rule which prohibits the retrospective inference from truth of Conclusion to that of Premisses, or of Consequent to that of Antecedent.
2. Then we have the further contradiction. In supporting the Logical Priority of Ma over Me it is laid down that falsehood of Premisses—of what comes first in an "explicit deduction," here Ma—involves falsehood of Conclusion, Me—of what comes last in the deduction; in other words, that truth of Conclusion implies truth of Premisses. The ordinary rule of course[1] is that falsehood of Antecedent or Premisses does not affect truth of Consequent or Conclusion either way; in other words, that truth of Consequent or Conclusion implies nothing either way about Antecedent or Premisses.
- ↑ This rule, we must remember, was relied on to establish the Logical Priority of the Consequent (and Conclusion) over Antecedent (and Premisses).
investigation which have not yet emerged from the stage in which empirical observations form an essential element in the process of furthering our knowledge." "Geometry may be regarded as the type to which every science may be expected to conform at the distant time when it has become completely rational." "Just as Geometry has no need of further empirical fact, completely rationalised Physics and Chemistry, as ideal schemes, would contain within themselves every element which could be supplied by physical observation; and would no longer be dependent for their further progress on the work of experience." Professor Hobson's Address to Mathematical and Physical Society of University College, London, 1912.
