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As may have become obvious, there is virtually no disagreement between my
philosophical position and the one of Donald Campbell...
as Campbell emphasizes, it is impossible to really separate
the different selectors. All the different types of selectors will affect the evolution of knowledge, scientific or other...
In this view, no single criterion can guarantee selection, or provide justification for a belief. We can
only use the simple heuristic that the more criteria an idea satisfies, and the higher the degree of satisfaction, the "fitter"
it is, and the more likely to win the competition with rival beliefs (Heylighen, 1993). In such a view, there is in general
no single "best" idea...
The scientific method, in Campbell's (1974) terminology,
is a vicarious selector, an interiorization of external selectors.
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