Table of Contents 1 163

Inferring and Explaining

Cover Page 1
Title Page 2
Copyright Page 3
Contents 4
Preface 8
Practical Epistemology 8
Critical Thinking 9
To My Student Readers 9
To My Fellow Philosophy Instructors 10
Two Further Debts 10
Notes 10
Chapter One. Valuing Truth 12
A Lofty Goal and a Practical Goal 12
The Skills and Values You Already Have 13
Truth and the Contemporary Academic Culture 14
Truth and the Popular Culture: The Need to Respect Differences 15
Truth and the Popular Culture: “Fake News” and “Alternative Facts” 16
A Plea for Critical Thinking 18
Exercises 18
Quiz One 19
Notes 19
Chapter Two. Skepticism 20
Descartes and the Arena of Reason 20
Confidence-Undermining Possibilities 21
Dreaming and the External World 22
The Evil Computer Scientist 23
Can I Know Anything? 24
The Quest for Certainty 25
Exercises 26
Quiz Two 26
Notes 26
Chapter Three. The Concept of Knowledge 28
Definitions and Word Games 28
The Myth of Definition 29
The Need for Conceptual Clarity 30
Knowledge and Belief 31
The Search for the Truth 32
Epistemic Justification 32
What Does It Take to Be Justified? 33
An Unsolved Problem 34
Exercises 35
Quiz Three 35
Notes 35
Chapter Four. Arguments 36
The Importance of Arguments 36
What Is an Argument? 37
Logical Connection 39
Inference to the Best Explanation 39
A Couple of Arguments from Sherlock Holmes 40
Schematizing the Argument 44
Start at the Bottom (Find the Conclusion) 45
Find the Relevant Evidence 45
Another Brokenhearted Teenager 46
Exercises 46
Quiz Four 46
Notes 46
Chapter Five. Inference to the Best Explanation 48
Inference to the Best Explanation 48
Schematizing Connie’s Argument 49
Rival Explanations (of Connie’s Data) 49
Rank Ordering Explanations (for Connie’s Argument) 50
Assessment of (Connie’s) Evidence 51
What about Ties? 52
The Origins of Natural Language 52
The Argument Schematized 53
Rival Explanations (of Pinker and Bloom’s Data) 53
Ideal Agnostics 55
Rank Ordering the Explanations (for Pinker and Bloom’s Argument) 55
Disagreements 56
Don’t Forget about the Final Assessment of the Evidence! 57
A Magical Encore? 57
Exercises 57
Quiz Five 58
Notes 58
Chapter Six. New Data and Experimentation 60
The Crazy Philosopher’s Evidence 60
Why Don’t You Just Test It? 61
A Pretty Picture of Science 62
A Better, But Untidy, Picture of Scientific Disconfirmation 63
A Better, But Untidy, Picture of Scientific Confirmation 65
The Significance of New Data 65
Exercises 66
Quiz Six 66
Notes 67
Chapter Seven. Semmelweis and Childbed Fever: A Case Study 68
Childbed Fever 68
Ignác Fülöp Semmelweis 69
The Vienna General Hospital 70
What Was Then Known 71
Differences in the Divisions 71
“Fortuitous” New Data 73
An Experiment and a Treatment 73
Semmelweis’s Evidence 74
The Tragedy of Semmelweis 75
Exercises 76
Quiz Seven 76
Notes 76
Chapter Eight. Darwin and Common Descent 78
Making Sense of What Is Already Known 78
The Two Theories 79
Rival Explanations to Common Descent 80
The Expanded Age of the Earth 81
The Fossil Record 81
The Scala Naturae, or the Natural System 82
Patterns of Geographical Distribution 82
Morphological Facts 83
Embryological Facts 84
Darwin’s Evidence for Descent with Modification 85
Natural Selection 86
One Long Argument 87
Exercises 88
Quiz Eight 88
Notes 88
Chapter Nine. Testimony 90
A Letter of Recommendation 90
Testimony regarding Miracles 93
Exercises 95
Quiz Nine 95
Notes 95
Chapter Ten. Textual Interpretation 98
Sounds, Shapes, Gestures, and Dashes and Dots 98
Inference to the Best Explanation and Textual Interpretation 99
Authorial Intention 100
A Notorious Interpretation of Hamlet 100
A Contemporary Psychological Interpretation of Hamlet 102
Exercises and Quiz Ten 104
Notes 104
Chapter Eleven. Statistics: Making Sense of the Numbers 106
What Numbers Can Tell Us 106
Samples and Populations 107
Couldn’t It Just Be a Fluke? 108
Couldn’t the Sample Be Biased? 109
Naomi Oreskes’s Study 111
Rival Explanations of the Sample 112
The Best Explanation? 114
Exercises 114
Quiz Eleven 115
Notes 115
Chapter Twelve. Correlations and Causes 118
Correlations 118
Explaining the Numbers 119
Explaining the Correlations 119
CO2 and Global Temperatures 120
Causation and Explanation 122
A Sad Story 123
Exercises 126
Quiz Twelve 126
Notes 126
Chapter Thirteen. Capital Punishment and the Constitution 128
Arguments from Pure Principle: For and against the Death Penalty 128
Constitutional Texts 129
Precedent 130
Inference to the Best Constitutional Interpretation 130
Some Key Constitutional Text 131
Some Key Constitutional Precedent 133
Statistics and the Death Penalty 136
A Causal Explanation of the Correlation 138
Some Other Contingent Realities 139
Exercises 140
Quiz Thirteen 140
Notes 140
Chapter Fourteen. Evidence, Explanation, and Narrative 142
Legal Storytelling 142
O. J. Simpson 144
Abe and His Daughter 145
Stories That Make Sense of Things 146
Mary Ann and Wanda 147
Geneva and Brown v. Board of Education 148
Fabula and Sjuzet 150
Inference to the Best Narrative 151
Exercises 152
Quiz Fourteen 152
Notes 152
Chapter Fifteen. Explanatory Virtue and Truth 154
Two Huge Problems 154
Literary Darwinism 157
Sally and Ann 158
Disagreement 159
Truth 160
Exercises 162
Quiz Fifteen 162
Notes 162

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