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Single Idea 22179

[filed under theme 14. Science / A. Basis of Science / 4. Prediction ]

Full Idea

Hempel said every scientific explanation is potentially a prediction - it would have predicted the phenomenon in question, had it not already been known. But also the information used to make a prediction is potentially an explanation.

Gist of Idea

Explanatory facts also predict, and predictive facts also explain

Source

report of Carl Hempel (Aspects of Scientific Explanation [1965]) by Samir Okasha - Philosophy of Science: Very Short Intro (2nd ed) 3

Book Ref

Okasha,Samir: 'Philosophy of Science: very short intro (2nd ed)' [OUP 2016], p.40

A Reaction

Sounds too neatly glib to be quite true. If you explain a single event there is nothing to predict. You might predict accurately from a repetitive pattern, with no understanding at all of the pattern.

The 18 ideas with the same theme [predicting events as support for a theory]:

12738 Successful prediction shows proficiency in nature [Leibniz]
22179 Explanatory facts also predict, and predictive facts also explain [Hempel, by Okasha]
13054 Correlations can provide predictions, but only causes can give explanations [Salmon]
18960 Most predictions are uninteresting, and are only sought in order to confirm a theory [Putnam]
8057 Unpredictability doesn't entail inexplicability, and predictability doesn't entail explicability [MacIntyre]
17087 The 'symmetry thesis' says explanation and prediction only differ pragmatically [Ruben]
16856 It is more impressive that relativity predicted Mercury's orbit than if it had accommodated it [Lipton]
16857 Predictions are best for finding explanations, because mere accommodations can be fudged [Lipton]
5340 Explanation does not entail prediction [Flanagan]
17374 The possibility of prediction rests on determinism [Dupré]
4807 A good barometer will predict a storm, but not explain it [Psillos]
4808 If we say where Mars was two months ago, we offer an explanation without a prediction [Psillos]
6757 Explanation predicts after the event; prediction explains before the event [Bird]
18698 Predictions give the 'content' of theories, which can then be 'equivalent' or 'adequate' [Button]
14916 What matters is whether a theory can predict - not whether it actually does so [Ladyman/Ross]
14915 The theory of evolution was accepted because it explained, not because of its predictions [Ladyman/Ross]
17405 If a theory can be fudged, so can observations [Scerri]
19737 A system can infer the structure of the world by making predictions about it [New Sci.]