The principles of science : $b a treatise on logic and scientific methodJevons, William Stanley
Philosophy
The principles of science : $b a treatise on logic and scientific method
Jevons, William Stanley
Logic; Science -- Methodology
Compare again the difficulty of decyphering with that of cyphering.
Anyone can invent a secret language, and with a little steady labour
can translate the longest letter into the character. But to decypher
the letter, having no key to the signs adopted, is a wholly different
matter. As the possible modes of secret writing are infinite in number
and exceedingly various in kind, there is no direct mode of discovery
whatever. Repeated trial, guided more or less by knowledge of the
customary form of cypher, and resting entirely on the principles of
probability and logical induction, is the only resource. A peculiar
tact or skill is requisite for the process, and a few men, such as
Wallis or Wheatstone, have attained great success.
Induction is the decyphering of the hidden meaning of natural
phenomena. Given events which happen in certain definite combinations,
we are required to point out the laws which govern those combinations.
Any laws being supposed, we can, with ease and certainty, decide
whether the phenomena obey those laws. But the laws which may exist
are infinite in variety, so that the chances are immensely against
mere random guessing. The difficulty is much increased by the fact
that several laws will usually be in operation at the same time, the
effects of which are complicated together. The only modes of discovery
consist either in exhaustively trying a great number of supposed laws,
a process which is exhaustive in more senses than one, or else in
carefully contemplating the effects, endeavouring to remember cases
in which like effects followed from known laws. In whatever manner we
accomplish the discovery, it must be done by the more or less conscious
application of the direct process of deduction.
The Logical Alphabet illustrates induction as well as deduction. In
considering the Indirect Process of Inference we found that from
certain propositions we could infallibly determine the combinations
of terms agreeing with those premises. The inductive problem is just
the inverse. Having given certain combinations of terms, we need to
ascertain the propositions with which the combinations are consistent,
and from which they may have proceeded. Now, if the reader contemplates
the following combinations,
ABC *ab*C
*a*BC *abc*,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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