical rationalism, knowledge production, epistemology, toleration, and nationalism in contextualisation to science in Africa, African politics and social life, especially as it concerns the problems of governance in Africa. Aside from this, one must also note the essay by Adam Chmielewski, a Polish philosopher. It is one of the most remarkable critique of the open society in Eastern Europe. Chmielewski further went on to apply this critique to Africa. His point suggests that African societies’ attempt to adopt openness is the cause of their dysfunctionality. His discussion of these topics, as well as his account of diversity and recognition are highly reflective of the issues concerning many multicultural and/or heterogeneous societies today.

I agree with Karl Popper that piecemeal engineering is a requirement for peer review, social learning and social transformation. While piecemeal engineering is intended primarily to detect social problems, and assess the results of public policies with the aim of solving them in bits and pieces, in this paper, I defend a modified view of Popper’s thesis. I argue the position that social reforms often require “many pieces at once” social engineering. The justification of this modified Popperian thesis on piecemeal social engineering is based on four overlapping arguments: it seems too slow for piecemeal social engineering to have significant consequences on radical institutional changes; it is difficult to see what effect small piecemeal changes can have in achieving noticeable consequences in changing society; the magnitude of real-life situations often requires that social reform be undertaken through many pieces at once; and while Popper’s piecemeal social engineering only seems most sensible where societies are more technologically advanced and are already deeply developed, societies that are less developed require faster, “many pieces at once” sweeping political change.

In his Open Society and Its Enemies, Popper defends the enlightenment values of individual freedom against any form of totalitarianism. Popper likens totalitarianism with collectivism. Collectivism denotes a society that is static and intellectually stagnated. In Popper’s view, “tribal” societies approximate this condition. Popper avers that collectivism is apt only of “tribal” “closed” intellectually stagnated societies, and not apt of an open society. However, a tribal closed society that Popper proclaimed are of two significantly distinct connotations: tribe and tribal. The Maori tribe of New Zealand is an example for the former and the Nazi totalitarian European states as the latter. Popper’s target was the latter and distinctly not the former. This distinction is impeccably appropriate as scholars often conflate the two. While the former seems largely applicable to traditional Africa, it is distinctly not applicable the same way to contemporary Africa. Africa today is yearning for development, and this demands openness in Popper’s understanding of it.

This book provides a diverse contextualization of Popper’s critical rationalism concerning knowledge and his generalized attitude of criticism on appropriate social and political reforms in contemporary Africa. The book evaluates how best to address contemporary political problems, especially in politically very troubled parts of the world. To address these contemporary problems, especially as it relates to Africa, the authors found the political philosophy of Popper as suitable. The discussion of Popper’s political philosophy engages us directly with all the particularities of socio-economic and political problems within contemporary Africa. In other words, it presents the truth of the present socio-political reality in Africa where the question of what kinds of political ideas and concepts can be offered as appropriate to a political environment, which so greatly faces facets of developmental issues. Although the issues and events that informed the writings of Popper’s The Poverty of Historicism as well as The Open Society and Its Enemies, were among others, the rise of fascism and communism in Europe, the inventiveness of this work is how happily scholars in non-liberal societies, such as in Africa, can pick up Popper’s insights and usefully work with them to offer appropriate social reforms for their society. This volume is a critical juxtaposition of Popper’s ideas in a bid to make good sense of social and intellectual conditions in Africa, particularly as it relates to the scale and speed of social change that is needed in most African nations that are often ridden by corruption. The book is suitable for studies in political philosophy, economic and development studies, African Studies and Indigenous Knowledge systems.

The general character of science and the methodology it employs are in specific terms referred to as observation and experimentation. These two ethodologiesreflect how science differs from other systematic modes of inquiries. This description characterises, strictly, ‘Western science’ and it is contrasted with the indigenous mode of enquiry that has come under the name, ‘African science’. In contemporary scholarship, ‘African science’ is being condemned to the level of the mysticoreligious or supernaturalist worldview. ‘African science’ is said to be purely esoteric, personal, and devoid of elements of objectivity and rigorous theorization. In this paper, I re-examine this recondite issue by further reflecting and strengthening some of the ideas put forward by some African scholars to affirm that there is a distinct method of ‘African science’ that can be termed scientific. In defending a pluralist thesis toward knowledge, scientific inclusive, this paper posits that there exist varieties of inquiry beyond what has been developed in the ‘West’ which can still be justifiably termed scientific. In addition to pluralism, it argues further that the social character of science, which makes it a part of social and cultural traditions, qualifiedly justifies ‘African science’ as a true science. I will employ the newly formulated conversational method endorsed by the Conversational School of Philosophy in this inquiry.

While Karl Popper highly valued the ability to invent a bold new form of theoretical thought, he warned us at the same time of the need to be cautious in action. Ambitions that are utopian or revolutionary seemed to Popper always unacceptable. We must always be open to reforming our practices, but we must attempt this slowly and piecemeal. Every change that we make we must hold open to criticism. However, change must be conservative and anti-revolutionary. This is the demand that while any one element of current culture may be criticised and rejected, it is important to do this work piecemeal and carefully. Only then does the audacity or boldness of rejecting a seemingly settled view amount to courage: for it reflects also significant conservation of values. Popper regarded no social change or scientific breakthrough as revolutionary. Even the process of conjecture and refutation, of trial and error, is a piecemeal method. Popper’s piecemeal method depicts Otto Neurath’s metaphor of not dismantling the whole ship except perhaps one plank at a time, replacing each plank as the effort goes on. Every step is as conservative as it is also bold, and that alone helps make it courageous. It is only through this conservatism, the piecemeal anti-revolutionary change, that people can become bold in how they experiment and replace some formerly received norm or idea.

To identify with confidence some ways in which the politics of Africa could be improved depends not at all upon a vision of a utopia. With Karl Popper, I agree that utopian thinking muddles meaningful political reform rather than assisting it. Liberalism opposes large scale planning, and quite without reference to any utopia supplies terms in which to be aptly critical of the corruption, by which in the present day, African states all are riddled. Liberal reforms in Africa would institute market accountability there. That there is in Africa at present no operative “institution of market accountability” means among other things that information that is crucial for considering ways to improve conditions in Africa does not collect and so remains unavailable to citizens, planners, and political decision-makers. Lack of accountability because of economic corruption is tantamount to a failure of intellectual openness. Liberals typically defend intellectual openness by focusing on the protection of individuals. This aspect of liberalism is potentially harmful to Africa, where the ambient ethic to the extent that one functions is communitarian. I argue that the individualism aspect of liberalism is incidental not essential: I deny that liberalism is counter to a society’s upholding communitarian ideals. I argue that to fully institute market accountability in Africa would mitigate many of the chief harms to Africa and would produce many benefits. It would not require that Africans sacrifice their communitarian spirit.

This paper reviews and adds to previous arguments for the thesis that Karl Popper was mistaken to have rejected hypothetico-deductive confirmation. By turning from the positive idea of verification to the negative idea of criticism, Popper believed that he had turned his back on induction. He believed he had “solved” the “problem of induction” by providing a non-inductive account of corroboration. Popper used the term “corroboration” rather than confirmation which he believed was too closely allied to the notion of the inductive or probabilistic support that a theory can receive from evidence. Wesley Salmon’s “concept of confirming evidence” and Clark Glymour’s “bootstrap conception of evidence for theory” both defended respectively the thesis that passed tests can be confirmed by evidence or warranted by the degree of probability. Using a sequence of symbols in logical form or analysis, I shall further defend the concept to hypothetico-deductive confirmation in order to show that the known weaknesses of Popper’s critical rationalism are remediable, once the notion of evidence for theories is brought back into consideration.

The focus of this paper is to examine the problem of induction as a methodology for science. It also evaluates Karl Popper’s deductive approach as the suitable methodology for scientific research. Popper calls his theory ‘hypothetico-deductive methodology’. However, this paper argues the thesis that Popper’s theory of hypothetico-deductive methodology, which he claims is the only appropriate methodology of science is fraught with some theoretical difficulties, which makes it unacceptable. Popper’s logical asymmetry between verification and falsification, we argue, is philosophically untenable. We argue the thesis for the complementarity of both inductive and deductive methodology in scientific investigation. This study seeks to establish the resonance of accepting both deductive and inductive reasoning as the basic methodologies upon which scientific research and discoveries proceed.

Understanding the true nature of the human being is no doubt a sine qua non for developing an ideology for a desirable praxis. This paper examines the pitfalls of Marxist-Leninist scientific socialism and African socialism. It argues that a critical analysis of both ideologies reveals a lack of clear understanding of the nature of man by their proponents. An exhaustive account of the nature of man must explain self-consciousness, the urge to avoid pain, the desire for a purposeful life and for freedom from external interference, the passion for distinction, and, most importantly, the desire to acquire personal property. The paper further contends that socialism , does not allow room for the pursuit of personal ambition. This accounts for the failure in the implementation of both Marxist-Leninist socialism and African socialism. The paper avers that there is need to understand that the human being cannot simply be seen as a socio-economic or historical being; rather, consideration of the intrinsic elements which constitute the true nature of personhood is quintessential to achieving a well-ordered society

The general character of science and the methodology it employs are in specific terms referred to as observation and experimentation. These two methodologies reflect how science differs from other systematic modes of inquiries. This description characterises, strictly, ‘Western science’ and it is contrasted with the indigenous mode of enquiry that has come under the name, ‘African science’. In contemporary scholarship, ‘African science’ is being condemned to the level of the mysticoreligious or supernaturalist worldview. ‘African science’ is said to be purely esoteric, personal, and devoid of elements of objectivity and rigorous theorization. In this paper, I re-examine this recondite issue by further reflecting and strengthening some of the ideas put forward by some African scholars to affirm that there is a distinct method of ‘African science’ that can be termed scientific. In defending a pluralist thesis toward knowledge, scientific inclusive, this paper posits that there exist varieties of inquiry beyond what has been developed in the ‘West’ which can still be justifiably termed scientific. In addition to pluralism, it argues further that the social character of science, which makes it a part of social and cultural traditions, qualifiedly justifies ‘African science’ as a true science. I will employ the newly formulated conversational method endorsed by the Conversational School of Philosophy in this inquiry. Keywords : African science, mystico-religious, rigorous, pluralism, Western science

The history of the modern world has recorded remarkable achievements and progress in the quality of life of people thanks to the developments of science and technology. Although man’s development of science and technology is said to date back to inception of the human society, the tremendous influence of the 18th century industrial revolution first in Europe and later the rest of the world, on the scientific and technological revolution that occurred during the early 1900s cannot be gainsaid. The world thereafter was taken by storm by the various scientific and technological inventions that characterize this period till date. This scientific and technological revolution enhanced productivity and changed the face of social material production. The revolution brought about, for instance, mechanized food production, technological construction, manufacture and design of means of transportation, clothing, medical applications, communication technology, military warfare, space exploration, power and energy, etc. In fact, the difference between the comfortable life in the developed countries, and by contrast the hardship in the developing countries, is strictly in the level of technological development. This paper examines the impacts of science and technology in human welfare. It considers the double-edge sword attribute of science and technology. It examines the implication of the incalculable harm of science and technology to mankind and as well as tremendous success recorded in the improvement of the quality of human life.