[Elsie]

As the philosopher David Hume argued, the predictive powers of induction are never actually based on simple observations.

In his critique of causality, he notes that we never actually see cause and effect taking place; we just apprehend the sequence of one thing happening, and then another. What undergirds inductive logic is an assumption, one that can’t be proved inductively or deductively, that “instances of which we have had no experience, must resemble those of which we have had experience, and that the course of nature continues always uniformly the same.”

[BroJoeK]

Elsie to Elsie: "As the philosopher David Hume argued, the predictive powers of induction are never actually based on simple observations. "

Now here, finally, is an appropriate place to ask HLPhat's question on practicality -- other than philosophical inquiry, what practical purpose is served by such observations?