Bayesianism and inference to the best explanation
Theoria 23 (1):89-106 (2008)
Abstract
Bayesianism and Inference to the best explanation are two different models of inference. Recently there has been some debate about the possibility of “bayesianizing” IBE. Firstly I explore several alternatives to include explanatory considerations in Bayes’s Theorem. Then I distinguish two different interpretations of prior probabilities: “IBE-Bayesianism” and “frequentist-Bayesianism”. After detailing the content of the latter, I propose a rule for assessing the priors. I also argue that Freq-Bay: endorses a role for explanatory value in the assessment of scientific hypotheses; avoids a purely subjectivist reading of prior probabilities; and fits better than IBE-Bayesianism with two basic facts about science, i.e., the prominent role played by empirical testing and the existence of many scientific theories in the past that failed to fulfil their promises and were subsequently abandoned.Author's Profile
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0495-4548
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Citations of this work
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Beyond Belief : On the Nature and Rationality of Agnostic Religion.Carl-Johan Palmqvist - 2020 - Printed in Sweden by Media-Tryck, Lund University.
Coherence and probability: A probabilistic account of coherence.Roche William - 2013 - In M. Araszkiewicz & J. Savelka (eds.), Coherence: Insights from philosophy, jurisprudence and artificial intelligence. Dordrecht: Springer. pp. 59-91.
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Grading the Quality of Evidence of Mechanisms.Stefan Dragulinescu - 2018 - Dissertation, University of Kent
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