David Hume Induction Argument

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Induction is the practice of drawing general conclusions based on particular experiences. While this approach is important to empiricism and the scientific method, there is always something uncertain about it, because we may get new data that are different and that challenge our previous conclusions. The principle of induction teaches us that we can predict the future based on what has happened in the past, which we cannot. There is a premise that says that the only way to justify induction would be to give a deductive argument or to give and inductive argument. However, according to Hume, there is not a deductive argument that can do this task. Hume’s supports this by saying that a conclusion that is false is likely to contradict the truth …show more content…

The first justification is functional: It is only logical that the future must resemble the past. Hume pointed out that we could just as easily imagine a world of chaos, so logic cannot guarantee our inductions. The second justification is that we can assume that something will continue to happen because it has always happened before. To Hume, this kind of reasoning is circular and lacks a foundation in reason. So what is wrong with this circularity? It seems that if you could justify inductive reasoning inductively, why then couldn’t people look into the future to justify the process of looking into the future to gain information? Or, using the very same “inductive” evidence that you have that counter-inductive reasoning does not work, why couldn’t a person using counter-inductive reasoning counter-inductively justify the counter-inductive method? Someone using inductive reasoning would draw from this the conclusion that inductive reasoning will always work better than counter-inductive reasoning, a person using counter-inductive reasoning would draw the opposite conclusion: that counter-inductive reasoning is now more likely than ever before to be more successful than inductive

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