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Scientific Progress:
Mill makes universal and normative claims about how science progresses in any given society. He thinks that a society makes scientific (and other types of) progress when it allows the free flow of ideas by everyone. The ability to express oneself freely is not restricted to social and economic elite. Rather, people from all types of diverse backgrounds should have the right to fearlessly express themselves. Therefore, the ideas proposed by people from diverse vantage points lead to a plethora of novel and unique ideas or theories ([[CiteRef::Godfrey-Smith, (2003, )|p.142)]]. This constant emergence of novel theories allow the exploration of hitherto unexplored notions, and after evaluation, the best ones are retained ([[CiteRef::Godfrey-Smith, (2003, )|p.116)]]. This process continues: new, radical ideas are continuously (and without hindrance) proposed, they are explored, they may challenge orthodox scientific beliefs, and if they become accepted, the best ideas then become the scientific belief. Thus, for Mill, this “marketplace of ideas” is a necessary condition that enables the progression of science ([[CiteRef::Godfrey-Smith, (2003, )|p.116, 142)]].
|Criticism=Many commentators during Mill’s days (and until now) have made a general argument against the inductivist camp of which Mill is a part. Many like Whewell argued that if inductive inferences are valid, whether they be iterative, initiating or enumerative, they should lead to a “nonfalsifiable establishment of connections between truths” [[CiteRef::Buchdahl (1971)|p.364]]. Mill himself concedes that the ‘certainty’ of inductive inferences is ‘absolute’ inasmuch as we are concerned with practical purposes. Inductive inferences do not hold absolutely “in circumstances unknown to us, and beyond the possible range of our experience,” such as the “distant parts of the stellar regions” [[CiteRef::Buchdahl (1971)|p.365]]. It is not fully clear how Mill can, on the one hand, concede that inductive inferences are inevitably fallible, and on the other hand, use such terms as “unconditional” and “invariable” to describe inductive inferences [[CiteRef::Buchdahl (1971)]].
