Hume's Problem

Hume's Problem PDF Author: Colin Howson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198250371
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
This volume offers a solution to one of the central, unsolved problems of Western philosophy, that of induction. It explores the implications of Hume's argument that successful prediction tells us nothing about the truth of the predicting theory.

Hume's Problem

Hume's Problem PDF Author: Colin Howson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198250371
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
This volume offers a solution to one of the central, unsolved problems of Western philosophy, that of induction. It explores the implications of Hume's argument that successful prediction tells us nothing about the truth of the predicting theory.

Hume's Problem Solved

Hume's Problem Solved PDF Author: Gerhard Schurz
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262352451
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
A new approach to Hume's problem of induction that justifies the optimality of induction at the level of meta-induction. Hume's problem of justifying induction has been among epistemology's greatest challenges for centuries. In this book, Gerhard Schurz proposes a new approach to Hume's problem. Acknowledging the force of Hume's arguments against the possibility of a noncircular justification of the reliability of induction, Schurz demonstrates instead the possibility of a noncircular justification of the optimality of induction, or, more precisely, of meta-induction (the application of induction to competing prediction models). Drawing on discoveries in computational learning theory, Schurz demonstrates that a regret-based learning strategy, attractivity-weighted meta-induction, is predictively optimal in all possible worlds among all prediction methods accessible to the epistemic agent. Moreover, the a priori justification of meta-induction generates a noncircular a posteriori justification of object induction. Taken together, these two results provide a noncircular solution to Hume's problem. Schurz discusses the philosophical debate on the problem of induction, addressing all major attempts at a solution to Hume's problem and describing their shortcomings; presents a series of theorems, accompanied by a description of computer simulations illustrating the content of these theorems (with proofs presented in a mathematical appendix); and defends, refines, and applies core insights regarding the optimality of meta-induction, explaining applications in neighboring disciplines including forecasting sciences, cognitive science, social epistemology, and generalized evolution theory. Finally, Schurz generalizes the method of optimality-based justification to a new strategy of justification in epistemology, arguing that optimality justifications can avoid the problems of justificatory circularity and regress.

The Philosophy Gym

The Philosophy Gym PDF Author: Stephen Law
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312314521
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
Unique and accessible explanations to some of life's biggest questions, obtained through a series of irresistable mental challenges

Knowledge, Reason, and Taste

Knowledge, Reason, and Taste PDF Author: Paul Guyer
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691151172
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 281

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Book Description
Immanuel Kant famously said that he was awoken from his "dogmatic slumbers," and led to question the possibility of metaphysics, by David Hume's doubts about causation. Because of this, many philosophers have viewed Hume's influence on Kant as limited to metaphysics. More recently, some philosophers have questioned whether even Kant's metaphysics was really motivated by Hume. In Knowledge, Reason, and Taste, renowned Kant scholar Paul Guyer challenges both of these views. He argues that Kant's entire philosophy--including his moral philosophy, aesthetics, and teleology, as well as his metaphysics--can fruitfully be read as an engagement with Hume. In this book, the first to describe and assess Hume's influence throughout Kant's philosophy, Guyer shows where Kant agrees or disagrees with Hume, and where Kant does or doesn't appear to resolve Hume's doubts. In doing so, Guyer examines the progress both Kant and Hume made on enduring questions about causes, objects, selves, taste, moral principles and motivations, and purpose and design in nature. Finally, Guyer looks at questions Kant and Hume left open to their successors.

Hume on Causation

Hume on Causation PDF Author: Helen Beebee
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134544707
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 440

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Book Description
Causation is one of the most important and enduring topics in philosophy, going as far back as Aristotle. In this lucid and enthralling account, Helen Beebee covers all the major debates and issues in the philosophy of causation, making it the ideal starting point for those approaching the subject for the first time. Beginning with an introduction to the concept, the book examines the most significant philosopher of causation – David Hume – and assesses the problems of induction and necessary connection in light of his thought. Helen Beebee then investigates different theories of causation and challenges to the Humean approach. She considers the concepts of regularity, causal experience, necessity and essences. Throughout the book, she also critically discusses other key philosophers on causation, including J.L. Mackie, John Wright and Brian Ellis.

Material Theory of Induction

Material Theory of Induction PDF Author: John D. Norton
Publisher: Bsps Open
ISBN: 9781773852751
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 544

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Book Description
The fundamental burden of a theory of inductive inference is to determine which are the good inductive inferences or relations of inductive support and why it is that they are so. The traditional approach is modeled on that taken in accounts of deductive inference. It seeks universally applicable schemas or rules or a single formal device, such as the probability calculus. After millennia of halting efforts, none of these approaches has been unequivocally successful and debates between approaches persist. The Material Theory of Induction identifies the source of these enduring problems in the assumption taken at the outset: that inductive inference can be accommodated by a single formal account with universal applicability. Instead, it argues that that there is no single, universally applicable formal account. Rather, each domain has an inductive logic native to it.The content of that logic and where it can be applied are determined by the facts prevailing in that domain. Paying close attention to how inductive inference is conducted in science and copiously illustrated with real-world examples, The Material Theory of Induction will initiate a new tradition in the analysis of inductive inference.

An Aristotelian Account of Induction

An Aristotelian Account of Induction PDF Author: Louis F. Groarke
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0773575766
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 480

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Book Description
In An Aristotelian Account of Induction Groarke discusses the intellectual process through which we access the "first principles" of human thought - the most basic concepts, the laws of logic, the universal claims of science and metaphysics, and the deepest moral truths. Following Aristotle and others, Groarke situates the first stirrings of human understanding in a creative capacity for discernment that precedes knowledge, even logic. Relying on a new historical study of philosophical theories of inductive reasoning from Aristotle to the twenty-first century, Groarke explains how Aristotle offers a viable solution to the so-called problem of induction, while offering new contributions to contemporary accounts of reasoning and argument and challenging the conventional wisdom about induction.

An Introduction to Probability and Inductive Logic

An Introduction to Probability and Inductive Logic PDF Author: Ian Hacking
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521775014
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 326

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Book Description
An introductory 2001 textbook on probability and induction written by a foremost philosopher of science.

An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding

An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding PDF Author: David Hume
Publisher: e-artnow
ISBN: 8027303893
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 119

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Book Description
"An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding" is a book by David Hume created as a revision of an earlier work, Hume's "A Treatise of Human Nature". The argument of the Enquiry proceeds by a series of incremental steps, separated into chapters which logically succeed one another. After expounding his epistemology, Hume explains how to apply his principles to specific topics. This book has proven highly influential, both in the years that would immediately follow and today. Immanuel Kant points to it as the book which woke him from his self-described "dogmatic slumber."

Collected Papers on Epistemology, Philosophy of Science and History of Philosophy

Collected Papers on Epistemology, Philosophy of Science and History of Philosophy PDF Author: W. Stegmüller
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 940101129X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
These two volumes contain all of my articles published between 1956 and 1975 which might be of interest to readers in the English-speaking world. The first three essays in Vol. 1 deal with historical themes. In each case I as far as possible, meets con have attempted a rational reconstruction which, temporary standards of exactness. In The Problem of Universals Then and Now some ideas of W.V. Quine and N. Goodman are used to create a modern sketch of the history of the debate on universals beginning with Plato and ending with Hao Wang's System L. The second article concerns Kant's Philosophy of Science. By analyzing his position vis-a-vis I. Newton, Christian Wolff, and D. Hume, it is shown that for Kant the very notion of empirical knowledge was beset with a funda mental logical difficulty. In his metaphysics of experience Kant offered a solution differing from all prior as well as subsequent attempts aimed at the problem of establishing a scientific theory. The last of the three historical papers utilizes some concepts of modern logic to give a precise account of Wittgenstein's so-called Picture Theory of Meaning. E. Stenius' interpretation of this theory is taken as an intuitive starting point while an intensional variant of Tarski's concept of a relational system furnishes a technical instrument. The concepts of inodel world and of logical space, together with those of homomorphism and isomorphism be tween model worlds and between logical spaces, form the conceptual basis of the reconstruction.