A Priori – Latin for before sense
experience sense experience
A priori truths are those that are true by
definition, e.g. all bachelors are unmarried
men.
A priori truths are necessarily true, i.e. they
couldn't be any other way.
Hume called a priori truths 'relations of
ideas', meaning that these are truths that
consist of concepts being linked together in
the mind. They do not require experience for
us to judge their truth.
A priori thinking takes a deductive
reasoning approach. Deductive reasoning
involves assembling statements that when
combined together produce a conclusion
backed by logical certainty, e.g. all swans are
white – Clive is a swan – therefore Clive is
white.
Analytic statements are those which
depend on the meaning of their constituent
terms to be true, e.g. 'all reporters are
journalists.' Journalist is simply the umbrella
term for those who work in the media, so this
statement will always be true.
If the premises of a deductive argument are
sound, then the conclusion is a certainty.
Denial entails contradiction – if something
really is an a priori truth (rather than a mere
assertion) it cannot be wrong.
A Posteriori – Latin for after
A posteriori truths are empirically true, in
other words information gathered through
our senses has told us it's true: e.g.
hearing a confession.
A posteriori truths are contingently true,
meaning they are true only if we have not
been deceived or misled in some way, e.g.
we could have misheard or the person
confessing could have been lying.
Hume called a posteriori truths 'matters of
fact', meaning that when we discuss them
we acknowledge the need to establish if
something is a fact or not. Matters of fact
are not true by definition.
A posteriori thinking uses inductive
reasoning, this is where we gather
evidence about specific instances to try
and formulate a generalised law, e.g. every
time I drop a paperweight it falls - this
might be explained by a law of gravity.
Synthetic statements are those which
depend on an outside factor for their truth,
e.g. the assertion 'the Queen is the richest
woman in the UK' would need to be
checked and might vary over time.
If the premises of an inductive argument
are sound then at best this gives a high
probability that the conclusion of the
argument is true.
Denial does not entail contradiction – if
something is an a posteriori truth it is not
illogical to challenge it (though we would
be wrong), since the state of affairs could
have been different.