The Raven paradox, also known as Hempel's paradox or Hempel's ravens is a paradox arising from the question of what constitutes evidence for a statement. Observing objects that are neither black nor ravens may formally increase the likelihood that all ravens are black—even though intuitively these observations are unrelated.
This problem was proposed by the logician Carl Gustav Hempel in the 1940s to illustrate a contradiction between inductive logic and intuition. A related issue is the problem of induction and the gap between inductive and deductive reasoning.
Read more about Raven Paradox: The Paradox, Proposed Resolutions
Famous quotes containing the words raven and/or paradox:
“Does wisdom perhaps appear on the earth as a raven which is inspired by the smell of carrion?”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“The conclusion suggested by these arguments might be called the paradox of theorizing. It asserts that if the terms and the general principles of a scientific theory serve their purpose, i. e., if they establish the definite connections among observable phenomena, then they can be dispensed with since any chain of laws and interpretive statements establishing such a connection should then be replaceable by a law which directly links observational antecedents to observational consequents.”
—C.G. (Carl Gustav)