The London Bombing, War Bloggers, and Falsifiability,

The war bloggers at Hit and Run and elsewhere have pointed to the London bombing as evidence to justify the Iraq War. Previously, however, many of these same war bloggers had asserted that the lack of a terrorist attack in Britain and the United States was evidence that the Iraq war was a success.

I noticed the same phenonemon after the the Madrid bombing. At the time, I made the case that those who tried to deply both arguments for the war had not only contradicted themselves but had flunked Karl Popper's test of falsifiability. Let me restate what I said then. Only this time, I will subsitute the words London for Madrid.

According to Popper,"A theory which is not refutable by any conceivable event is non-scientific. Irrefutability is not a virtue of a theory....but a vice."

I submit that advocates of the pro-war position seem generally oblivious to the need to fulfill this test and thus fail Popper's falsifiability principle.

Here is the pro-war approach to the London Bombing and the question of terrorism in general:

Terrorism goes up? One argument for why the Iraq war/occupation was justified.

Terrorism goes down? One argument for why the Iraq war/occupation was justified.

I will admit that the pro-war folks have a lot of moxie. They contend (or at least strongly imply) that the London bombing provides an argument for why their side was right all along.

On the other hand, any fair advocate of the anti-war position would admit that the case against the war/occupation can be falsified. Thus....

Terrorism goes up? One argument for why the Iraq war/occupation was unjustfied.

Terrorism goes down? One argument for why the Iraq war/occupation was justified.

When will the pro-war side construct a set of arguments that can be tested by Karl Popper's falsifiability principle? In other words, when will they tell us how their position can be refuted? We are waiting.