Fallacies in Argumentation and Discoveries: Methodological Analysis
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24234/wisdom.v29i1.1108Keywords:
Meta-argumentation, fallacies, discoveries, “evident facts”, uncritical assumptions, erroneous preconceptions, “crazy ideas", the First Mover, natural selection, Darwinism, crazy ideasAbstract
This article discusses and suggests solutions to a number of issues related to the problem of main causes of fallacies arising in the history of scientific discoveries like the role of “evident facts”, uncritical assumptions, erroneous preconceptions and “crazy ideas”. Special attention is given to particular cases of Aristotelian idea of the First Mover, Charles Darwin’s non-Darwinian principles advocated in many occasions on pages of Origin of Species, the mechanical explanation of the physical world by the nineteenth century science. The issue of “crazy ideas” is presented in its relation to the notion of “absurdity”. Authors of the article invite its readers to a well-known fact of history of science that scientists can suggest incongruous concepts while the scientific community and wide circles of men of learning could accept these absurd concepts as a respectful and true theory for long centuries of whole epochs.
Discussions of the problems and their solutions in this article are undertaken in the light of the concept of meta-argumentation developed by authors of the article.
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