Induction and abduction are well known non-deductive inferences. We shall propose that design is also another form of non-deductive inference, and, based on Barwise and Seligman’s mathematical theory of information flow, construct a formal model of non-deductive inferences. We shall show also that these inferences are interpretable each other, and argue mathematical properties of the model.

Deductive reasoning is the kind of reasoning in which, roughly, the truth of the input propositions (the premises) logically guarantees the truth of the output proposition (the conclusion), provided that no mistake has been made in the reasoning. The premises may be propositions that the reasoner believes or assumptions that the reasoner is exploring. Deductive reasoning contrasts with inductiv...

The framework of algorithmic knowledge assumes that agents use algorithms to compute the facts they explicitly know. In many cases of interest, a deductive system, rather than a particular algorithm, captures the formal reasoning used by the agents to compute what they explicitly know. We introduce a logic for reasoning about both implicit and explicit knowledge with the latter defined with res...

LEWIS (1988) made the case that today’s biology is essentially hypothetico-deductive in nature. In Lewis’s view, biology is not a science in which one gathers all the facts, classifies them and then somehow crystallizes them into theory. In Lewis’s words, ‘‘This erroneous view of method plus the absence of a proper definition of theory misguided my early development in science’’ (p. 362). The f...