The Pros And Cons Of Inductive Risk

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5. Inductive risk is the risk of error. More specifically, it is the possibility of wrongly accepting a false hypothesis or falsely rejecting a correct hypothesis. For example, there is a new cancer drug on the market. There are two types of inductive risk in this scenario. The first, is that scientists presume that it is a safe, effective treatment when it is not, so it stays in the market. The second scenario is that scientists believe this treatment is ineffective and so it is pulled from the market, even though it is actually effective and could cure the cancer. When evaluating inductive risk, it is imperative to evaluate all possible consequences of various solutions before reaching a decision.

In Douglas’ article, she argues that “non-epistemic values are a required part of the internal aspects of scientific reasoning for cases where inductive risk includes risk of non-epistemic consequences (Douglas, p. 559). She continues on to explain the foundation for the term inductive risk, and how it came about. “Inductive risk, a term first used by Hempel [in 1965, it] is the chance that one will be wrong in accepting (or rejecting) a scientific hypothesis” (Douglas, p. 561). Apparently, traditional philosophers contend the values act as a precursor to scientific arguments. However, Hempel believed that these values should …show more content…

Miranda Fricker discusses epistemic injustice in her article, Epistemic Injustice and a Role for Virtue in the Politics of Knowing. More specifically, she refers to what is known as testimonial injustice. Fricker argues that by giving less credit than is due to a speaker giving testimony, the receiver of the testimony, whom is critically evaluating the speaker, is doing them an injustice. This theory is also known as credibility deficit. On the other hand, giving one too much credit than is due is referred to as credibility excess. While these two phenomena have fundamental differences, the logic behind why both result in an

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