________________________________ From: Eric Yost <mr.eric.yost@xxxxxxxxx> Donal: Popper's philosophy does indeed create some intractable tangles [e.g. explicating 'verisimilitude'] but the Raven Paradox isn't one... >Hold on a minute! That was Hempel. I know you like Popper, but jeez, he gets more work in your posts than an accordion player at a Polish wedding. From Nietzsche, we've high-tailed it to Poppermania.> The sense I intended was not that Popper created the Raven Paradox ["That was Hempel"] but that it is side-stepped by Popper's non-inductive approach which gives positive instances of a generalisation no greater logical value than instances of anything else: in other words, the intractable tangle of the Raven Paradox is a tangle created by inductivism [insofar as this attempts to give positive instances a logical status via 'confirmation' that is greater than the mere fact they are the absence of a falsifying instance] but not one created by a non-inductive approach. But then if Robert can be misinterpreted as saying the Tractatus is over-rated... [There is less mania in Popper's philosophy than most btw, though I admit there are self-styled Popperians of a manic sort.] Donal Plymouth