Embrace Being Less Wrong

The statement 'all swans are white' illustrates a key concept in the philosophy of science: the challenge of induction and the nature of scientific theories. Historically accepted as true based on existing evidence, this claim was invalidated upon the discovery of black swans, emphasizing that while a theory's truth can be impossible to prove due to the infinite nature of observation, its falsity can be demonstrated with just one counterexample. Consequently, the strength of a scientific theory lies not in proving its truth but in proving its potential falsehood through empirical evidence. Science is not about achieving absolute correctness but about progressively refining understanding to be less wrong than before, which parallels discussions in the political domain.