•  Okasha’s first section (pp. 18-23) is primarily a characterization of inductive reasoning. That involves distinguishing it from deductive reasoning and looking at examples of it. His consideration of examples leads him to discuss Karl Popper’s claim that inductive reasoning has no proper role in science. You should certainly try to get a good sense of what inductive reasoning is; but Okasha’s discussion of Popper’s ideas is very brief, and it is fine to postpone thinking about that issue until you read O’Hear.

•  Okasha next turns to a problem posed by David Hume for any attempt to justify inductive reasoning (pp. 24-28). A good way to get a sense Hume’s argument is to think how you would respond to it and what Hume might say in reply. Okasha presents his account in a way that should help you do this, and much of the class is likely to be devoted to this topic.

•  As Okasha notes, Popper’s views on induction were motivated by Hume’s argument, so you should have possible responses to Hume in mind as you read O’Hear’s discussion and criticism of Popper. He will give you more details about Popper’s views than Okasha does but will criticize them in a way that is close to the one Okasha suggests at the end of the first section. Think how Popper might reply to such criticisms.

You will run into the term “corroboration” several times in O’Hear’s paper. Popper uses this as a sort of technical term, so when you see him saying things about its meaning in the quotations O’Hear gives, he is telling you what he means by it. Thus the question to ask about “corroboration” is not whether Popper is right in what he says it consists in but whether he is right about the role in science of the sort of thing he calls “corroboration.” And thinking about this is important: many people take Popper more seriously than Okasha’s and O’Hear’s accounts might suggest.