>There is plenty of useful work which doesn't specify a falsifiable hypothesis, but it's not science until it does so. That's quite a bold statement which is n

>There is plenty of useful work which doesn't specify a falsifiable hypothesis, but it's not science until it does so. That's quite a bold statement which is not supported by current work in the philosophy of science. Would you be willing to claim that most papers submitted to Nature don't count as science? >No. Again, being falsifiable means that astrology can be a subject of scientific study. It doesn't make it science in and of itself. The claim was that falsifiability is necessary and sufficient to count as science - so really we're in agreement. Making falsifiable claims is not necessary and sufficient demarcation of science and pseudo-science. You need something more than falsifiability to distinguish science from pseudo-science. The question is: what is that thing? >but by definition it won't be science. By whose definition? You're sending mixed messages - why is physics a science, rather than merely capable of being a subject of scientific study? We can make claims in physics that are just as falsifiable as the ones in astrology. It's also unwise to paint an idealistic vision of science (falsificationism) in contrast to how it's actually practiced; from SEP: >Popper’s focus on falsifications of theories led to a concentration on the rather rare instances when a whole theory is at stake. According to Kuhn, the way in which science works on such occasions cannot be used to characterize the entire scientific enterprise. Instead it is in “normal science”, the science that takes place between the unusual moments of scientific revolutions, that we find the characteristics by which science can be distinguished from other activities.