Inference is the act or process of deriving logical conclusions from premises known or assumed to

be true.[1] The conclusion drawn is also called an idiomatic. The laws of valid inference are studied in
the field of logic.

Alternatively, inference may be defined as the non-logical, but rational means, through observation
of patterns of facts, to indirectly see new meanings and contexts for understanding. Of particular use
to this application of inference are anomalies and symbols. Inference, in this sense, does not draw
conclusions but opens new paths for inquiry. (See second set of Examples.) In this definition of
inference, there are two types of inference: inductive inference and deductive inference. Unlike the
definition of inference in the first paragraph above, meaning of word meanings are not tested but
meaningful relationships are articulated.

Human inference (i.e. how humans draw conclusions) is traditionally studied within the field
of cognitive psychology; artificial intelligence researchers develop automated inference systems to
emulate human inference.

Statistical inference uses mathematics to draw conclusions in the presence of uncertainty. This
generalizes deterministic reasoning, with the absence of uncertainty as a special case. Statistical
inference uses quantitative or qualitative (categorical) data which may be subject to random
variation.

Examples[edit]

Greek philosophers defined a number of syllogisms, correct three part inferences, that can be used
as building blocks for more complex reasoning. We begin with a famous example:

1. All men are mortal

2. Socrates is a man

3. Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

The reader can check that the premises and conclusion are true, but Logic is concerned with
inference: does the truth of the conclusion follow from that of the premises?

The validity of an inference depends on the form of the inference. That is, the word "valid" does not
refer to the truth of the premises or the conclusion, but rather to the form of the inference. An
inference can be valid even if the parts are false, and can be invalid even if some parts are true. But a
valid form with true premises will always have a true conclusion.

For example, consider the form of the following symbological track:

1. All meat comes from animals.

2. Beef is a type of meat.

3. Therefore, beef comes from an animal.

If the premises are true, then the conclusion is necessarily true, too.

Now we turn to an invalid form.

1. All A are B.

2. C is a B.
 3. Therefore, C is an A.

To show that this form is invalid, we demonstrate how it can lead from true premises to a false
conclusion.

1. All apples are fruit. (Correct)

2. Bananas are fruit. (Correct)

3. Therefore, bananas are apples. (Wrong)

A valid argument with false premises may lead to a false conclusion:

1. All tall people are Greek.

2. John Lennon was tall.

3. Therefore, John Lennon was Greek. (wrong)

When a valid argument is used to derive a false conclusion from false premises, the inference is valid
because it follows the form of a correct inference.

A valid argument can also be used to derive a true conclusion from false premises:

1. All tall people are musicians (although wrong)

2. John Lennon was tall (right, Valid)

3. Therefore, John Lennon was a musician (Right)

In this case we have two false premises that imply a true conclusion.

Example for definition #2[edit]

Evidence: It is the early 1950s and you are an American stationed in the Soviet Union. You read in
the Moscow newspaper that a soccer team from a small city in Siberia starts winning game after
game. The team even defeats the Moscow team. Inference: The small city in Siberia is not a small
city anymore. The Soviets are working on their own nuclear or high-value secret weapons program.

Knowns: The Soviet Union is a command economy: people and material are told where to go and
what to do. The small city was remote and historically had never distinguished itself; its soccer
season was typically short because of the weather.

Explanation: In a command economy, people and material are moved where they are needed. Large
cities might field good teams due to the greater availability of high quality players; and teams that
can practice longer (weather, facilities) can reasonably be expected to be better. In addition, you put
your best and brightest in places where they can do the most good—such as on high-value weapons
programs. It is an anomaly for a small city to field such a good team. The anomaly (i.e. the soccer
scores and great soccer team) indirectly described a condition by which the observer inferred a new
meaningful pattern—that the small city was no longer small. Why would you put a large city of your
best and brightest in the middle of nowhere? To hide them, of course.

Incorrect inference[edit]

An incorrect inference is known as a fallacy. Philosophers who study informal logic have compiled
large lists of them, and cognitive psychologists have documented many biases in human
reasoning that favor incorrect reasoning.
Automatic logical inference[edit]

AI systems first provided automated logical inference and these were once extremely popular
research topics, leading to industrial applications under the form of expert systemsand
later business rule engines. More recent work on automated theorem proving has had a stronger
basis in formal logic.

An inference system's job is to extend a knowledge base automatically. The knowledge base (KB) is a
set of propositions that represent what the system knows about the world. Several techniques can
be used by that system to extend KB by means of valid inferences. An additional requirement is that
the conclusions the system arrives at are relevant to its task.

Example using Prolog[edit]

Prolog (for "Programming in Logic") is a programming language based on a subset of predicate

calculus. Its main job is to check whether a certain proposition can be inferred from a KB (knowledge
base) using an algorithm called backward chaining.

Let us return to our Socrates syllogism. We enter into our Knowledge Base the following piece of
code:

mortal(X) :- man(X).

man(socrates).

( Here :- can be read as "if". Generally, if P → Q (if P then Q) then in Prolog we would code Q:-P (Q if
P).)
This states that all men are mortal and that Socrates is a man. Now we can ask the Prolog system
about Socrates:

?- mortal(socrates).

(where ?- signifies a query: Can mortal(socrates). be deduced from the KB using the rules) gives the
answer "Yes".

On the other hand, asking the Prolog system the following:

?- mortal(plato).

gives the answer "No".

This is because Prolog does not know anything about Plato, and hence defaults to any property
about Plato being false (the so-called closed world assumption). Finally ?- mortal(X) (Is anything
mortal) would result in "Yes" (and in some implementations: "Yes": X=socrates)
Prolog can be used for vastly more complicated inference tasks. See the corresponding article for
further examples.

Use with the semantic web[edit]

Recently automatic reasoners found in semantic web a new field of application. Being based
upon description logic, knowledge expressed using one variant of OWL can be logically processed,
i.e., inferences can be made upon it.

Bayesian statistics and probability logic[edit]

Philosophers and scientists who follow the Bayesian framework for inference use the mathematical
rules of probability to find this best explanation. The Bayesian view has a number of desirable
features—one of them is that it embeds deductive (certain) logic as a subset (this prompts some
writers to call Bayesian probability "probability logic", following E. T. Jaynes).

Bayesians identify probabilities with degrees of beliefs, with certainly true propositions having
probability 1, and certainly false propositions having probability 0. To say that "it's going to rain
tomorrow" has a 0.9 probability is to say that you consider the possibility of rain tomorrow as
extremely likely.

Through the rules of probability, the probability of a conclusion and of alternatives can be
calculated. The best explanation is most often identified with the most probable (seeBayesian
decision theory). A central rule of Bayesian inference is Bayes' theorem.

See Bayesian inference for examples.

Nonmonotonic logic[2][edit]

A relation of inference is monotonic if the addition of premises does not undermine previously
reached conclusions; otherwise the relation is nonmonotonic. Deductive inference is monotonic: if a
conclusion is reached on the basis of a certain set of premises, then that conclusion still holds if
more premises are added.

By contrast, everyday reasoning is mostly nonmonotonic because it involves risk: we jump to

conclusions from deductively insufficient premises. We know when it is worth or even necessary
(e.g. in medical diagnosis) to take the risk. Yet we are also aware that such inference is defeasible—
that new information may undermine old conclusions. Various kinds of defeasible but remarkably
successful inference have traditionally captured the attention of philosophers (theories of induction,
Peirce's theory of abduction, inference to the best explanation, etc.). More recently logicians have
begun to approach the phenomenon from a formal point of view. The result is a large body of
theories at the interface of philosophy, logic and artificial intelligence.