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Parsimony and predictive equivalence

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Abstract

If a parsimony criterion may be used to choose between theories that make different predictions, may the same criterion be used to choose between theories that are predictively equivalent? The work of the statistician H. Akaike (1973) is discussed in connection with this question. The results are applied to two examples in which parsimony has been invoked to choose between philosophical theories-Shoemaker's (1969) discussion of the possibility of time without change and the discussion by Smart (1959) and Brandt and Kim (1967) of mind/body dualism and the identity theory.

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Sober, E. Parsimony and predictive equivalence. Erkenntnis 44, 167–197 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00166500

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