[lit-ideas] Re: Grice and the logic of confirmation
- From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 21 Mar 2014 12:04:04 -0700 (PDT)
Well, yes, he discusses that at quite some length. I am afraid that I am not
going to summarize a full/length book here.
O.K.
On Friday, March 21, 2014 7:47 PM, Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
>Reichenbach in Experience and Prediction provides a fairly convincing account
>or defense of the
validity of inductive reasoning in terms of the probability or 'weight'
of a hypothesis being increased by successive confirming observations,
in proportion to their number and frequency. (Mainly, even though it is
more complicated than that, and mathematical theories of probability are
involved.)>
As one counter-example falsifies a law-like prediction, how does Reichenbach
explain how - logically and infallibly - "successive confirming observations"
("in proportion to their number and frequency") render it less probable that
any counter-example exists?
Without such an explanation it is clear R's account, however "fairly
convincing" it may seem, fails - for the accumulation of "successive confirming
observations" cannot increase the probability of a law-like prediction being
true unless that accumulation lessens the probability of there being any
counter-example. The problem is that no such accumulation, logically, does
lessen the probability of there being any counter-example - a point that was
clearly enough understood by Hume, who saw that probabilistic induction was in
no better logical boat than non-probabilistic induction.
Dnl
Ldn
On Friday, 21 March 2014, 18:23, Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Reichenbach in Experience and Prediction provides a fairly convincing account
or defense of the validity of inductive reasoning in terms of the probability
or 'weight' of a hypothesis being increased by successive confirming
observations, in proportion to their number and frequency. (Mainly, even though
it is more complicated than that, and mathematical theories of probability are
involved.) He does not claim that this is necessarily the only or the main
method by which scientists arrive at new hypotheses, and acknowledges the role
of conjectures and intuitions in the process of discovery. Since Popper also
grants that hypothesis are 'corroborated' by successive failed attempts at
falsification, the difference so far might be one of terms rather than
substance. However, Reichenbach emphasizes that scientific theories need to be
capable of predicting future events for the purposes of planning human action,
which renders it necessary that they should be as
reliable as possible. Popper, on the other hand, seems to be more concerned
with the explanatory power of hypotheses rather with their predictive
reliability.
O.K.
On Friday, March 21, 2014 6:15 PM, Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
>O. T. O. H., cfr. the reverse implicature we get by exchanging adverbs:>
The "reverse implicature"? Whatever next?
Dnl
Ldn
On Friday, 21 March 2014, 16:02, "Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx" <Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx>
wrote:
Subj: Re: [lit-ideas] Re: Popper's "critical approach" to science seen in
action
In a message dated 3/21/2014 6:18:56 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
_donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxx.uk_ (mailto:donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx) quotes:
"Nevertheless, the signal will have to
be confirmed. "I think a lot of
people will be looking very critically at this," says Pontzen.'"
and comments:
"Very critically" being the operative words - not "very inductively".
O. T. O. H., cfr. the reverse implicature we get by exchanging adverbs:
"And then, Ponzen said,
"I think a lot of people will be looking very inductively at this."
On the OTHER hand (can we use this in sequence, or does this implicate that
we have three hands?) the keyword may well be, 'confirm', which many
(including Vincenzo Crupi, below) take as synonym for 'inductively prove'.
Or not.
Note that, granted, as even Pontzen may grant, to confirm a theory is
different from (or 'than', as some
sociolects go) to confirm a signal.
Or not?
Cheers,
Speranza
'Confirmation',
Crupi, Vincenzo, "Confirmation", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
(Spring 2014 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), forthcoming URL =
<http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2014/entries/confirmation/>.
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Chandler, J., 2013, “Contrastive Confirmation: Some
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Synthese, 190: 129–138.
Christensen, D., 1997, “What Is Relative Confirmation?”, Noûs, 3: 370–384.
.
Crupi, V. and K. Tentori, 2013, “Confirmation as Partial Entailment: A
Representation Theorem in Inductive
Logic”,Journal of Applied Logic, 11: 364–
372.
–––, “Confirmation Theory”, in A. Hájek and C. Hitchcock (eds.), Oxford
Handbook of Philosophy and Probability, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
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Englewood
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Hempel, C.G., –––, 1943, “A Purely Syntactical Definition of Confirmation”
, Journal of Symbolic Logic, 8: 122–143.
–––, 1945, “Studies in the Logic of Confirmation”, Mind, 54: 1–26, 97–
121.
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Maher, P., –––, 2006, “Confirmation Theory”, in D.M.
Borchert (ed.),
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Confirmation”, Philosophy of Science, 63: 21–6.
–––, “On Measures of Confirmation”, British Journal for the Philosophy
of Science.
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British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 25: 1–23.
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Handbook of the Philosophy of Science: Philosophy of Statistics, Amsterdam:
Elsevier,
pp. 391–440.
Okasha, S., 2011, “Experiment, Observation, and the Confirmation of Laws”,
Analysis, 71: 222–232.
Peijnenburg, J., 2012, “A Case of
Confusing Probability and Confirmation”,
Synthese, 184: 101–107.
Salmon, W.C., –––, 1975, “Confirmation and Relevance”, in Maxwell and
Anderson, 1975, pp. 3–36.
–––, 2001, “Explanation and Confirmation: A Bayesian Critique of
Inference to the Best Explanation”, in G. Hon and S.S. Rakover (eds.),
Explanation: Theoretical Approaches and Applications, Dordrecht: Kluwer, pp.
61–91.
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376–392.
Schurz, G., –––, 2005, “Bayesian H-D Confirmation and Structuralistic
Truthlikeness: Discussion and Comparison with
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–––, 2011b, “Hypothetico-Deductive Confirmation”, Philosophy Compass, 6:
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”, Synthese 156: 55–77.
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Tentori, K., V. Crupi, and D. Osherson, 2007, “Determinants of Confirmation
”, Psychonomic Bulletin &
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–––, 2010, “Second-order Probability Affects Hypothesis Confirmation”,
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Williamson, J., 2011,
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–––, 2011, “Scientific Explanation”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy (Winter 2011 Edition), E.N.
Zalabardo, J., 2009, “An Argument for the Likelihood Ratio Measure of
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