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From: jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton)
Subject: Re: Heliocentricism (Re: THE PURPOSE OF LIFE Defined & Gaia)
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References: <3g0otg$jam@ccshst05.cs.uoguelph.ca> <D2z3yu.483@cogsci.ed.ac.uk> <3g6a3p$9a8@mp.cs.niu.edu>
Date: Fri, 27 Jan 1995 20:00:45 GMT
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In article <3g6a3p$9a8@mp.cs.niu.edu> rickert@cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert) writes:
>In <D2z3yu.483@cogsci.ed.ac.uk> jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton) writes:
>>In article <3g0otg$jam@ccshst05.cs.uoguelph.ca> bmyers@uoguelph.ca (Brendan P Myers) writes:
>>>jerrybro@uclink2.berkeley.edu wrote:
>
>>>: But not the argument, "if P then Q, Q, so let's suppose P for the
>>>: time being."  This is abduction, and it's used all the time.
>
>>>	I think the point Jeff was trying to make is that only a 
>>>deduction *must* be true; inductions and other forms of reasoning are 
>>>only *likely* to be true but not nessisarily so.
>
>>I was trying to indicate that it's not just the benighted "theologians
>>and others" that Galileo had to deal with who think there's something
>>wrong with arguments of that form: we modern folk think so too.
>
>Most likely, Galileo was not using that sort of argument.

That's what I said as well.  I also suggested that in addition to
positive arguments for his own views he may have had negative
arguments against the received view.

>I would guess that he was using an argument of the form:
>
>	If P then (Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4,..... Qn)
>	Moreover Q1, Q2, ..., seem to be otherwise unrelated.
>	(Q1, Q2, ...) are true.
>
>	Therefore P is well supported by the evidence.
>
>The difference is that there is a whole complex conceptual structure
>involved.  Even if P has not been proved with absolute certainty, it
>might be useful to tentatively assume it, for such an assumption is
>one which unifies and organizes.

That makes sense, though such arguments are not always convincing.
Consider, e.g., Julian Jaynes in his _Origin of Consciousness_ or
(it seems to me) Chomsky, Pinker, and others when arguing for their
views on language learning.

-- jeff
