The Emergence of Probability

by Ian Hacking

"Historical records show that there was no real concept of probability in Europe before the mid-seventeenth century, although the use of dice and other randomizing objects was commonplace. Ian Hacking here presents a philosophical critique of early ideas about probability, induction and statistical inference and the growth of this new family of ideas in the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The contemporary debates center around figures such as Pascal, Leibniz and Jacques Bernoulli."--Jacket.