WEEK 13 - CONFIRMATION

Group 3

          This week, Group 3 presented a topic about confirmation. The presenters for this topic are Izza, Fatin, Shaney and Zulfarhan. They started with greetings the class and proceed with giving us a video and a slide for their presentation. This is what I can conclude from their video and slide.

        Confirmation is the study of the logic by which scientific hypotheses may be confirmed or disconfirmed (or supported or rejected) by evidence. All confirmation theories rely on measures of how well the evidence accounts for various alternative hypotheses. The first concept for confirmation is absolute. Absolute means that hypothesis (H) is highly supported given evidence (E). The probability of H given E is above some threshold, assumed to be at least ½ (0.5). This means if the probability is less than 0.5, then H is not highly supported given evidence E. E is not absolute evidence for H. The second concept is incremental. Evidence increases the evidential support for the hypothesis. The probability of H given E is higher than the probability of H not given E. It means that if the probability H given E is less than H not given E, then E does not increase the evidential support for H. E does not incrementally confirm H.

       Then, the theory of confirmation. Firstly is qualitative. It is generally interpreted as a relationship, among other things, between three sentences or propositions. For example, evidence E confirms hypothesis H relative to background information B. The raven paradox, also known as Hempel's paradox. Logically equivalent hypotheses are confirmed by the same evidential propositions. For example, “All ravens are black” is logically equivalent to “All non-black things are non-ravens”. Non-black non-raven can be used to confirm the ravens' hypothesis. Besides, there are four types of criteria of adequacy which are entailment condition, consistency condition, consequence condition, and converse consequence condition. The criteria are testability, fruitfulness, scope, simplicity, and conservatism. Furthermore, Popper’s Falsificationism suggests there should be many observational sequences in science. The hypothesis is not scientific because there are no conditions under which a given hypothesis is incorrect. Another theory of confirmation is probabilistic. Probabilistic theories of confirmation assume that claims of confirmation and disconfirmation must be evaluated relative to some probability function. While, Bayesian theorem gives the probability of an event occurring based on new information that may be related to it.

        Next, inductive and deductive reasoning. Inductive reasoning is when we make a specific observation to draw a general conclusion. It allows for the conclusion to be false. For example, every quiz has been easy, therefore the test will be easy. While deductive reasoning is when we make a general observation to draw a specific conclusion. For example, quadrilateral has four sides, therefore square is a quadrilateral. Deductive reasoning is also known as the H-D method. H-D method uses the experiments to see if the assumptions are accurate. If the assumptions are accurate then it confirms the hypothesis. If not, then it disconfirms the hypothesis. The weakness in H-D method are first, some hypothesis cannot be proved by using this method, secondly, it does not prove conclusively that the hypothesis is correct and thirdly, it might be needed auxiliary hypothesis.

       The presenters continue the presentation by opening a Q&A session. One of the questions is why probability is important especially when we make decision?. This is because probability can help us to predict the result, especially in the experiment. It is same as deciding our life. We need probability to compare the pros and cons of the result of our decision. After the session has ended, they give us a video of an experiment about Acid and Base Test by Using Litmus Paper and list out the Hypothesis and Evidence from the experiment. Then, give a conclusion either E confirms H or not.

H: Acidic substance turns the blue litmus to red.

E: When a lime solution and vinegar solution is pouring on it, blue litmus turn to red.

Therefore, E confirms H.

       Then, there is a quiz given and we need to share our score so they can see whether all students understand about this topic. So, we finished our class when the students have answered the quiz.

This is a video from Group 3 for topic Confirmation.