Deductivist Versus Inductivist Approaches in the Philosophy of Science as Illustrated by some Controversies Between Whewell and Mill

Abstract The contrast between the two approaches listed in the title has over the years gained a certain prominence in discussions on the philosophy of science. With the knowledge of hindsight it will be of interest therefore to study its incidence during an earlier period, and in particular, in the writings of Whewell and Mill which may yield added significance for a later generation. For the moment I shall not attempt to define the two schools of thought delineated by these labels, partly because at this stage—being controversial—any account of necessary and sufficient criteria would be difficult to come by, and partly because it may be more fruitful in the present context to evaluate the differences by way of a study of the philosophical positions held by Whewell and Mill themselves. So for the moment we may use them simply as convenient reference labels. The situation is in any case complicated by the fact that, on the one side, despite Whewell’s apparently explicit attachment to deductivism, he also elaborated a nominally inductive type of methodology; whilst on the other side, Mill’s explicitly inductive approach did not prevent him from attributing considerable importance to deductive methods in the development of scientific theorizing, especially in the realm of physics.