> We (and by we I mean Popperians) want to believe that science is a series of universally positive logical assertions that can be cut down by a single negative observation, as logic would dictate. But we don't always know what the criteria are for successful negative observations. The criteria are less rigid and well defined than we would be willing to admit.

Bayesian reasoning helps here, I think, because people are wrong, and different people are wrong with different probabilities. For example, overturning mass-energy conservation because someone said they saw a professor turn into a small cat or a strange spacecraft appear and disappear is not reasonable: The probability of one person being wrong or insane is a lot higher than the probability of something really well-verified being completely incorrect.

Is it political at times? Yes. Can it be improved? Sure. But it is flawed, not completely broken, and I think Kuhn makes too much of the flawed-ness which encourages people to imagine that it's completely broken and therefore the next paradigm shift will validate homeopathy.