Convergências entre a refutação socrático-platônica e o racionalismo crítico de Karl Popper

Abstract

For Karl Popper, refutation is one of the central elements for understanding the scientific activity as distinctive from others. Furthermore, the importance of this concept extends to the formulation of his critical rationalism. Understanding refutation and criticism as core elements in the scientific activity and in the human rationality, it is possible to understand that Popper was, to a certain extent, influenced by the Socratic-Platonic spirit. Indeed, in his early dialogues, Plato presents Socrates using a method of inquiry that often results in the refutation of his interlocutors. This supposed method is associated with the Greek term élenkhos. Thus, based on the epistemological texts or texts that refer to Popper's critical rationalism and the Platonic early dialogues, we offer an attempt to highlight some convergences between the two philosophers, having the notion of refutation as a central analysis category. We conclude that an approximation can be made between the Socratic-Platonic refutation and the epistemology of Popper and his critical rationalism, especially from the image of a “critical ethos” forged by the Platonic dialogues that point to Socrates as a model of critical rationality and intellectual modesty.