Abductive reasoning

en.wikipedia.org · 11,569 words · saved by 1 readers

Abductive reasoning (also called abduction, abductive inference, or retroduction) is a form of logical inference formulated and advanced by American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce beginning in the last third of the 19th century. It starts with an observation or set of observations and then seeks the simplest and most likely conclusion from the observations. This process, unlike deductive reasoning, yields a plausible conclusion but does not positively verify it. Abductive conclusions are thus qualified as having a remnant of uncertainty or doubt, which is expressed in retreat terms such as "best available" or "most likely". One can understand abductive reasoning as inference to the best explanation, although not all usages of the terms abduction and inference to the best explanation are exactly equivalent.In the 1990s, as computing power grew, the fields of law, computer science, and artificial intelligence research spurred renewed interest in the subject of abduction.

Abductive reasoning - Wikipedia Jump to content From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Inference seeking the simplest and most likely explanation "Abductive" redirects here. For other uses, see Abduction (disambiguation) . A Mastermind player uses abduction to infer the secret peg colors (bottom) from summaries (smaller pegs, right) of discrepancies in their guesses (large pegs, top) . Abductive reasoning (also called abduction , [ 1 ] abductive inference , [ 1 ] or retroduction [ 2 ] ) is a form of logical inference that seeks the simplest and most likely conclusion from a set of observations.

Abductive reasoning

related reading