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A Bayesian Account of Independent Evidence with Applications

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Branden Fitelson
Branden Fitelson*
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin-Madison
*
†This paper won the PSA 2000 Graduate Student Essay Contest. Send requests for reprints to the author, Philosophy Department, University of Wisconsin, 600 N. Park St., Madison, WI 53706; email: fitelson@students.wisc.edu.
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Abstract

A Bayesian account of independent evidential support is outlined. This account is partly inspired by the work of C. S. Peirce. I show that a large class of quantitative Bayesian measures of confirmation satisfy some basic desiderata suggested by Peirce for adequate accounts of independent evidence. I argue that, by considering further natural constraints on a probabilistic account of independent evidence, all but a very small class of Bayesian measures of confirmation can be ruled out. In closing, another application of my account to the problem of evidential diversity is also discussed.

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Footnotes

‡

Thanks to Marty Barrett, Ellery Eells, Malcolm Forster, Jim Joyce, Mike Kruse, Greg Mougin, Dan Steel, Wayne Myrvold, and, especially, Patrick Maher and Elliott Sober for useful comments and suggestions on previous drafts of this paper.

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