ABSTRACT
This chapter begins by discussing the question of how science is applied in practice; that is, what Karl Popper called the pragmatic problem of induction. Popper's revolutionary doctrine about theoretical science is that science can be a rational enterprise even though it makes no appeal to induction and has no use for justification. It is perhaps not to be wondered at that those who have not seen the significance of this critical rationalist doctrine have no time for his purportedly inductionless and justificationless solution to the pragmatic problem of induction. The pragmatic problem of induction formulated is straightforwardly solved if it is allowed that the agent accepts as true some universal generalizations. On Popper's account, the process of critical reasoning plays a prominent role in deciding what to do in practice; what does not follow, and may not even be true, is that this reasoning is appropriately directed.
