Darwins invloed op de wetenschapsfilosofie

"How and why do we accept one theory in preference to others? The preference is certainly not due to anything like a experiential justification of the statements composing the theory; it is not due to a logical reduction of the theory to experience. We choose the theory which best holds its own in competition with other theories; the one which, by natural selection, proves itself the fittest to survive. This will be the one which not only has hitherto stood up to the severest tests, but the one which is also testable in the most rigorous way. A theory is a tool which we test by applying it, and which we judge as to its fitness by the results of its applications." (Popper 1959, The Logic of Scientific Discovery, p. 91)