“In 1645 a group of people living in London decided that they would refuse to believe things that weren’t demonstrably true (…) This group which included the natural philosophers (scientists) Robert Boyle and Robert Hooke and the architect Christopher Wren was referred to (…) as the Invisible College (…) The Motto of the group was Nullis in Verba – Believe nothing from mere words. When one of their number number announced the result of an experiment, the others wanted to kow not just what the result was but how the experiment has been conducted, so that the claims could be tested elsewhere. Philosophers of science calls this condition falsifiability. Claims that lacked falsifiability were to be regarded with great skepticism (…) The Invisible College became so important to British science that its members formed the core of the Royal Society, a much less invisible organization chartered in 1662 and still in operation to this day.”
