Knowing About Semipalatinsk

Abstract

In the Introduction to his Human Knowledge Bertrand Russell writes as follows. “If I believe that there is such a place as Semipalatinsk, I believe it because of things that have happened to me; and unless certain substantial principles of inference are accepted, I shall have to admit that all these things might have happened to me without there being any such place.” ¹ This seems to be true in some sense, and if true to have important implications which have not been explored; but in what sense cannot be gathered merely from context; and so it is the purpose here to examine the inferences which flow from the statement.