Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-17T19:35:07.563Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

“Deductive” versus “Inductive” Archaeology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Merrilee H. Salmon
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Disagreements among archaeologists about whether inductive or deductive methods are appropriate for establishing archaeological hypotheses are often founded in a misunderstanding of the nature of inductive reasoning. In this paper several cases of confirmation of archaeological hypotheses are examined in order to expose the logical structure of the reasoning involved. In all these cases the structure is basically inductive. In actual practice the methodology adopted by archaeologists is far more sophisticated than the account of this methodology presented by archaeologists.

Type
Comment
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 41 , Issue 3 , July 1976 , pp. 376 - 381
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1976

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Fritz, John 1968 Archaeological epistemology: two views. M.A. thesis. University of Chicago.Google Scholar
Hempel, Call 1966 Philosophy of natural science. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs.Google Scholar
Irving, W. N., and Harington, C. R. 1973 Upper pleistocene radiocarbon-dated artifacts from the northern Yukon. Science 179, 4071:335–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Longacre, W. A. 1968 Some aspects of prehistoric society in east-central Arizona. In New perspectives in archaeology, edited by Sally R. Binford, and Binford, L. R.. Aldine, Chicago.Google Scholar
Reid, J. J., Schiffer, M., and Rathje, W. 1975 Behavioral archaeology: four strategies. American Anthropologist (77:864–69.)Google Scholar
Salmon, W. C. 1973 Logic. 2nd ed. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs.Google Scholar
Watson, R. A. 1966 Discussion: is geology different: a critical discussion of “The Fabric of Geology.” Philosophy of Science 33(1-2):172–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar