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Single Idea 15285
[filed under theme 14. Science / C. Induction / 5. Paradoxes of Induction / b. Raven paradox
]
Full Idea
If empirical predicates are linked in clusters, contraposition of (black, raven) would carry one via such pairs as (shoe, white) into a different empirical cluster, or no cluster at all.
Clarification
A→B so ¬B→¬A is contraposition
Gist of Idea
The items put forward by the contraposition belong within different natural clusters
Source
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.I)
Book Ref
Harré,R/Madden,E.H.: 'Causal Powers: A Theory of Natural Necessity' [Blackwell 1975], p.124
A Reaction
This is, of course, addressed to Hempel's Raven Paradox. Those paradoxes now strike me as relics of a time when Humean empiricism and logic were thought to be the best approaches to scientific theory. Harré and Madden pioneered a better view.
The
16 ideas
with the same theme
[problem irrelevant evidence for a general law]:
19000
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Read 'all ravens are black' as about ravens, not as about an implication
[Belnap]
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17674
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The raven paradox has three disjuncts, confirmed by confirming any one of them
[Armstrong]
|
15889
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It is because ravens are birds that their species and their colour might be connected
[Harré]
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15890
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Non-black non-ravens just aren't part of the presuppositions of 'all ravens are black'
[Harré]
|
15284
|
Contraposition may be equivalent in truth, but not true in nature, because of irrelevant predicates
[Harré/Madden]
|
15285
|
The items put forward by the contraposition belong within different natural clusters
[Harré/Madden]
|
15287
|
The possibility that all ravens are black is a law depends on a mechanism producing the blackness
[Harré/Madden]
|
16832
|
If something in ravens makes them black, it may be essential (definitive of ravens)
[Lipton]
|
16836
|
My shoes are not white because they lack some black essence of ravens
[Lipton]
|
16831
|
A theory may explain the blackness of a raven, but say nothing about the whiteness of shoes
[Lipton]
|
16833
|
We can't turn non-black non-ravens into ravens, to test the theory
[Lipton]
|
16834
|
To pick a suitable contrast to ravens, we need a hypothesis about their genes
[Lipton]
|
18993
|
If sentences point to different evidence, they must have different subject-matter
[Yablo]
|
19003
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Most people say nonblack nonravens do confirm 'all ravens are black', but only a tiny bit
[Yablo]
|
4782
|
'All x are y' is equivalent to 'all non-y are non-x', so observing paper is white confirms 'ravens are black'
[Mautner, by PG]
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7006
|
Observing irrelevant items supports both 'all x are y' and 'all x are non-y', revealing its absurdity
[Schofield,J]
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