Evidence and Leverage
Comment on Roush
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11512759 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Eric Christian Barnes (0000-0002-8018-8773, Southern Methodist University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2008 |
| Volume | 59 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 549-557 |
| Publication date | 2008-08-24 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-0882 • E-ISSN: 1464-3537 |
| Publisher | University of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1093/bjps/axn022 |
| OpenAlex | W2051381799 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
| References cited | 1 |
Sherrilyn Roush's Tracking Truth provides a sustained and ambitious development of the basic idea that knowledge is true belief that tracks the truth. In this essay, I provide a quick synopsis of Roush's book and offer a substantive discussion of her analysis of scientific evidence. Roush argues that, for e to serve as evidence for h, it should be easier to determine the truth value of e than it is to determine the truth value of h, an ideal she refers to as ‘leverage’. She defends a detailed method by which the value of p(h/e) is computed without ‘direct’ information about p(h) but only using evidence about the value of p(e), from which the value of p(h) is derived. She presents an example of how to use her leverage method, which I argue involves a certain critical mistake. I show how the leveraging method can be used in a way that is sound—I conclude with a few remarks about the importance of distinguishing clearly between prior and posterior probabilities
Epistemology · Leverage (statistics · Mistake · Political science · Truth value · Value (mathematics · Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science · Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics · Law · Philosophy · Philosophy and History of Science · Science and Climate Studies
| Citations per year | 0.18 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2009 - 2010 (2) |
| Highly cited | No |