Abstract

Peirce measures the testability of scientific hypotheses by these oft-repeated standards: "money, time, energy, thought". His concept of testability is outlined and developed. It is found to be strikingly different, but not incompatible with, the positivist-empiricist concept of testability- in-principle. Peirce's concept of testability is, however, much richer than the received positivist-empiricist concept, and plays a larger, more central role in the logic of science, as Peirce sees it. In particular, Peirce's concept, in its role in his theory of the economy of research, shows how the acceptance of scientific hypotheses is itself a function of economic factors, and thus is not value-neutral.