A continued affair with science and judgements

A continued affair with science and judgements

Michael Marmot

UCL Epidemiology & Public Health, 10–19 Torrington Place, London WC1E 7HB, UK. E-mail: m.marmot@ucl.ac.uk

Accepted 3 June 2009. International Journal of Epidemiology Volume 38, Number 4 Pp. 908-910

(Appointed by Maria Inês Reinert Azambuja)

One Friday evening in 1946, Karl Popper was invited to address the ‘Moral Science Club’, a group of philosophers who met regularly in the room of one of the senior fellows of King's College Cambridge. Among the audience was the now legendary Ludwig Wittgenstein, professor of philosophy at Cambridge University, who is credited with arguing that there are no real philosophical problems only linguistic muddles. Popper had quite different views on philosophy. There were indeed real problems to be sorted out: communism, psychoanalysis and the nature of scientific enquiry.

Accounts of what actually happened next vary. During Popper's seminar, Wittgenstein was said to have become so incensed that he seized the poker from the fire place and started gesticulating with it. Bertrand Russell leapt to his feet and told Wittgenstein to put down the poker. ‘You misunderstand me, Russell’, said Wittgenstein. ‘You always misunderstand me’. Russell's response: ‘You’re mixing things up, Wittgenstein. You always mix things up’. One account has it that Wittgenstein, in anger, challenged Popper to give him one example of a real moral precept. Popper claimed to have replied: ‘Not to threaten visiting lecturers with a poker’. Wittgenstein dropped the poker with a clatter and stormed out./.../