The Logic of Scientific Discovery

Popper’s argument is that induction cannot ground science: no number of confirming observations establishes a universal law, so what separates science from non-science is not verification but falsifiability — whether a theory forbids anything, and so exposes itself to a test that could kill it. Knowledge advances by bold conjectures severely tested and discarded, never by accumulating proof, which means the best theories are the riskiest ones still standing.

Why it’s on the list: It sits in the section Li Lu opens his bibliography with — science, philosophy, evolution and the history of human civilization — the part of the list that supplies the epistemology before any of the investing arrives. Falsification is the discipline of holding a thesis in a form that can be shown to be wrong.

Where I saw it: On Li Lu’s Recommended Book List, the Himalaya Capital bibliography — 137 entries across six numbered sections. Kyle saved it as two X posts that between them photographed only the value-investing section; this entry came from the source PDF. Li Lu lists it as Routledge, 2002.

Connections

• Li Lu’s Recommended Book List — the list this came from.
• Karl Popper — the author; his The Open Society and its Enemies is the adjacent entry in the same section of Li Lu’s list.
• Falsifiability — the criterion this book introduced.
• Epistemology, Science — the ground the argument is fought on.