Page:System of Logic.djvu/426

420 not, we find, for instance, the following: the witness's being an honest person or not; his being an accurate observer or not; his having an interest to serve in the matter or not. Now, not only may we be able to obtain other approximate generalizations respecting the degree of frequency of these various possibilities, but we may know which of them is positively realized in the individual case. That the witness has or has not an interest to serve, we perhaps know directly; and the other two points indirectly, by means of marks; as, for example, from his conduct on some former occasion; or from his reputation, which, though a very uncertain mark, affords an approximate generalization (as, for instance, Most persons who are believed to be honest by those with whom they have had frequent dealings, are really so), which approaches nearer to a universal truth than the approximate general proposition with which we set out, viz., Most persons on most occasions speak truth.

As it seems unnecessary to dwell further on the question of the evidence of approximate generalizations, we shall proceed to a not less important topic, that of the cautions to be observed in arguing from these incompletely universal propositions to particular cases.

§ 5. So far as regards the direct application of an approximate generalization to an individual instance, this question presents no difficulty. If the proposition, Most A are B, has been established, by a sufficient induction, as an empirical law, we may conclude that any particular A is B with a probability proportioned to the preponderance of the number of affirmative instances over the number of exceptions. If it has been found practicable to attain numerical precision in the data, a corresponding degree of precision may be given to the evaluation of the chances of error in the conclusion. If it can be established as an empirical law that nine out of every ten A are B, there will be one chance in ten of error in assuming that any A, not individually known to us, is a B: but this of course holds only within the limits of time, place, and circumstance, embraced in the observations, and therefore can not be counted on for any sub-class or variety of A (or for A in any set of external circumstances) which were not included in the average. It must be added, that we can guide ourselves by the proposition, Nine out of every ten A are B, only in cases of which we know nothing except that they fall within the class A. For if we know, of any particular instances i, not only that it falls under A, but to what species or variety of A it belongs, we shall generally err in applying to i the average struck for the whole genus, from which the average corresponding to that species alone would, in all probability, materially differ. And so if i, instead of being a particular sort of instance, is an instance known to be under the influence of a particular set of circumstances, the presumption drawn from the numerical proportions in the whole genus would probably, in such a case, only mislead. A general average should only be applied to cases which are neither known, nor can be presumed, to be other than average cases. Such averages, therefore, are commonly of little use for the practical guidance of any affairs but those which concern large numbers. Tables of the chances of life are useful to insurance offices, but they go a very little way toward informing any one of the chances of his own life, or any other life in which he is interested, since almost every life is either better or worse than the average. Such averages can only be considered as supplying the first term in a series of approximations; the subsequent terms proceeding on an appreciation of the circumstances belonging to the particular case.