Means-ends epistemology
British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 50 (1):1-31 (1999)
| Abstract | This paper describes the corner-stones of a means-ends approach to the philosophy of inductive inference. I begin with a fallibilist ideal of convergence to the truth in the long run, or in the 'limit of inquiry'. I determine which methods are optimal for attaining additional epistemic aims (notably fast and steady convergence to the truth). Means-ends vindications of (a version of) Occam's Razor and the natural generalizations in a Goodmanian Riddle of Induction illustrate the power of this approach. The paper establishes a hierarchy of means-ends notions of empirical success, and discusses a number of issues, results and applications of means-ends epistemology. | |||||||||
| Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,631 |
| External links |
 |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesThomas Scanlon (2008). Moral Dimensions: Permissibility, Meaning, Blame. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
Michael Byron (1998). Satisficing and Optimality. Ethics 109 (1):67-93.
Gregory Mellema (1984). The Nature of Aims and Ends in Education. Philosophy Research Archives 10:321-336.
Rajendra Prasad (ed.) (1989). Ends and Means in Private and Public Life. Indian Institute of Advanced Study in Association with Indus Pub. Co., New Delhi.
O. Schulte (2000). Discussion. What to Believe and What to Take Seriously: A Reply to David Chart Concerning the Riddle of Induction. British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 51 (1):151-153.
Oliver Schulte (1999). The Logic of Reliable and Efficient Inquiry. Journal of Philosophical Logic 28 (4):399-438.
Daniel J. O.’Keefe (2012). Conviction, Persuasion, and Argumentation: Untangling the Ends and Means of Influence. Argumentation 26 (1):19-32.
Gerald Gaus (2008). Reasonable Utility Functions and Playing the Cooperative Way. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 11 (2):215-234.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-28Total downloads13 ( #87,789 of 548,974 )Recent downloads (6 months)1 ( #63,511 of 548,974 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
