Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T20:30:53.208Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Confirmation and Adequacy Conditions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Marsha Hanen
Marsha Hanen*
Affiliation:
University of Calgary
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Several standard conditions of adequacy for confirmation are considered and a conclusion of B. Skyrms regarding the converse-consequence condition is shown to be mistaken. Widely accepted conditions such as the entailment condition and the special consequence condition are shown to be open to counterexample, and confusion about these conditions is traced to confusion about the difference between two kinds of confirmation concepts—concepts of firmness and concepts of increase in firmness. The importance of concepts of the latter sort is stressed. Finally, some suggestions are offered relating to the notion of selective confirmation.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 38 , Issue 3 , September 1971 , pp. 361 - 368
Copyright
Copyright © 1971 by The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

[1] Brody, B. A., “Confirmation and Explanation,” The Journal of Philosophy, vol. LXV, 1968, pp. 282–299.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[2] Carnap, R., Logical Foundations of Probability, Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1950.Google Scholar
[3] Goodman, N., Fact, Fiction and Forecast, Second edition; Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company Inc., 1965.Google Scholar
[4] Hanen, M., “Goodman, Wallace, and the Equivalence Condition,” The Journal of Philosophy, vol. LXIV, 1967, pp. 271–280.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[5] Hempel, C. G., “Studies in the Logic of Confirmation,” Mind, vol. 54 (1945): 1–26, 97-121, reprinted in Hempel, Aspects of Scientific Explanation, New York: The Free Press, 1965, pp. 3-46. All references to Hempel are to this book.Google Scholar
[6] Hempel, C. G., “Postscript (1964) on Confirmation,” Aspects of Scientific Explanation, pp. 47–51.Google Scholar
[7] Hesse, M., “Theories and the Transitivity of Confirmation,” Philosophy of Science, vol. 37, 1970, pp. 50–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[8] Lehrer, K., “Induction, Reason, and Consistency,” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, vol. 21, 1970, pp. 103–114.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[9] Salmon, W., “Consistency, Transitivity, and Inductive Support,” Ratio, vol. VII, 1965, pp. 164–169.Google Scholar
[10] Scheffler, I., The Anatomy of Inquiry. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1963.Google Scholar
[11] Skyrms, B., “Nomological Necessity and the Paradoxes of Confirmation,” Philosophy of Science, vol. 33, 1966, pp. 230–249.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[12] Smokier, H., “The Equivalence Condition,” American Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 4, 1967, pp. 300–307.Google Scholar
[13] Smokier, H., “Conflicting Conceptions of Confirmation,” The Journal of Philosophy, vol. LXV, 1968, pp. 300–312.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[14] Todd, W., “Probability and the Theorem of Confirmation,” Mind, vol. 76, 1967, pp. 260–263.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[15] Wallace, J. R., “Goodman, Logic, Induction,” The Journal of Philosophy, vol. LXIII, 1966, pp. 310–328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar