Bertrand Russell - On Induction

Vocabulary flashcards based on Bertrand Russell's text On Induction.

Principle of the Uniformity of Nature

The idea that the laws of nature that have held in the past will continue to hold in the future.

Principle of Induction

A general principle holding that the future will be like the past, enabling expectations about unobserved cases based on past experience.

Inductive Reasoning

Forward-looking reasoning based on past cases of a law being fulfilled, yielding expectations that are only probable rather than certain.

Crude Expectations of Uniformity

Instinctive expectations about future occurrences formed in humans and nonhuman animals by the frequent repetition of a uniform succession or coexistence, which can be misleading.

Uniformity of Nature (Russell's Explanation)

The idea that everything that has happened or will happen is an instance of some general law to which there are no exceptions.

Past Futures

Times or events that were in the future relative to an earlier time but have since become part of the past.

Cosmogonies

Theories of the origin of the Solar System or universe, cited as examples of unexperienced past events subject to the problem of induction.

Reign of Law

The belief that general laws without exception hold in the future or in unexamined cases in the past, a belief grounded in the principle of induction.