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hinking also known as the “bottom up” approach, moves from particular observations to a more
   
d theory or conclusion, it detects patterns and regularities; as well as, it helps to formulate tenetative
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s, from which we derive our generalized theory or conclusion. For example, if we see 100 cats, all with over 80,000 paper
colored coat, we could conclude that all cats have some type of coat, right? Wrong, there is such a    
sphynx; which is hairless. This intern becomes an error in reasoning also known as a fallacy.  

 
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, but we do have good practical inductive arguments based on repeated, accurate observations. The SAVE PAPER
would be and example given by Kirby Goodpastor and Levine (1999) of a sound inductive argument.    

y I notice that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. Though I’ll be dead in one hundred years, I
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tatements of probability not certainty. and easy to find."
 
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l, also known as the “if-then” form. An example of such would be, “If you don’t eat your dinner, then   have opened my eye
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Inductive reasoning does not
with a definite conclusion like deductive
does, but rather is based on past
on and observations of others. ....
Is Hume's Problem Of Induction .... as  
is no rational way of justifying these
s, but we still do it anyway and in his
on needed to it (he calls inductive
"the great ....
Francis Bacon created \"Idols\" during  
enaissance. He was focused on  
reasoning while earlier Aristotle
ocused on deductive reasoning. ....
.... evidence. Inductive  
will permit the reference of  
usions, which are well supported by their
is ....
.... By using inductive reasoning,
now that winter generally brings cold, and
weather, while summer generally brings  
hume vs. Induction The syllogism for the
above example of inductive reasoning
would appear as follows: These beans from
this bag are white (specific case) These
beans are white.
 
David Hume The syllogism for the above
example of inductive reasoning would
appear as follows: These beans from this bag
are white (specific case) These beans are
white.
 
Philosophy & Christian Beliefs arguments.
Aristotle used deductive and inductive
reasoning. Deductive specific. Inductive
reasoning argues from the specific to the
general. The
 
Study of Philosophy & Christian Beliefs
arguments. Aristotle used deductive and
inductive reasoning. Deductive specific.
Inductive reasoning argues from the specific
to the general. The
 
Hypotheses Francis Bacon basically defined
inductive reasoning which he viewed as an
accounting of a large number of observations
about nature.
David Hume What this denial of causation is,
in effect, is a complete denial of the possibility
of induction, of the process of inductive
reasoning, or of any sort of

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INDUCTIVE REASONING
FROM WIKIPEDIA, THE FREE ENCYCLOPEDIA
Jump to: navigation, search

For other article subjects named induction, see Induction.

This article is missing citations or needs footnotes. Please help add inline citations to guard
against copyright violations and factual inaccuracies. (December 2009)

Inductive reasoning, also known as induction or inductive logic, is a type of reasoning that involves moving
from a set of specific facts to a general conclusion.[1] It can also be seen as a form of theory-building, in which
specific facts are used to create a theory that explains relationships between the facts and allows prediction of
future knowledge. The premises of an inductive logical argument indicate some degree of support (inductive
probability) for the conclusion but do not entail it; i.e. they do not ensure its truth. Induction is used to ascribe
properties or relations to types based on an observation instance (i.e., on a number of observations or
experiences); or to formulate laws based on limited observations of recurring phenomenal patterns. Induction is
employed, for example, in using specific propositions such as:

This ice is cold. (Or: All ice I have ever touched has been cold.)

This billiard ball moves when struck with a cue. (Or: Of one hundred billiard balls struck
with a cue, all of them moved.)

...to infer general propositions such as:

All ice is cold.

All billiard balls move when struck with a cue.

Another example would be:

3+5=8 and eight is an even number. Therefore, an odd number added to another odd
number will result in an even number.

Note that mathematical induction is not a form of inductive reasoning. While mathematical induction may be
inspired by the non-base cases, the formulation of a base case firmly establishes it as a form of deductive
reasoning.

CONTENTS
[hide]

 1 Strong and weak induction

o 1.1 Strong induction
o 1.2 Weak induction
 2 Validity
 o 2.1 Criticism of inductive reasoning
 3 Types of inductive reasoning
o 3.1 Generalization
o 3.2 Statistical syllogism
o 3.3 Simple induction
 3.3.1 Argument from analogy
o 3.4 Causal inference
o 3.5 Prediction
 4 Bayesian inference
 5 See also
 6 Footnotes
 7 References
 8 External links

[EDIT] STRONG AND WEAK INDUCTION

[EDIT] STRONG INDUCTION
All observed crows are black.

Therefore:

All crows are black.

This exemplifies the nature of induction: inducing the universal from the particular. However, the conclusion is not
certain. Unless we can systematically falsify the possibility of crows of another colour, the statement (conclusion)
may actually be false.

For example, one could examine the bird's genome and learn whether it is capable of producing a differently
coloured bird. In doing so, we could discover that albinism is possible, resulting in light-coloured crows. Even if
you change the definition of "crow" to require blackness, the original question of the colour possibilities for a bird
of that species would stand, only semantically hidden.

A strong induction is thus an argument in which the truth of the premises would make the conclusion probable,
but not necessitate it as being factual.

[EDIT] WEAK INDUCTION

I always hang pictures on nails.

Therefore:

All pictures hang from nails.

Assuming the first statement to be true, this example is built on the certainty that "I always hang pictures on nails"
leading to the generalization that "All pictures hang from nails". However, the link between the premise and the
inductive conclusion is weak. No reason exists to believe that just because one person hangs pictures on nails
that there are no other ways for pictures to be hung, or that other people cannot do other things with pictures.
Indeed, not all pictures are hung from nails; moreover, not all pictures are hung. The conclusion cannot be
strongly inductively made from the premise. Using other knowledge we can easily see that this example of
induction would lead us to a clearly false conclusion. Conclusions drawn in this manner are usually
overgeneralisations.

Many speeding tickets are given to teenagers.

Therefore:
 All teenagers drive fast.

In this example, the premise is built upon a certainty; however, it is not one that leads to the conclusion. Not
every teenager observed has been given a speeding ticket. In other words, unlike "The sun rises every morning",
there are already plenty of examples of teenagers not being given speeding tickets. Therefore the conclusion
drawn is false. Moreover, when the link is weak, the inductive logic does not give us a strong conclusion. In both
of these examples of weak induction, the logical means of connecting the premise and conclusion (with the word
"therefore") are faulty, and do not give us a strong inductively reasoned statement.

[EDIT] VALIDITY
Main article: Problem of induction

Formal logic, as most people learn it, is deductive rather than inductive. It is controversial whether a logic of
induction is even possible. In contrast to deductive reasoning, conclusions arrived at by inductive reasoning do
not have the same degree of certainty as the initial premises. For example, a conclusion that all swans are white
is false, but may have been thought true in Europe until the settlement of Australia or New Zealand, when Black
Swans were discovered. Inductive arguments are never binding but they may be cogent. Inductive reasoning is
deductively invalid. (An argument in formal logic is valid if and only if it is not possible for the premises of the
argument to be true while the conclusion is false.) In induction there are always many conclusions that can
reasonably be related to certain premises. Inductions are open; deductions are closed. It is however possible to
derive a true statement using inductive reasoning if you know the conclusion. The only way to have an efficient
argument by induction is for the known conclusion to be able to be true only if an unstated external conclusion is
true, from which the initial conclusion was built and has certain criteria to be met in order to be true (separate
from the stated conclusion). By substitution of one conclusion for the other, you can inductively find out what
evidence you need in order for your induction to be true. For example, you have a window that opens only one
way, but not the other. Assuming that you know that the only way for that to happen is that the hinges are faulty,
inductively you can postulate that the only way for that window to be fixed would be to apply oil (whatever will fix
the unstated conclusion). From there on you can successfully build your case. However, if your unstated
conclusion is false, which can only be proven by deductive reasoning, then your whole argument by induction
collapses. Thus ultimately, inductive reasoning is not reliable.

The classic philosophical treatment of the problem of induction, meaning the search for a justification for
inductive reasoning, was by the Scottish philosopher David Hume. Hume highlighted the fact that our everyday
reasoning depends on patterns of repeated experience rather than deductively valid arguments. For example, we
believe that bread will nourish us because it has done so in the past, but this is not a guarantee that it will always
do so. As Hume said, someone who insisted on sound deductive justifications for everything would starve to
death.

Instead of approaching everything with severe skepticism, Hume advocated a practical skepticism based on
common sense, where the inevitability of induction is accepted.

Induction is sometimes framed as reasoning about the future from the past, but in its broadest sense it involves
reaching conclusions about unobserved things on the basis of what has been observed. Inferences about the
past from present evidence – for instance, as in archaeology, count as induction. Induction could also be across
space rather than time, for instance as in physical cosmology where conclusions about the whole universe are
drawn from the limited perspective we are able to observe (see cosmic variance); or in economics, where
national economic policy is derived from local economic performance.

Twentieth-century philosophy has approached induction very differently. Rather than a choice about what
predictions to make about the future, induction can be seen as a choice of what concepts to fit to observations or
of how to graph or represent a set of observed data. Nelson Goodman posed a "new riddle of induction" by
inventing the property "grue" to which induction as a prediction about the future does not apply.

[EDIT] CRITICISM OF INDUCTIVE REASONING

Inductive reasoning has been attacked several times. Historically, David Hume denied its logical admissibility.
Sextus Empiricus questioned how the truth of the Universals can be established by examining some of the
particulars. Examining all the particulars is difficult as they are infinite in number.[2] During the twentieth century,
thinkers such as Karl Popper and David Miller have disputed the existence, necessity and validity of any
inductive reasoning, including probabilistic (Bayesian) reasoning.[3]
[EDIT] TYPES OF INDUCTIVE REASONING
[EDIT] GENERALIZATION

A generalization (more accurately, an inductive generalization) proceeds from a premise about a sample to a
conclusion about the population.

The proportion Q of the sample has attribute A.

Therefore:

The proportion Q of the population has attribute A.

Example

There are 20 balls in an urn, either black or white. To estimate their respective numbers you draw a sample of 4
balls and find that 3 are black, one is white. A good inductive generalisation would be: there are 15 black and 5
white balls in the urn.

How great the support is which the premises provide for the conclusion is dependent on (a) the number of
individuals in the sample group compared to the number in the population; and (b) the degree to which the
sample is representative of the population (which may be achieved by taking a random sample). The hasty
generalisation and biased sample are fallacies related to generalisation.

[EDIT] STATISTICAL SYLLOGISM

A statistical syllogism proceeds from a generalization to a conclusion about an individual.

A proportion Q of population P has attribute A.

An individual I is a member of P.

Therefore:

There is a probability which corresponds to Q that I has A.

The proportion in the first premise would be something like "3/5ths of", "all", "few", etc. Two dicto simpliciter
fallacies can occur in statistical syllogisms: "accident" and "converse accident".

[EDIT] SIMPLE INDUCTION

Simple induction proceeds from a premise about a sample group to a conclusion about another individual.

Proportion Q of the known instances of population P has attribute A.

Individual I is another member of P.

Therefore:

There is a probability corresponding to Q that I has A.

This is a combination of a generalization and a statistical syllogism, where the conclusion of the generalization is
also the first premise of the statistical syllogism.
[edit] Argument from analogy
Main article: False analogy

Some philosophers believe that an argument from analogy is a kind of inductive reasoning.

An argument from analogy has the following form:

I has attributes A, B, and C

J has attributes A and B

So, J has attribute C

An analogy relies on the inference that the attributes known to be shared (the similarities) imply that C is also a
shared property. The support which the premises provide for the conclusion is dependent upon the relevance
and number of the similarities between I and J. The fallacy related to this process is false analogy. As with other
forms of inductive argument, even the best reasoning in an argument from analogy can only make the conclusion
probable given the truth of the premises, not certain.

Analogical reasoning is very frequent in common sense, science, philosophy and the humanities, but sometimes
it is accepted only as an auxiliary method. A refined approach is case-based reasoning. For more information on
inferences by analogy, see Juthe, 2005.

[EDIT] CAUSAL INFERENCE

A causal inference draws a conclusion about a causal connection based on the conditions of the occurrence of
an effect. Premises about the correlation of two things can indicate a causal relationship between them, but
additional factors must be confirmed to establish the exact form of the causal relationship.

[EDIT] PREDICTION

A prediction draws a conclusion about a future individual from a past sample.

Proportion Q of observed members of group G have had attribute A.

Therefore:

There is a probability corresponding to Q that other members of group G will have

attribute A when next observed.

[EDIT] BAYESIAN INFERENCE

Of the candidate systems for an inductive logic, the most influential is Bayesianism. This uses probability theory
as the framework for induction. Given new evidence, Bayes' theorem is used to evaluate how much the strength
of a belief in a hypothesis should change.

There is debate around what informs the original degree of belief. Objective Bayesians seek an objective value
for the degree of probability of a hypothesis being correct and so do not avoid the philosophical criticisms of
objectivism. Subjective Bayesians hold that prior probabilities represent subjective degrees of belief, but that the
repeated application of Bayes' theorem leads to a high degree of agreement on the posterior probability. They
therefore fail to provide an objective standard for choosing between conflicting hypotheses. The theorem can be
used to produce a rational justification for a belief in some hypothesis, but at the expense of rejecting objectivism.
Such a scheme cannot be used, for instance, to decide objectively between conflicting scientific paradigms.

Edwin Jaynes, an outspoken physicist and Bayesian, argued that "subjective" elements are present in all
inference, for instance in choosing axioms for deductive inference; in choosing initial degrees of belief or prior
probabilities; or in choosing likelihoods. He thus sought principles for assigning probabilities from qualitative
knowledge. Maximum entropy – a generalization of the principle of indifference – and transformation groups are
the two tools he produced. Both attempt to alleviate the subjectivity of probability assignment in specific situations
by converting knowledge of features such as a situation's symmetry into unambiguous choices for probability
distributions.

Cox's theorem, which derives probability from a set of logical constraints on a system of inductive reasoning,
prompts Bayesians to call their system an inductive logic.

[EDIT] SEE ALSO

Thinking portal

Logic portal

 Abductive reasoning
 Analogy
 Deductive reasoning
 Explanation
 Falsifiability
 Inductive reasoning aptitude
 Inductive Logic Programming
 Inferential statistics
 Inquiry
 Logic
 Machine learning
 Mathematical induction
 Raven paradox
 Retroduction
 Laurence Jonathan Cohen

[EDIT] FOOTNOTES

1. ^ "Induction definition". Yourdictionary.com. 2005. http://www.yourdictionary.com/induction.

Retrieved 2009-08-20.
2. ^ Sextus Empiricus, Outlines Of Pyrrhonism. Trans. R.G. Bury, Harvard University Press,
Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1933, p. 283.
3. ^ Karl R. Popper, David W. Miller: A proof of the impossibility of inductive probability.
Nature 302 (1983), 687–688.

[EDIT] REFERENCES

 Herms, D. "Logical Basis of Hypothesis Testing in Scientific Research" (pdf).

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~bio125/logic.Giere.pdf .
 Kemerling, G (2001-10-27). "Causal Reasoning". http://www.philosophypages.com/lg/e14.htm .
 Holland, JH; Holyoak KJ; Nisbett RE; Thagard PR (1989). Induction: Processes of
Inference, Learning, and Discovery. Cambridge, MA, USA: MIT Press. ISBN 0262580969.
 Holyoak, K; Morrison R (2005). The Cambridge Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning.
New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521824170.

[EDIT] EXTERNAL LINKS

  Four Varieties of Inductive Argument from the Department of Philosophy, University of North
Carolina at Greensboro.
 Inductive Logic from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
 Properties of Inductive ReasoningPDF (166 KiB), a psychological review by Evan Heit of the
University of California, Merced.

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