Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', '27: Book of Daniel' and 'talk'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     choose another area for these texts

display all the ideas for this combination of texts


1 idea

14. Science / C. Induction / 5. Paradoxes of Induction / b. Raven paradox
Observing irrelevant items supports both 'all x are y' and 'all x are non-y', revealing its absurdity [Schofield,J]
     Full Idea: Although Hempel's raven paradox produces an absurdity of irrelevant observations, we can ignore it because (unlike good observations) observing a white handbag supports the contradictions of 'ravens are black' and 'ravens are non-black'.
     From: Jonathan Schofield (talk [2005]), quoted by PG - Db (ideas)
     A reaction: The idea of 'eliminating it from our enquiries' cannot be totally irrational (e.g. in detective work), but it is only seriously sensible in a restricted domain (such as a country house)