December 2013 Lunchtime Abstracts & Details

::: A Material Dissolution of the Problem of Induction
John D. Norton
University of Pittsburgh
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
12:05 pm, 817R CL

Abstract: In a formal theory of induction, inductive inferences are licensed by
universal schemas. In a material theory of induction, inductive inferences
are licensed by facts. With this change in the conception of the nature of
induction, I argue that the celebrated "problem of induction" can no longer
be set up and is thereby dissolved. Attempts to recreate the problem in the
material theory of induction fail. They require relations of inductive
support to conform to an unsustainable, hierarchical empiricism.