Full Idea
The reason my shoe is white is not that it lacks some feature essential to ravens that makes them black.
Gist of Idea
My shoes are not white because they lack some black essence of ravens
Source
Peter Lipton (Inference to the Best Explanation (2nd) [2004], 06 'The Method')
Book Reference
Lipton,Peter: 'Inference to the Best Explanation (2nd ed)' [Routledge 2004], p.101
A Reaction
Good, but not totally true. If my shoes were made to grow from genes, and then had some raven spliced into them, we might manage it. That is an explanation, but a long way from the best one. Enquiry is explanations, not deductions.