Hume's Problem Solved: The Optimality of Meta-Induction - Couverture rigide

Schurz, Gerhard

Couverture rigide

ISBN 10 : 0262039729 ISBN 13 : 9780262039727

Editeur : The MIT Press, 2019

Synopsis

A new approach to Hume's problem of induction that justifies the optimality of induction at the level of meta-induction.

Hume's problem of justifying induction has been among epistemology's greatest challenges for centuries. In this book, Gerhard Schurz proposes a new approach to Hume's problem. Acknowledging the force of Hume's arguments against the possibility of a noncircular justification of the reliability of induction, Schurz demonstrates instead the possibility of a noncircular justification of the optimality of induction, or, more precisely, of meta-induction (the application of induction to competing prediction models). Drawing on discoveries in computational learning theory, Schurz demonstrates that a regret-based learning strategy, attractivity-weighted meta-induction, is predictively optimal in all possible worlds among all prediction methods accessible to the epistemic agent. Moreover, the a priori justification of meta-induction generates a noncircular a posteriori justification of object induction. Taken together, these two results provide a noncircular solution to Hume's problem.

Schurz discusses the philosophical debate on the problem of induction, addressing all major attempts at a solution to Hume's problem and describing their shortcomings; presents a series of theorems, accompanied by a description of computer simulations illustrating the content of these theorems (with proofs presented in a mathematical appendix); and defends, refines, and applies core insights regarding the optimality of meta-induction, explaining applications in neighboring disciplines including forecasting sciences, cognitive science, social epistemology, and generalized evolution theory. Finally, Schurz generalizes the method of optimality-based justification to a new strategy of justification in epistemology, arguing that optimality justifications can avoid the problems of justificatory circularity and regress.

A propos du livre

À propos de l?auteur

Gerhard Schurz is Director of the Düsseldorf Center for Logic and Philosophy of Science at Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: The MIT Press
• Date d'édition: 2019
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 0262039729
• ISBN 13: 9780262039727
• Reliure: Relié
• Nombre de pages: 400
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: non disponible