Topic: Counterfactuals
Gestalt Effects in Counterfactual and Abductive Inference
By Claudio Pizzi
This paper begins by focusing the basic idea that Gestalt phenomena belong not only to the realm of perception but to the realm of inference. It is shown that Gestalt effects (i.e. the derivability of incompatible indifferent conclusions on the basis of the same background information) often occur both in counterfactual and in ampliative – i.e. inductive and abductive – reasoning. The main thesis of the paper is that the common feature of such forms of non-deductive reasoning is provided by a rational selection between incompatible conclusions, where rationality lies in the choice of the alternative which preserves the maximum of background information. It is also stressed a distinction between a weak and a strong notion of incompatibility. Such distinction may help in giving account of some alleged Gestalt phenomena which have been recognized in theory construction and theory change.
Keywords: Abduction, Counterfactuals, Induction, Gestalt, Rationality
To appear in the L. J. of the IGPL
Posted by Tony Marmo
at 00:01 BST
Updated: Wednesday, 12 April 2006 05:49 BST
