Abductive Belief Revision in Science

Abstract

The chapter starts from the observation that neither belief revision in the AGM tradition nor belief base revision contain mechanisms for learning new hypotheses from new evidences. After a discussion of two approaches to implement such learning mechanisms into input-driven belief revision, and of alternative accounts in terms of deliberate belief revision, an account of input-driven abductive belief expansion and revision is develop which intends to be as close as possible to belief revision in science and in common sense cognition. For this purpose, the chapter draws on a theory of abduction developed elsewhere. Abductive expansion and revision functions, including induction as a special case, are described within three specific domains: inductive generalization, factual abduction, and theoretical model abduction. It turns out that abductive belief revision does not satisfy the Levi-identity.