Overcoming Hume’s Induction Problem – Avoid Blindess to the Possible

Hume’s induction problem stems from the Cartesian silo.  Separating causality from experience, from operating in the world. Observation is not separate from perception. 

Without the silo, instrumentalism is sufficient reason, sufficient logic. 

Hume’s problem can be restated as ” if you separate reason from existence, reason from being in the world, then the explanatory value of observation is only custom. … “

Or further “if you separate reason from existence, reason from being in the world, then induction makes no sense.” But, since induction works, the reverse is more accurate: it makes no sense to separate mind from body, observation from philosophical reasoning. It makes no sense to pretend we don’t live in the world. 

That being said, there is clear emotional, intellectual and instrumentalist value in surfacing and exploring seemingly non-sensical paths to see what’s there. Optionality has value. Expanding our vistas has value. Pushing against norms has value. Especially in this reading: saying something as experientially fundamental as causality is a norm, a habit, a custom says too that all norms, habits and customs  could be based on nothing, no logic, no reason. (Except, being in the world. Experience speaks to the force of custom.)

Circling back to Cartesian doubt.  We can now see how skepticism, while setting the table for these explorations and expansions, can receive pushback. It can be seen as denying the validity of living / the lived, embodied experience. It privileges mind over mind in body, over mind and body. This can quickly become a dead end. 

This same seemingly rational privileging is behind AI fears as well as the temptation to doom. Albeit calm doom. 

And so the need to embrace the solidity of uncertainty beyond skepticism. Believe in the observed adaptability and Darwinian fitness we have exhibited for 10,000 years, particularly our co-adaptation with the tools and built environment we create.  

Don’t let the emotional baggage of doom impair your decision making or worse, impair joyful imagining of the present and the possibilities of what comes next. 

APPLICATION
For strategic decision making: The value of optionality, affective reason and knowing there’s always another move.  Optimism overcomes negativity bias and creates new opportunities / stops available opportunities from being overlooked.