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28th May 2013, 08:38 AM | #1 |
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The problem of induction
Why are black swans called black swans, but tigers are not called stripy lions?
Why don't we decide that all swans are white, and that swan-shaped birds of other colours should be called something else? |
28th May 2013, 09:18 AM | #2 |
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Because the meaning of the word "swan" doesn't include a definition of its colour. It might have done, but it doesn't. The very saying, current in Europe prior to the discovery of Australia, "all swans are white" implies that they might be some other colour without ceasing to qualify as swans.
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28th May 2013, 09:41 AM | #3 |
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28th May 2013, 10:00 AM | #4 |
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28th May 2013, 01:06 PM | #5 |
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In some cases, we do.
The issue is that taxonomy is extremely difficult. It requires an in-depth knowledge of numerous groups of organisms, to the point where you known what traits are important for each individual group (remembering that groups can be subgroups of other groups--it's a nested heirarchy). In swans, color isn't a significant variation--meaning that it's not sufficient to differentiate between species. In other groups, it might be. Then there's the issue of farming. Biologically there's no difference between a kid and a goat, or a calf and a heffer and a cow outside of ontogeny. But if you try to sell me a cow when I ask for a calf I'm going to be very upset with you. Nothing to do with induction, though. This is an issue of semantics and communication, not logic. |
28th May 2013, 03:04 PM | #6 |
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We refer to black swans by their color because white swans are far more common. When people hear the word "swan", they tend to picture the white variety. Specifying that the swan is black helps correct a possible misunderstanding. If you lived in an area where swans were predominantly black, you'd probably use the phrase "white swan" to refer to other kinds of swan. We don't call tigers stripy lions because lions are not tigers. They're different species. It's not just fur pattern that sets them apart. |
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28th May 2013, 08:41 PM | #7 |
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Which 'we' are you referring to? Amidst the murk of meaning...much can be made of nothing. Where lies the final arbiter? Perhaps 'we' need to establish a global court of naming...where all conflicts, contradictions, inconsistencies, and disputes can be reviewed. Doubtless the lawyers so engaged will enjoy a profitable life. Methinks the occurrence of black swans is ultimately attributable to the tower of Babel. Thus...God done it (though, to be fair, God must eventually acknowledge universal culpability). |
28th May 2013, 08:57 PM | #8 |
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David Foster Wallace had a story about the problem of induction, which I'll paraphrase. As a kid he spent his summers on a farm and his favorite chicken was called "Mr. Chicken". Every day a man would appear with a bag of feed and upon seeing him Mr. Chicken would start pecking at the ground in anticipation. Then one day the man showed up with an empty bag. Mr. Chicken started the routine of warm up pecks but was abruptly yanked out of the pen to have its neck broken and was then placed in the sack.
Induction is pretty damn useful, but it does have its downsides sometimes. |
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28th May 2013, 09:05 PM | #9 |
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We call the Black Swan (Cygnus atratus) by that name because that the common name of that particular species of swan throughout the English-speaking world. Yes, they happen to be black in color, and uniquely so, and that's also likely how they got the name. But strictly speaking, we call them Black Swans because that's what they're called, not because they're black. And that's what they're called in Australia too. There's no species known as a White Swan. But more importantly, why is the Black Swan a common topic of conversation these days? Because Nassim Nicholas Taleb has popularized the Black Swan concept in his books over the last 10 years, to illustrate how we live in a reality where unpredictable events can and do have profound impacts. If you get hung up with word games, you will have missed the point. This is about Uncertainty. |
29th May 2013, 10:32 AM | #10 |
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Is it fair to assume that all swans have very long necks? How accurate is this assumption when faced with a goose? Or should we assume that all zebras are stripy when faced with a donkey - or even a zorse?
I don't think the fact that some black swan-shaped birds are called black swans proves the unexpected can happen. It does, however, highlight the erratic nature of nomenclature. |
29th May 2013, 10:39 AM | #11 |
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As for the Mr Chicken story, I'm not convinced that highlights the problem of induction either. Rather it shows the limits of observation. In the example, Mr Chicken was unable to observe that the conditions were not the same, and therefore realise that a different result might occur.
For my money, induction refers to the assumption that the exact same conditions will lead to the exact same outcome. Having a variable (hidden or otherwise) in the mix is not a problem with induction but a problem with incorrect or limited observation. |
29th May 2013, 10:45 AM | #12 |
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29th May 2013, 11:12 AM | #13 |
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Because that's how language works. English speaking people, who are the only ones these specific questions relate to, learned about lions and tigers and received words for them, along paths that gave distinct words for the different species. When at a much later date English speaking people encountered birds related to and very similar to the exclusively white swan family they naturally considered them a new kind of swan, a black one.
Some English speaking people did something similar when encountering a big cat in the Americas, but mountain lion was apparently coined much later than the borrowing of several of the words already used for the big cats. And as has been mentioned before, the problem of induction is a philosophical question that isn't dependent on the language used to express it, or nitpicky flaws in oft used simplifying examples. |
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29th May 2013, 11:25 AM | #14 |
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29th May 2013, 11:32 AM | #15 |
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I think a better understanding of the problem of induction could be had by exploring the differences between the Black Rhino and the White Rhino. So long as a nice bottle of wine were included in the discussion, of course.
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29th May 2013, 11:36 AM | #16 |
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Originally Posted by Wiki
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29th May 2013, 11:38 AM | #17 |
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There's a reason scientists drink.
And really, the problem with induction isn't a problem in practice. No one uses purely inductive reasoning. Induction provides us with generalized concepts, which we use to make deduced predictions. Then we see if observations match our predictions. The combination of induction and deduction we use naturally (and more formally as the scientific method) neatly negates the problem with induction. This method has its own problems, but that's another conversation. |
29th May 2013, 11:55 AM | #18 |
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No-one has commented on the ridiculous notion that a tiger is a stripy lion. Why are we focusing on swans, when the bigger semantic cock-up was in the other half of the OP?
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29th May 2013, 11:56 AM | #19 |
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29th May 2013, 11:57 AM | #20 |
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29th May 2013, 12:09 PM | #21 |
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Well, that right there is the problem. Induction is GIGO--garbage in, garbage out. You're not drawing conclusions based on the system, but rather on a subset of the system labeled "Observations". To do otherwise is logically impossible (how do you interpret things you can't observe?), but it does place limits on what you can do with induction alone.
Originally Posted by MikeG
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29th May 2013, 12:33 PM | #22 |
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I became aware of the "problem of induction" reading Karl Popper. After some thought, I realized that his "problem" was logical positivism rather than induction.
Maybe he draw wrong general conclusions about induction from the specific views of logical positivists. |
29th May 2013, 12:36 PM | #23 |
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It could be deduced that;
All swans are white The birds observed are black Therefore, the birds are not swans |
29th May 2013, 12:41 PM | #24 |
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Originally Posted by keyfeatures
For the long version, start with Linnaeus and work your way forward. |
29th May 2013, 01:02 PM | #25 |
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29th May 2013, 01:19 PM | #27 |
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The problem that the OP may be trying to get at, though ineptly, is that if you make an assumption of knowledge about a category of things when your observations haven't taken in the entire population of occurrences, then your conclusion is susceptible to failure. The "black swan" is an easy to understand case, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with what words we use to label things. There was a time when everyone (European men of learning) thought there was likely no such thing as a black swan because no one had ever seen one (and reported it). As a matter of fact, "black swan" was a sort of byword for this idea going back to Roman times. When Europeans arrived in Australia, the knowledge of non-existence of black swans turned out to be incorrect. Inductive reasoning failed in that case. It's the problem of induction. |
29th May 2013, 01:19 PM | #28 |
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Lumpers vs. splitters; what can you do?
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29th May 2013, 01:36 PM | #29 |
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29th May 2013, 01:39 PM | #30 |
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29th May 2013, 01:41 PM | #31 |
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29th May 2013, 02:05 PM | #32 |
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A paper cut out set on a black background, or a projected dark shadow of a swan, would have been unmistakable as a swan even to a seventeenth century resident of the Northern Hemisphere who had seen only white ones in nature. Thus, even then the concept "swan" was separable from its colour.
ETA How would the first European visitors to Australia most naturally and accurately have described its fauna to their friends when they returned home? - In New Holland there are no swans - In New Holland the swans are black |
29th May 2013, 02:20 PM | #33 |
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Tigers are also called;
Afrikaans: tier Amuzgo: kítziaⁿ Arabic: نَمِرٌ (námir) m., بَبرٌ (babr) m. Aramaic: Syriac: ܛܝܓܪܝܣ (Ṭīgrīs) m. Hebrew: טיגריס (Ṭīgrīs) m. Belarusian: тыгра (tigra) f. Binisayâ: tigre Bosnian: tigar (bs) m. Bulgarian: тигър (bg) (tígər) m. Burmese: ကား (kà) Catalan: tigre m. Chinese: 老虎 (lǎohǔ) Croatian: tigar (hr) m. Czech: tygr (cs) m. Danish: tiger Dutch: tijger (nl) m. Esperanto: tigro Finnish: tiikeri (fi) French: tigre (fr) m. Frisian: tiger German: Tiger (de) m. Middle High German: tiger, tigertier Old High German: tigir, tigirtior Greek: τίγρις (el) (tígris) m. and f. Guaraní: jaguarete Hebrew: טיגריס (he) (tigris) m. Hindi: बाघ (bāgh) m., व्याघ्र (vyāghra) m. Hungarian: tigris (hu) Indonesian: harimau (id), macan (id) Interlingua: tigre Irish: tíogar (ga) m. Italian: tigre (it) m. Japanese: 虎, トラ(とら, torá) Khmer: ខាធំ (khlā-thum) Kannada: ಹುಲಿ (huli) Korean: 호랑이 (horang-i) Kurdish: پڵنگ Lao: ເສືອ (lo) (syya) Latin: tigris (la) m. and f. Latvian: tīģeris m. Lithuanian: tigras m. Macedonian: тигар (tigar) m. Malayalam: പുലി (puli), വ്യാഘ്രം (vyaaghram) Manchu: (tasha) Norwegian: tiger (no) m. Persian: ببر (babr) Polish: tygrys (pl) m. Portuguese: tigre (pt) m. Romanian: tigru (ro) m. Russian: тигр (ru) (tigr) m. Sanskrit: व्याघ्रः (vyāghraḥ) m. Serbian: Cyrillic: тигар m. Roman: tigar m. Sinhala: කොටියා (koṭiya) Slovak: tiger (sk) m. Slovene: tiger (sl) m. Spanish: tigre (es) m. Swedish: tiger (sv) c. Tamil: புலி (puli) Telugu: పులి (puli) Thai: เสือ (seua) Tibetan: (tag) Tupinambá: îagûara, îagûareté Turkish: kaplan (tr) Ukrainian: тигр (tyhr) m. Vietnamese: con hổ, con cọp Volapük: tiaf Welsh: teigr m. Xhosa: ingwe Zulu: ingwe Not that this or your post have anything to do with the problem of induction |
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29th May 2013, 02:32 PM | #34 |
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29th May 2013, 03:04 PM | #36 |
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29th May 2013, 03:08 PM | #37 |
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29th May 2013, 04:55 PM | #38 |
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29th May 2013, 05:12 PM | #39 |
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29th May 2013, 05:23 PM | #40 |
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Occassionally, I call swans "lasagne".
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