Hi, Gary,
Here the known rule is "All the beans from this bag are white." The
hypothesis is "These beans are from this bag." From there one may deduce
implications of these beans' being from this bag, tests of which would
usefully corroborate the rule if the rule were in doubt, but would not,
of itself, fully confirm it. To confirm it well, one would want to find
some way to check the beans currently in the bag, perhaps even track
down (by evidence other than their whiteness) beans taken from the bag
in the past and observing whether they're white, or at least whether
fair samples are consistently white. But is there any reason in Peirce's
example to suppose that it's in question whether all the beans in the
bag are white?
In the 1878 beans example, Peirce says,
Suppose I enter a room and there find a number of bags, containing
different kinds of beans. On the table there is a handful of white
beans; and, after some searching, I find one of the bags contains
white beans only. I at once infer as a probability, or a fair guess,
that this handful was taken out of that bag. This sort of inference
is called _/making an hypothesis/_. It is the inference of a
_/case/_ from a _/rule/_ and _/result/_.
[ https://books.google.com/books?id=u8sWAQAAIAAJ&jtp=472 ]
In that example, the reasoner finds the bag of white beans _/after/_ the
observation of white beans on the table. Still, the rule that all that
bag's beans are white is not a conjecture, but an observation (if the
reasoner has observed all the beans in that bag). As a perceptual
judgment, it is essentially abductive, but it is not in doubt, and it
really doesn't make a difference to the idea of hypothesis whether the
rule came to be known before or after the surprising observation. The
hypothesis in question is, instead, that the beans on the table are from
the bag of white beans.
In 1903, Peirce discusses the case where a rule (or law) already known
_/before/_ the surprising observation
[....] The mind seeks to bring the facts, as modified by the new
discovery, into order; that is, to form a general conception
embracing them. In some cases, it does this by an act of
_/generalization /_. In other cases, no new law is suggested, but
only a peculiar state of facts that will "explain" the surprising
phenomenon; and a law already known is recognized as applicable to
the suggested hypothesis, so that the phenomenon, under that
assumption, would not be surprising, but quite likely, or even would
be a necessary result. This synthesis suggesting a new conception or
hypothesis, is the Abduction. [....]
(From "Syllabus", 1903, EP 2:287
http://www.commens.org/dictionary/entry/quote-syllabus-syllabus-course-lectures-lowell-institute-beginning-1903-nov-23-some
)
Best, Ben
On 4/25/2016 4:20 PM, Gary Richmond wrote:
Ben, you wrote:
Many of Peirce's examples of abductive inference involve merely
the extension of a known rule to cover a surprising case. The
beans example is classic, from 1878 in "Deduction, Induction, and
Hypothesis".
All the beans from this bag are white.
These beans are white.
∴ these beans are from this bag.'
Again, I don't think that it's a matter of "merely the extension of a
known rule," but rather of the /supposition/ that there *is* a rule
(i.e., my hypothesis should it be shown to be true through
experimental testing, say). That rule was /not/ earlier known, but
now--if my hypothesis is valid--it is known.
Best,
Gary R
Gary Richmond
*Gary Richmond
Philosophy and Critical Thinking
Communication Studies
LaGuardia College of the City University of New York
C 745
718 482-5690*
On Mon, Apr 25, 2016 at 2:43 PM, Benjamin Udell wrote:
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