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| 5401 | The mortality of Socrates is more certain from induction than it is from deduction [Russell] |
| Full Idea: We would do better to go straight from the evidence that some men have died to the mortality of Socrates, than to go via 'all men are mortal', for the probability that Socrates is mortal is greater than the probability that all men are mortal. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Problems of Philosophy [1912], Ch. 7) | |
| A reaction: Russell claims that deduction should stick to a priori truth, and induction is best for the real world. Interesting. To show that something is a member of a set (e.g. planets) you need an awful lot of knowledge of the set. |