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(2013) Synthese 190 (16).
Justifying inference to the best explanation as a practical meta-syllogism on dialectical structures
Gregor Betz
pp. 3553-3578
This article discusses how inference to the best explanation (IBE) can be justified as a practical meta-argument. It is, firstly, justified as a practical argument insofar as accepting the best explanation as true can be shown to further a specific aim. And because this aim is a discursive one which proponents can rationally pursue in—and relative to—a complex controversy, namely maximising the robustness of one’s position, IBE can be conceived, secondly, as a meta-argument. My analysis thus bears a certain analogy to Sellars’ well-known justification of inductive reasoning (Sellars, In: Essays in honour of Carl G. Hempel, 1969); it is based on recently developed theories of complex argumentation (Betz, In: Theorie dialektischer Strukturen, 2010a).
Publication details
DOI: 10.1007/s11229-012-0210-z
Full citation:
Betz, G. (2013). Justifying inference to the best explanation as a practical meta-syllogism on dialectical structures. Synthese 190 (16), pp. 3553-3578.
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