Neha Gupta (Linacre College): 'A Newer Riddle of Induction and its Grounding-based Solution'
Abstract: One reason for positing structure is that doing so helps us reason inductively—in particular, it resolves Goodman's new riddle of induction. In this talk, I propose a newer riddle of induction. Namely, sometimes, when one has never encountered anything that is either F or G, upon first observing an individual that is F and G, one’s credence in the hypothesis “All Fs are Gs” should be higher than that of “All Gs are Fs”. How do we account for this difference? I argue that no structure-based principle can do so. Neither can any principle relying on less suspect notions, such as causation, necessity, or empirical knowledge. But a grounding-based principle can. Thus, we have reason to posit grounding rather than structure.
