Abstract

The problem of induction has long been one of the central problems of empiricist epistemology. There are two main versions of this problem: to justify a strictly universal statement on the basis of a finite set of singular statements and to justify a new singular statement on the basis of some finite set of accepted singular statements. In both cases it is assumed that we have a set of singular statements with which to begin and that these singular statements are, somehow, provided by observation; neither of these assumptions will be disputed in this paper. But there is another assumption without which there might well be no problem of induction:A. Any synthetic statement which is to be accepted as known must be justified on the basis of observation.It is only because philosophers assume A that they are faced with the problem of showing how we can infer from statements which have been justified by observation to others which have not. It is this assumption which will concern us here, for if there are no adequate grounds for accepting A, the problem of induction may not arise at all.