Analytic and Synthetic Statements The distinction between analytic and synthetic judgments was first made by Immanuel Kant in the introduction to his Critique of Pure Reason. According to him, all judgments could be exhaustively divided into these two...

. A priori knowledge is that which has its justification independently of experience, though it may presuppose experience from which we can get the concepts it involves; many philosophers (though not all: see Lehman) regard mathematical knowledge as a...

In epistemology, knowledge that is independent of all particular experiences, as opposed to a posteriori (or empirical) knowledge, which derives from experience. The terms have their origins in the medieval Scholastic debate over Aristotelian concepts...

A Latin phrase applied to mean that which refers to what went before. It is used especially in logical reasoning to deduce effect from cause or to describe prior knowledge, especially that which has been used unethically or...

A proposition that can only be known to be true or false by reference to a known...

Knowledge arrived at without reference to experience. The basic premise, or premises, from which deduction...

. See A...

The terms "a priori" and "a posteriori" are used in philosophy to distinguish between deductive and inductive reasoning, respectively. Attempts to define clearly or explain a priori and a posteriori knowledge are part of a central thread in...