General Science, Mathematics, and TechnologyIntroduction |
How does deductive reasoning differ from inductive reasoning? |
Deductive reasoning, often used in mathematics and philosophy, uses general principles to examine specific cases. Inductive reasoning is the method of discovering general principles by close examination of specific cases. Inductive reasoning first became important to science in the 1600s, when Francis Bacon (1561–1626), Sir Isaac Newton (1642–1727), and their contemporaries began to use the results of specific experiments to infer general scientific principles.