ABSTRACT
The Duhem–Quine thesis from the philosophy of science states the problem of the garden of forking paths in reverse. It argues that we cannot test a hypothesis in isolation, as it always relies on a set of auxiliary hypotheses. We can thus often not falsify a given hypothesis, since the problem could always be with the auxiliary hypotheses. Every auxiliary hypothesis corresponds to a specific choice in the garden of forking paths. Hence, the numerous different empirical approaches, coupled with always different findings, we observe in applied research is only one side of the coin, whereas the impossibility to falsify a hypothesis in the Duhem–Quine sense is the other side of the same coin. This implies that as long as we observe large variation in empirical feedback, we will also not able to falsify theories.
