Hempel's paradox
E334005
epistemological problem
philosophical paradox
problem in confirmation theory
problem in the philosophy of science
Hempel's paradox is a famous problem in the philosophy of science that challenges our intuitions about confirmation by showing how evidence seemingly unrelated to a hypothesis can still count as confirming it.
All labels observed (5)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Hempel's paradox canonical | 2 |
| Hempel's raven paradox | 1 |
| Hempel's ravens paradox | 1 |
| Nicod's criterion | 1 |
| the Nicod criterion | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T3166604 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Hempel's paradox Context triple: [Carl Hempel, notableIdea, Hempel's paradox]
-
A.
Yablo's paradox
Yablo's paradox is a self-referential logical paradox involving an infinite sequence of sentences, each saying that all later sentences in the sequence are false, which challenges traditional notions of semantic paradox and self-reference.
-
B.
The Logic of Scientific Discovery
The Logic of Scientific Discovery is Karl Popper’s foundational philosophical work that introduces falsifiability as the key criterion distinguishing scientific theories from non-scientific ones.
-
C.
Carnap's continuum of inductive methods
Carnap's continuum of inductive methods is a family of formal Bayesian-style confirmation functions that systematically vary how evidence updates degrees of belief in logical probability theory.
-
D.
Occam's razor
Occam's razor is a philosophical and scientific principle that advises preferring the simplest explanation that adequately accounts for all observed facts.
-
E.
Curry paradox
Curry paradox is a self-referential logical paradox that arises in certain formal systems without using negation, showing how naive reasoning about implication and self-reference can lead to triviality.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Hempel's paradox Target entity description: Hempel's paradox is a famous problem in the philosophy of science that challenges our intuitions about confirmation by showing how evidence seemingly unrelated to a hypothesis can still count as confirming it.
-
A.
Yablo's paradox
Yablo's paradox is a self-referential logical paradox involving an infinite sequence of sentences, each saying that all later sentences in the sequence are false, which challenges traditional notions of semantic paradox and self-reference.
-
B.
The Logic of Scientific Discovery
The Logic of Scientific Discovery is Karl Popper’s foundational philosophical work that introduces falsifiability as the key criterion distinguishing scientific theories from non-scientific ones.
-
C.
Carnap's continuum of inductive methods
Carnap's continuum of inductive methods is a family of formal Bayesian-style confirmation functions that systematically vary how evidence updates degrees of belief in logical probability theory.
-
D.
Occam's razor
Occam's razor is a philosophical and scientific principle that advises preferring the simplest explanation that adequately accounts for all observed facts.
-
E.
Curry paradox
Curry paradox is a self-referential logical paradox that arises in certain formal systems without using negation, showing how naive reasoning about implication and self-reference can lead to triviality.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
epistemological problem
ⓘ
philosophical paradox ⓘ problem in confirmation theory ⓘ problem in the philosophy of science ⓘ |
| alsoKnownAs |
Hempel's paradox
ⓘ
surface form:
Hempel's ravens paradox
ravens paradox ⓘ
surface form:
the paradox of the ravens
|
| basedOnPrinciple |
Nicod's criterion that a universal generalization is confirmed by its positive instances
ⓘ
the equivalence condition for confirmation ⓘ |
| challenges |
intuitive views about what counts as confirming evidence
ⓘ
simple hypothetico-deductive accounts of confirmation ⓘ |
| concerns |
Hempel's paradox
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
the Nicod criterion
the equivalence condition for hypotheses ⓘ the logic of scientific confirmation ⓘ the relation between evidence and hypotheses ⓘ |
| discussedIn |
Carl Hempel's writings on the logic of confirmation
ⓘ
contemporary philosophy of science textbooks ⓘ |
| example |
a green apple confirming the hypothesis that all ravens are black
ⓘ
a white shoe confirming the hypothesis that all ravens are black ⓘ |
| field |
epistemology
ⓘ
logic ⓘ philosophy of science ⓘ |
| hasSolutionApproach |
Bayesian approaches to confirmation
ⓘ
contextual or relevance-based accounts of confirmation ⓘ rejection or modification of Nicod's criterion ⓘ restriction of the equivalence condition ⓘ |
| historicalPeriod | 20th-century analytic philosophy ⓘ |
| illustrates |
a tension between logical principles of confirmation and intuitive judgments
ⓘ
counterintuitive consequences of standard confirmation theory ⓘ that evidence seemingly unrelated to a hypothesis can confirm it ⓘ that logically equivalent hypotheses should be confirmed by the same evidence ⓘ |
| influenced |
debates about the nature of scientific evidence
ⓘ
subsequent work on formal confirmation theory ⓘ |
| involves |
hypotheses about all ravens
ⓘ
observations of black ravens ⓘ observations of non-black non-ravens ⓘ the hypothesis 'All ravens are black' ⓘ the logically equivalent hypothesis 'All non-black things are non-ravens' ⓘ |
| mainTopic |
confirmation theory
ⓘ
hypothesis confirmation ⓘ inductive reasoning ⓘ |
| namedAfter |
Carl Hempel
ⓘ
surface form:
Carl Gustav Hempel
|
| relatedTo |
Bayesian epistemology
ⓘ
surface form:
Bayesian confirmation theory
new riddle of induction ⓘ
surface form:
Goodman's new riddle of induction
inductive logic ⓘ problem of induction ⓘ raven paradox literature ⓘ |
| status | standard example in discussions of confirmation theory ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Hempel's paradox Description of subject: Hempel's paradox is a famous problem in the philosophy of science that challenges our intuitions about confirmation by showing how evidence seemingly unrelated to a hypothesis can still count as confirming it.
Referenced by (6)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
subject surface form:
Carl Gustav Hempel
this entity surface form:
Hempel's raven paradox
this entity surface form:
Hempel's ravens paradox
this entity surface form:
the Nicod criterion
subject surface form:
Ravens paradox
subject surface form:
Ravens paradox
this entity surface form:
Nicod's criterion