The Sessions on Induction and Probability at the 1935 Paris Congress: An overview

The First International Congress for the Unity of Science (Congrès international de philosophie scientifique) held in Paris in 1935 hosted two sessions devoted to “Induction” and “Probability” respectively. Outstanding representatives of the movement for scientific philosophy read papers in those sessions: the one on Induction hosted papers by Hans Reichenbach, Moritz Schlick, and Rudolf Carnap, while the one on Probability hosted papers by Reichenbach, Bruno de Finetti, Zygmunt Zawirski, Schlick, and Janina Hosiasson—in that order. The topics addressed concern the nature of scientific laws, the problem of meaning, and the principle of empiricism, together with the related issue of confirmation of scientific hypotheses. The nature of probability was also addressed, covering all major interpretations, namely logicism, frequentism, and subjectivism. The possibility of building a probability logic was also explored. In this paper, the contributions delivered at the sessions on Induction and Probability are surveyed, based on the version published in the fourth volume of the proceedings.