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In the absence, then, of any universal law of co-existence similar to the universal law of causation which regulates sequence, we are thrown back upon the unscientific induction of the ancients, per enumerationem simplicem, ubi non reperitur instantia contradictoria.
The writer tells us how he dreamed that a dead relation of his came to his bedside, and announced that he must die that day. Unlike Miss Lee, he went on living. Yet the dream impressed him so much that he noted it down in writing as soon as he awoke. Dr. Johnson also mentions an instantia contradictoria.
This class includes whatever errors of generalisation are not mere blunders, but arise from some wrong general conception of the inductive process. Only a few kinds can be noted. 1. Under this Fallacy come generalisations which cannot be established by experience, e.g. inferences from the order in the Solar System to other and unknown parts of the universe; and also, except when a particular effect would contradict either the laws of number and extension, or the universal law of causality, all inferences from the fact that we have never known of a particular effect to its impossibility. 2. Those generalisations also are fallacious which resolve, either, as in early Greece, all things into one element, or, as often in modern times, impressions on the senses, differing in quality, and not merely in degree, into the same; e.g. heat, light, and (through vibrations) sensation, into motion; mental, into nervous states; and vital phenomena, into mechanical or chemical processes. In these theories, one fact has its laws applied to another. It may possibly be a condition of that other; but even then the mode in which the new fact is actually produced would have to be explained by its own law, and not by that of the condition. 3. Again, generalisations got by Simple Enumeration, fall under this Fallacy. That sort of Induction 'precariò concludit, says Bacon, 'et periculo exponitur ab instantiâ contradictoriâ, ... ex his tantummodò quæ præsto sunt pronuncians. The ancients used it; and in questions relating to man and society, it is still employed by practical men. By it men arrived at the various examples of the formula, Whatsoever has never been (e.g. a State without artificial distinctions of rank; negroes as civilised as the white race) will never be; which, being inductions without elimination, could at most form the ground only of the lowest empirical laws. Higher empirical laws can be got, when a phenomenon presents (as no negation can) a series of regular gradations, since something may then be inferred from the observed as to the unobservable terms of the series. Such is the law of man's necessary progression, in contradiction to the above formula. But even this better generalisation is similarly, though not as grossly, fallacious as the preceding, when, though not itself a cause, but only a summary expression for the general result of all the causes, it is accepted as the law of human changes, past and even future. So, empirical generalisations, from present to past time, and from the character of one nation to that of another, are similarly fallacious when employed as causal laws. 4. This Fallacy occurs, not only when an empirical is confounded with a causal law, but when causation is inferred improperly. The mistake sometimes lies in inferring
Our only substitute for an universal law of coexistence is the ancients' induction per enumerationem simplicem ubi non reperitur instantia contradictoria, that is, the improbability that an exception, if any existed, could have hitherto remained unobserved. But the certainty thus arrived at can be only that of an empirical law, true within the limits of the observations.
Gonzaga writes to the Marchioness on March 11, 1831 : "Ho subito mandate a Venezia e scritto a Titiano, quale è forse il piu eccellente in quell' arte che a nostri tempi si ritrovi, ed è tutto mio, ricercandolo con grande instantia a volerne fare una bella lagrimosa piu che si so puo, e farmela haver presto."
But though the course of nature is uniform, it is also infinitely various. Hence there is no certainty in the induction in use with the ancients, and all non-scientific men, and which Bacon attacked, viz. 'Inductio per enumerationem simplicem, ubi non reperitur instantia contradictoria' unless, as in a few cases, we must have known of the contradictory instances if existing.
The induction of the ancients has been well described by Bacon, under the name of “Inductio per enumerationem simplicem, ubi non reperitur instantia contradictoria.” It consists in ascribing the character of general truths to all propositions which are true in every instance that we happen to know of.
The induction of the ancients has been well described by Bacon, under the name of “Inductio per enumerationem simplicem, ubi non reperitur instantia contradictoria.” It consists in ascribing the character of general truths to all propositions which are true in every instance that we happen to know of.
See the chapter entitled "Della Malitia e pessíme Conditioni del Tyranno," in Savonarola's "Tractato circa el reggimento e governo della Citta di Firenze composto ad instantia delli excelsi Signori al tempo di Giuliano Salviati, Gonfaloniere di Justitia." A more terrible picture has never been drawn by any analyst of human vice and cruelty and weakness. Guasti's edition of the Rime, p. 26.
It is false that state, justice, and law cannot be maintained without the aid of religion and its articles of belief, and that justice and police regulations need religion as a complement in order to carry out legislative arrangements. It is false if it were repeated a hundred times. For the ancients, and especially the Greeks, furnish us with striking instantia in contrarium founded on fact.
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