Reverse Inference

Famous quotes containing the words reverse and/or inference:

    They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
    Bible: Hebrew Isaiah, 2:4.

    The words reappear in Micah 4:3, and the reverse injunction is made in Joel 3:10 (”Beat your plowshares into swords ...”)

    Rules and particular inferences alike are justified by being brought into agreement with each other. A rule is amended if it yields an inference we are unwilling to accept; an inference is rejected if it violates a rule we are unwilling to amend. The process of justification is the delicate one of making mutual adjustments between rules and accepted inferences; and in the agreement achieved lies the only justification needed for either.
    Nelson Goodman (b. 1906)