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Harriman Book on Induction Available for Pre-Order

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Atlas51184

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I have been waiting for a good book on induction and I'm sure this one will be great but I have a few questions for anyone who cares to answer:

I thought Dr. Peikoff was going to write one on "The Validation of Induction". Has he done so already? Does he plan to?

Does anyone know the content of this Harriman book? Does it provide a validation of induction? Or does it focus on good and bad examples of induction?

Any information would be appreciated. Thanks.

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I thought Dr. Peikoff was going to write one on "The Validation of Induction". Has he done so already? Does he plan to?

Peikoff started out writing a book on his theory of induction, then brought Harriman on board as co-writer, and finally handed the project over to Harriman completely. For most of its life that project was called "Induction in Physics and Philosophy"; it seems to have wound up with the title "The Logical Leap: Induction in Physics".

Does anyone know the content of this Harriman book? Does it provide a validation of induction? Or does it focus on good and bad examples of induction?

At OCON 2007, Harriman provided a handout with the table of contents of the book. Let me see if I can dig that up... and here it is. Obviously, this reflects the content as of 2007. But on the assumption that the book's plan didn't radically change, this may still have value:

  1. The Foundation
    • The Problem of Induction
    • The Nature of Concepts
    • First-Level Generalizations
    • The Structure of Inductive Reasoning

[*]The Role of Experiment

  • Galileo's Kinematics
  • Newton's Optics
  • The Methods of Difference and Agreement
  • Induction as Inherent in Conceptualization

[*]The Role of Mathematics

  • The Birth of Celestial Physics
  • Mathematics and Causality
  • The Power of Mathematics

[*]Newton's Integration

  • The Development of Dynamics
  • The Discovery of Universal Gravitation
  • Discovery is Proof

[*]The Atomic Theory

  • Chemical Elements and Atoms
  • The Kinetic Theory of Gases
  • The Unification of Chemistry
  • The Method of Proof

[*]The Causes of Error

  • What is an Error?
  • Misapplications of the Inductive Method
  • Rationalism and Empiricism

[*]Measurement and Knowledge

  • Mathematics as Objective
  • An Explanation for the Role of Mathematics
  • Epistemology as Objective

[*]Epilogue: A New Beginning

  • The Failure of Modern Philosophy
  • The State of Contemporary Physics
  • A Green-Light to Future Progress

As to whether the book is a validation of induction or a study of good and bad examples -- I'd say it looks to be both. It is an attempt to provide an inductive validation of induction by examining instances of inductive success and failure in the history of science, and generalizing from them.

On a side note, I have to say that Objectivists have been on fire lately when it comes to books. Just consider what has been and will be published between OCON 2009 and OCON 2010: Elan Journo's Winning the Unwinnable War: American's Self-Crippled Response to Islamic Totalitarianism, Andrew Bernstein's Capitalism Unbound: The Incontestable Moral Case for Individual Rights, John Lewis' Nothing Less Than Victory: Decisive Wars and the Lessons of History, C. Bradley Thompson's Neoconservatism: An Obituary for an Idea and now David Harriman's The Logical Leap: Induction in Physics. And there's more in the works for the following years. Harry Binswanger just finished the first draft of his book on consciousness, How We Know, and Leonard Peikoff is in the editing phase on The DIM Hypothesis. Oh, and on the academic front I almost forgot about Allan Gotthelf and Greg Salmieri's Ayn Rand: A Companion to her Work and Thought, and the forthcoming series of collections of papers from meetings of the Ayn Rand Society. And who knows what else that I just haven't heard about? (The first I knew about Thompson's book was the announcement of upcoming publication I received from the Ayn Rand Bookstore.)

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On a side note, I have to say that Objectivists have been on fire lately when it comes to books. Just consider what has been and will be published between OCON 2009 and OCON 2010: Elan Journo's Winning the Unwinnable War: American's Self-Crippled Response to Islamic Totalitarianism, Andrew Bernstein's Capitalism Unbound: The Incontestable Moral Case for Individual Rights, John Lewis' Nothing Less Than Victory: Decisive Wars and the Lessons of History, C. Bradley Thompson's Neoconservatism: An Obituary for an Idea and now David Harriman's The Logical Leap: Induction in Physics. And there's more in the works for the following years. Harry Binswanger just finished the first draft of his book on consciousness, How We Know, and Leonard Peikoff is in the editing phase on The DIM Hypothesis. Oh, and on the academic front I almost forgot about Allan Gotthelf and Greg Salmieri's Ayn Rand: A Companion to her Work and Thought, and the forthcoming series of collections of papers from meetings of the Ayn Rand Society. And who knows what else that I just haven't heard about? (The first I knew about Thompson's book was the announcement of upcoming publication I received from the Ayn Rand Bookstore.)

I was just commenting about this to someone. Yesterday, I received Lewis', Nothing Less Than Victory, and will probably start reading it sometime next month. The combination of Journo's, Thompson's, and Lewis' works will provide a large, unique tract from which foreign policy can be analyzed.

Right now I'm waiting to pre-order "Logical Leap" and "Neoconservatism." There seems to be confusion about hardcover or paperback at the AR bookstore, and B&N.com doesn't yet have Harriman's book listed.

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From Harriman's bio on aynrand.org, this book is "presenting Dr. Leonard Peikoff's theory of induction".

Reading through Kyle's table of contents, this sounds just... awesome. I'm particularly interested in "Induction as Inherent in Conceptualization".

You can preorder Logical Leap on Amazon.

Edited by brian0918
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Adding to Kyle's list: Allan Gotthelf's CV lists a book on epistemology, co-authored by him, Onkar Ghate, Jim Lennox, and Greg Salmieri. It's title is "Concepts and Their Role in Knowledge: Ayn Rand's "New Approach to Epistemology."" It is listed as "under consideration. If that is published by a major academic press (hopefully Oxford) it will be HUGE, insofar as it will improve AR's reputation in academic philosophy. Even if not published by a major press it is still very important. Gotthelf's CV: http://www.pitt.edu/~hpsdept/people/fac_pages/gotthelf.html

EDIT: Gotthelf's CV also shows the titles of his chapters in the Ayn Rand Companion book, as well as the ARS volume. Worth checking out.

Edited by Atlas51184
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A few more: Shoshana Knapp's Rand biography (possibly two volumes). Darryl Wright's book on ethics. Pat Corvini's book on math. Harriman's OTHER physics and philosophy book. Vol 1 of the biography is almost done, iirc. I don't know at what stages the others are.

A long standing complaint Objectivists have had is the lack of printed secondary material. Now our problem is going to be too much good stuff to read. That's a good problem, I think!

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Adding to Kyle's list: Allan Gotthelf's CV lists a book on epistemology, co-authored by him, Onkar Ghate, Jim Lennox, and Greg Salmieri. It's title is "Concepts and Their Role in Knowledge: Ayn Rand's "New Approach to Epistemology."" It is listed as "under consideration. If that is published by a major academic press (hopefully Oxford) it will be HUGE, insofar as it will improve AR's reputation in academic philosophy. Even if not published by a major press it is still very important. Gotthelf's CV: http://www.pitt.edu/~hpsdept/people/fac_pages/gotthelf.html

EDIT: Gotthelf's CV also shows the titles of his chapters in the Ayn Rand Companion book, as well as the ARS volume. Worth checking out.

I wasn't aware of these projects, Atlas. Thanks!

Peikoff's DIM Hypothesis is supposed to be out at the end of the year too. The year of the Objective!

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  • 2 weeks later...
As to whether the book is a validation of induction or a study of good and bad examples -- I'd say it looks to be both. It is an attempt to provide an inductive validation of induction by examining instances of inductive success and failure in the history of science, and generalizing from them.

Thank you very much Kyle. The information you provided is invaluable.

The Table of Contents alone has sold me. Should be great.

I am blown away. Can't wait.

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The Table of Contents alone has sold me. Should be great.

There seems to be an updated table of contents on the book's web site. It's a little different than the one I posted from 2007, which isn't too surprising. It looks like much the same material, structured a bit differently. Looks like the epilogue may have been folded into the final chapter.

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  • 4 months later...

Amazon said mine was shipped yesterday.

They had a limited number of copies on sale here at OCON 2010 -- I picked mine up bright and early on the morning of July 3rd. It is now sitting on the desk in my hotel room with Harriman's signature on the front page, waiting for me to have time to really dig into it.

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The first chapter is almost a verbatim version of the first lecture of "Induction in Physics and Philosophy."

Middle chapters are gratifyingly detailed in the history of the discoveries described. (Just skimmed these so far)

Last chapter ends with a condemnation of modern physics as back-sliding into being satisfied with "saving appearances".

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