Minkowski geometry is axiomatized in terms of the asymmetric binary relation of optical connectibility, using ten first-order axioms and the second-order continuity axiom. An axiom system in terms of the symmetric binary optical connection relation is also presented. The present development is much simpler than the corresponding work of Robb, upon which it is modeled.

In response to recent recognition of the complexities of scientific change, discussion of the objectivity and the rationality of science has focused on criteria of theory choice. This paper addresses instead the rationality of scientific decisions at the level of ongoing research. It argues that whether or not a realist view of theories is compatible with the historical discontinuities of scientific change, certain realist assumptions are crucial to the rationality of research. The researcher must presume that questions about the existence and the properties of at least some of the “unobservable“ entities he theorizes about or experiments on are answerable on the basis of his work. The rationale of research cannot be understood solely in terms of the desiderata of instrumental utility or the empirical adequacy of theories.

It is possible for a causal factor to raise the probability of a second factor in some situations while lowering the probability of the second factor in other situations. Must a genuine cause always raise the probability of a genuine effect of it? When it does not always do so, an “interaction“ with some third factor may be the reason. I discuss causal interaction from the perspectives of Giere's counterfactual characterization of probabilistic causal connection (1979, 1980) and the “contextual unanimity” model developed by, among others, Cartwright (1979) and Skyrms (1980). I argue that the contextual unanimity theory must exercise care, in a new way that seems to have gone unnoticed, in order to adequately accommodate the phenomenon, and that the counterfactual theory must be substantially revised; although it will still, pending clarification of a second kind of revision, be unable to accommodate a kind of interaction exemplified in cases like those described by Sober (1982).

This book consists thematically of three broad sections: (1) a lengthy introduction (approximately one third of the book) in which Grünbaum critically assesses the hermeneutic construal of psychoanalysis, as represented in the work of Habermas, G. S. Klein, and Ricoeur; (2) a critical examination of Popper's assessment of both psychoanalysis and inductivism; and (3) a logical analysis of core psychoanalytic ideas that constitute the foundation for much of psychoanalytic theory. This last section is, in my view, the heart of the book and therefore, it is that section on which I will focus in this review.

Hausman has argued that Mill in the Logic demands verification of qualified, inexact statements if they are to be considered lawlike. This puts Mill in line with a reasonable interpretation of what modern microeconomists are about, but requires the additional hypothesis that Mill abandoned his earlier stress on modal truth in his 1836 essay on the method of economics. The paper maintains that neither textual nor contextual evidence supports this hypothesis. Moreover, it is superfluous if one attends carefully to how Mill conceived economic science, which occupied a peculiar, somewhat isolated place in his own views on the deductive method and on verification.

Clark Glymour (1980) defined bootstrap-confirmation as a three-place relation: “Evidence E bootstrap confirms hypothesis H with respect to theory T.“ By an ingenious choice of examples, David Christensen (1983) has shown that Glymour's definition is satisfied in a class of cases in which confirmation seems to be highly counterintuitive. Responding to Christensen's criticism, Glymour (1983) revised his 1980 definition of bootstrap confirmation, by introducing an additional condition that rules out Christensen's counterexamples.

In their 1983 article, Popper and Miller present an argument against inductive probability. This argument is criticized by Redhead in his 1985 article. The aim of the present note is to state one form of the Popper-Miller argument, and defend it against Redhead's criticisms.

Six recently discussed problems in discrete probabilistic sample space, which have been found puzzling and even paradoxical, are reexamined. The importance is stressed of a sharp distinction between the formalization of mathematical problems and their formal solution that, applied to probability theory, must lead through the explicit partitioning of a sample space. If this approach is consistently followed, such problems reveal themselves to be either inherently ambiguous, and therefore without solution, or quite straightforward. In both cases nothing remains of any sense of paradox.

What has belief to do with perception? Some contemporary philosophers have suggested that one's perceiving an object entails one's having a particular perceptual belief, not just some belief or other, about that object. N. R. Hanson, for instance, has illustrated the present view, with respect to visual perception, as follows:

Douglas W. Hands's “What Economics Is Not: An Economist's Response to Rosenberg“ (Hands 1984a) is an unsympathetic criticism of the explanatory hypotheses of “If Economics Isn't Science, What Is It?” (Rosenberg 1983). Before replying to his objection, I summarize the claims of that paper.

Skyrms's formulation of the argument against stochastic hidden variables in quantum mechanics using conditionals with chance consequences suffers from an ambiguity in its “conservation“ assumption. The strong version, which Skyrms needs, packs in a “no-rapport” assumption in addition to the weaker statement of the “experimental facts.“ On the positive side, I argue that Skyrms's proof has two unnoted virtues (not shared by previous proofs): (1) it shows that certain difficulties that arise for deterministic hidden variable theories that exploit a non-classical probability theory extend to the stochastic case; (2) the use of counterfactual conditionals relates the Bell puzzle to Dummett's (1976) discussion of realism in quantum mechanics.