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Dear Nicolai, Your example is from Charles Peirce (Collected papers 2.623). His wording is: Fact: these beans are white Rule: all the beans from this bag are white Case: these beans are from this bag A good example of abductive reasoning is found in François Voltaire (1747): Zadig, third chapter Quoting Voltaire: ----------------- While walking one day near a little wood he saw one of the queen's eunuchs hastening toward him, followed by several officers, who seemed to be greatly troubled, and ran hither and thither like distracted men seeking something very precious they have lost. "Young man," cried the Chief Eunuch, "you haven't seen the queen's dog, have you?" "It's not a dog" answered Zadig modestly, "it's a bitch." "That's so," said the Chief Eunuch. "It's a very small spaniel" added Zadig, "which has had puppies recently; her left forefoot is lame, and she has very long ears." "You have seen her then?" said the Eunuch, quite out of breath. "Oh, no!" answered Zadig. "I have not seen the animal, and I never knew the queen had a bitch." () [Zadig was brought to court and had to explain himself] "I was walking toward the little wood where I met later the venerable Chief Eunuch and the very illustrious Master of the King's Hounds. I saw an animal's tracks on the sand and I judged without difficulty they were the tracks of a small dog. The long, shallow furrows printed on the little ridges of sand between the tracks of the paws informed me that the animal was a bitch with pendent dugs, who hence had had puppies recently. Other tracks in a different direction, which seemed all the time to have scraped the surface of the sand beside the fore-paws, gave me the idea that the bitch had very long ears; and as I remarked that the sand was always less hollowed by one paw than by the three others, I concluded that our august queen's bitch was somewhat lame, if I dare say so. ------------------- I recommend Umberto Eco & Thomas Sebeok (eds.): Dupin, Holmes, Peirce. The Sign of the Three As food for thought Best Rolf ----------------- Rolf Johansson Architect SAR/MSA, Dr. Professor in Landscape Architecture Design Theory Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) Department of Urban and Rural Development Unit of Landscape Architecture -------------------- Den 2015-02-10 21.22 skrev Nicolai Steinĝ <[log in to unmask]>: >Dear all, > >Some years back I did an urban design workshop with Thai and Danish BSc >students at Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok. I used the example below >to explain abduction, as opposed to deduction and induction. I find the >example useful because it explains the difference by the order of a rule, >a case and a result, respectively. > >Unfortunately I no longer remember where I got it from. > >Best, > >Nic > >-- > >Research approach > >American pragmatist philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce > >Deduction (necessary inferences) > >Rule All thai people have dark hair >Case All the people we have met are thai >Result Therefore, all people we have met have dark hair > >Induction (probable inferences) > >Result All people we have met have dark hair >Case All the people we have met are thai >Rule Therefore, all thai people have dark hair > >Abduction (hypotheses) > >Rule All thai people have dark hair >Result All people we have met have dark hair >Case Therefore, all the people we have met are thai > >Pros and cons of abduction > >Does not rely on strong theory building >Does not rely on large samples >Requires a capacity for making 'hunches' >The validity of the conclusion relies on the quality of the hunch ----------------------------------------------------------------- PhD-Design mailing list <[log in to unmask]> Discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design Subscribe or Unsubscribe at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/phd-design -----------------------------------------------------------------