Science and Pseudo-Science (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
by Sven Ove Hansson · Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Survey of the demarcation problem: how philosophers have tried to separate science from pseudoscience, why Popper's falsifiability criterion is judged insufficient, and what multi-criterion and cluster accounts propose instead. Revised July 2025, with worked examples from creationism and denialism.
More resources on Philosophy Of Science
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
Landmark philosophy of science text introducing paradigm shifts, normal science, and revolutionary science, transforming understanding of scientific progress.
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (50th Anniversary Edition)
Kuhn's 1962 argument that science advances through periods of normal puzzle-solving punctuated by paradigm shifts rather than steady accumulation. This fourth edition adds Ian Hacking's introductory essay situating the book's reception and criticisms.
Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge
Collected essays and lectures in which Popper sets out falsifiability as the line between science and pseudoscience, argues that knowledge grows through conjecture and error elimination rather than induction, and extends the argument into history and politics.
Science and Pseudoscience (1973 lecture transcript)
Four-page transcript of Lakatos's Open University radio talk, arguing that naive falsificationism fails against actual scientific history and proposing progressive versus degenerating research programmes as the demarcation criterion. The most compact statement of his methodology.
Scientific Method (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Peer-reviewed reference entry tracing methodological debate from Aristotle through logical positivism and falsificationism to contemporary pluralism about experiment, statistics, and modelling. Carries a large classified bibliography and cross-links, with a substantive revision dated August 2026. Free, permanently maintained, and more current than any textbook.
Theory and Reality: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science (2nd Edition)
The standard undergraduate survey, built from the author's Stanford lectures. Traces logical positivism, induction and confirmation, Popper, Kuhn, Lakatos, Feyerabend, science studies, and scientific realism, then defends naturalism. The 2021 edition adds a chapter on truth, simplicity, and models.