Popper, autograph letter signed, to Professor Scott, 14 July 1946

POPPER, SIR KARL

Autograph letter signed ("K.R. Popper"), to Professor Scott

EXPLAINING HIS "FALSIFIABILITY" THESIS AND ITS ORIGINS ("...no statement can tell us anything about the empirical world unless it can be false. Only to the extent to which we risk saying something that may be false do we make an pronouncement about empirical reality..."), 3 pages, 4to, LSE, 14 July 1946

A PRECISE AND LUCID EXPLANATION OF POPPER'S BASIC PRINCIPLE TO DISTINGUISH SCIENTIFIC THEORIES. Popper goes on to explain to Scott that had come to the idea through consideration of certain theories that claimed scientific basis (Marxism, Freudian psychoanalysis): "I found that they were, in the form in which they were usually used, not refutable, so that 'verification' was trivial and not of empirical significance." Popper had evidently met Scott at an academic seminar. Scott had picked up on a chance reference by Popper to the Bank of England, suggesting that he was an economist.

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