~ The philosopher Carl G. Hempel, in his 1965 essay ?Studies in the Logic of Confirmation,? brought to light a central paradox in the scientific method as it is commonly understood.
The problem is with inductive reasoning, and Hempel?s example was as follows: Suppose you see a raven, and you note that it is black. ?Hmm,? you say, ?that raven was black.? Sometime later you notice a couple more ravens, and they too are black. ?What a coincidence,? you remark, ?those ravens are black too.? Time goes by and you see many more ravens. And it happens that all the ravens you see are black. ?This is beyond coincidence,? you might reasonably think, and with the instincts of a good and observant scientist you form a hypothesis: All ravens are black.
http://www.paradoxes.info/TheRavens.html Paradox or fallacy?
Sincerely,
