Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-m8qmq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-18T10:50:21.642Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

HOW TO SOLVE HUME'S PROBLEM OF INDUCTION

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 September 2017

Alexander Jackson
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper explains what's wrong with a Hume-inspired argument for skepticism about induction. Hume's argument takes as a premise that inductive reasoning presupposes that the future will resemble the past. I explain why that claim is not plausible. The most plausible premise in the vicinity is that inductive reasoning from E to H presupposes that if E then H. I formulate and then refute a skeptical argument based on that premise. Central to my response is a psychological explanation for how people judge that if E then H without realizing that they thereby settled the matter rationally.

Type
Articles
Information
Episteme , Volume 16 , Issue 2 , June 2019 , pp. 157 - 174
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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

Alter, A. and Oppenheimer, D. 2009. ‘Uniting the Tribes of Fluency to Form a Metacognitive Nation.’ Personality and Social Psychology Review, 13: 219–35.Google Scholar
Alter, A., Oppenheimer, D. and Epley, N. 2013. ‘Disfluency Prompts Analytic Thinking – But Not Always Greater Accuracy: Response to Thompson et al. (2013).’ Cognition, 128: 252–5.Google Scholar
Bogacz, R., Brown, E., Moehlis, J., Holmes, P. and Cohen, J. D. 2006. ‘The Physics of Optimal Decision Making: A Formal Analysis of Models of Performance in Two-Alternative Forced-Choice Tasks.’ Psychological Review, 113: 700–65.Google Scholar
Bogacz, R., Usher, M., Zhang, J. and McClelland, J. L. 2007. ‘Extending a Biologically Inspired Model of Choice: Multi-Alternatives, Nonlinearity and Value-Based Multidimensional Choice.’ Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 362: 1655–70.Google Scholar
Boghossian, P. 2001. ‘How are Objective Epistemic Reasons Possible?’ Philosophical Studies, 106: 340–80.Google Scholar
Boghossian, P. 2003. ‘Blind Reasoning.’ Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume, 77: 225–48.Google Scholar
Carruthers, P. 2011. The Opacity of Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Cohen, S. 2002. ‘Basic Knowledge and the Problem of Easy Knowledge.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 65: 309–29.Google Scholar
Coliva, A. 2015. Extended Rationality: A Hinge Epistemology. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Dogramaci, S. 2013. ‘Intuitions for Inferences.’ Philosophical Studies, 165: 371–99.Google Scholar
Easwaran, K. 2011a. ‘Bayesianism I: Introduction and Arguments in Favor.’ Philosophy Compass, 6: 312–20.Google Scholar
Easwaran, K. 2011b. ‘Bayesianism II: Applications and Criticisms.’ Philosophy Compass, 6: 321–32.Google Scholar
Evans, J. and Stanovich, K. 2013a. ‘Dual-Process Theories of Higher Cognition: Advancing the Debate.’ Perspectives on Psychological Science, 8: 223–41.Google Scholar
Evans, J. and Stanovich, K. 2013b. ‘Theory and Metatheory in the Study of Dual Processing: Reply to Comments.’ Perspectives on Psychological Science, 8: 263–71.Google Scholar
Greco, J. 2000. Putting Skeptics in their Place: The Nature of Skeptical Arguments and their Role in Philosophical Inquiry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Haack, S. 1976. ‘The Justification of Deduction.’ Mind, 85: 112–19.Google Scholar
Hall, N. and Hájek, A. 2002. ‘Induction and Probability.’ In Machamer, P. and Silberstein, M. (eds), The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of Science, pp. 149–72. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Harries, C., Evans, J. and Dennis, I. 2000. ‘Measuring Doctors' Self-insight into their Treatment Decisions.’ Applied Cognitive Psychology, 14: 455–77.Google Scholar
Hayes, B., Heit, E. and Swendsen, H. 2010. ‘Inductive Reasoning.’ WIREs Cognitive Science, 1: 278–92.Google Scholar
Hawthorne, J. 2004. Knowledge and Lotteries. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Howson, C. 2000. Hume's Problem: Induction and the Justification of Belief. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Huemer, M. 2001. Skepticism and the Veil of Perception. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.Google Scholar
Huemer, M. 2007. ‘Compassionate Phenomenal Conservatism.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 74: 30–55.Google Scholar
Hume, D. 2000. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Beauchamp, T. (ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jackson, A. 2015. ‘How You Know You Are Not a Brain In a Vat.’ Philosophical Studies, 172: 2799–822.Google Scholar
Jackson, A. Forthcoming. ‘How To Formulate Arguments From Easy Knowledge, and Maybe How to Resist Them.’ American Philosophical Quarterly.Google Scholar
Kelly, T. 2010. ‘Hume, Norton, and Induction without Rules.’ Philosophy of Science, 77(5): 754–64.Google Scholar
Koriat, A. 2007. ‘Metacognition and Consciousness.’ In Zelazo, P., Moscovitch, M. and Thompson, E. (eds), The Cambridge Handbook of Consciousness, pp. 289–325. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Koriat, A. 2011. ‘Subjective Confidence in Perceptual Judgments: A Test of the Self-Consistency Model.’ Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 140: 117–39.Google Scholar
Koriat, A. 2012. ‘The Self-Consistency Model of Subjective Confidence.’ Psychological Review, 119: 80–113.Google Scholar
Koriat, A. 2013. ‘Confidence in Personal Preferences.’ Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 26: 247–59.Google Scholar
Koriat, A. and Adiv, S. 2011. ‘The Construction of Attitudinal Judgments: Evidence From Attitude Certainty and Response Latency.’ Social Cognition, 29: 577–611.Google Scholar
Lange, M. 2002. ‘Okasha on Inductive Scepticism.’ Philosophical Quarterly, 52: 226–32.Google Scholar
Lange, M. 2004. ‘Would ‘Direct Realism’ Resolve the Classical Problem of Induction?’ Noûs, 38: 197–232.Google Scholar
Lange, M. 2011. ‘Hume and the Problem of Induction.’ In Gabbay, D., Hartmann, S. and Woods, J. (eds), Handbook of the History of Logic, Volume 10: Inductive Logic, pp. 43–91. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
McGlynn, A. 2017. ‘Epistemic Entitlement and the Leaching Problem.’ Episteme, 14: 89–102.Google Scholar
Moretti, L. 2015. ‘Phenomenal Conservatism.’ Analysis, 75: 296–309.Google Scholar
Nisbett, R. and Wilson, T. 1977. ‘Telling More Than We Can Know: Verbal Reports on Mental Processes.’ Psychological Review, 84: 231–59.Google Scholar
Norton, J. 2003. ‘A Material Theory of Induction.’ Philosophy of Science, 70: 647–70.Google Scholar
Norton, J. 2014. ‘A Material Dissolution of the Problem of Induction.’ Synthese, 191: 671–90.Google Scholar
Okasha, S. 2001. ‘What did Hume Really Show about Induction?’ Philosophical Quarterly, 51: 307–27.Google Scholar
Okasha, S. 2003. ‘Probabilistic Induction and Hume's Problem: Reply to Lange.’ Philosophical Quarterly, 53: 419–24.Google Scholar
Okasha, S. 2005. ‘Does Hume's Argument Against Induction Rest on a Quantifier-Shift Fallacy?’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 105: 253–71.Google Scholar
Papineau, D. 1993. Philosophical Naturalism. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Proust, J. 2013. The Philosophy of Metacognition: Mental Agency and Self-Awareness. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pryor, J. 2000. ‘The Skeptic and the Dogmatist.’ Noûs, 34: 517–49.Google Scholar
Pryor, J. 2012. ‘When Warrant Transmits.’ In Coliva, A. (ed.), Mind, Meaning, and Knowledge: Themes from the Philosophy of Crispin Wright, pp. 269–303. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Sloman, S. and Lagnado, D. 2005. ‘The Problem of Induction.’ In Holyoak, K. and Morrison, R. (eds), The Cambridge Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning, pp. 95–116. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Thompson, V. 2009. ‘Dual-Process Theories: A Metacognitive Perspective.’ In Evans, J. and Frankish, K. (eds), In Two Minds: Dual Processes and Beyond, pp. 171–95. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Thompson, V., Prowse Turner, J. and Pennycook, G. 2011. ‘Intuition, Reason, and Metacognition.’ Cognitive Psychology, 63: 107–40.Google Scholar
Thompson, V., Prowse Turner, J., Pennycook, G., Ball, L., Brack, H., Ophir, Y. and Ackerman, R. 2013a. ‘The Role of Answer Fluency and Perceptual Fluency as Metacognitive Cues for Initiating Analytic Thinking.’ Cognition, 128: 237–51.Google Scholar
Thompson, V., Ackerman, R., Sidi, Y., Ball, L. J., Pennycook, G. and Prowse Turner, J. A. 2013b. ‘The Role of Answer Fluency and Perceptual Fluency in the Monitoring and Control of Reasoning: Reply to Alter, Oppenheimer, and Epley (2013).’ Cognition, 128: 256–8.Google Scholar
Tucker, C. (ed.) 2013a. Seemings and Justification: New Essays on Dogmatism and Phenomenal Conservatism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Tucker, C. 2013b. ‘Seemings and Justification: An Introduction.’ In Tucker, C. (ed.), Seemings and Justification: New Essays on Dogmatism and Phenomenal Conservatism, pp. 1–29. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
van Cleve, J. 1984. ‘Reliability, Justification, and the Problem of Induction.’ In French, P., Uehling, T. and Wettstein, H. (eds), Midwest Studies in Philosophy IX: Causation and Causal Theories, pp. 555–67. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Vogel, J. 1990. ‘Are There Counterexamples to the Closure Principle?’ In Roth, M. and Ross, G. (eds), Doubting, pp. 13–27. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Weatherson, B. 2007. ‘The Bayesian and the Dogmatist.’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 107: 169–85.Google Scholar
Weatherson, B. 2014. ‘Probability and Scepticism.’ In Dodd, D. and Zardini, E. (eds), Scepticism and Perceptual Justification, pp. 71–86. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wedell, D. 1997. ‘Another Look at Reasons for Choosing and Rejecting.’ Memory and Cognition, 25: 873–87.Google Scholar
Weintraub, R. 2008. ‘Skepticism About Induction.’ In Greco, J. (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Skepticism, pp. 129–48. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Weisberg, J. 2011. ‘Varieties of Bayesianism.’ In Gabbay, D., Hartmann, S. and Woods, J. (eds), Handbook of the History of Logic, Volume 10: Inductive Logic, pp. 477–552. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Weisberg, J. 2015. ‘You've Come a Long Way, Bayesians’, Journal of Philosophical Logic, 40th Anniversary Issue, 44: 817–834.Google Scholar
White, R. 2015. ‘The Problem of the Problem of Induction.’ Episteme, 12: 275–90.Google Scholar
Wigton, R. 1996. ‘Social Judgement Theory and Medical Judgement.’ Thinking and Reasoning, 2: 175–90.Google Scholar
Wilson, T. 2002. Strangers to Ourselves. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.Google Scholar
Worrall, J. 2010. ‘For Universal Rules, Against Induction.’ Philosophy of Science, 77: 740–53.Google Scholar
Wright, C. 2002. ‘(Anti-)Sceptics Simple and Subtle: G.E. Moore and John McDowell.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 65: 330–48.Google Scholar
Wright, C. 2004. ‘Warrant For Nothing (And Foundations For Free)?’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Supplemental, 78: 167–212.Google Scholar