I argue that we should consider Norton's material theory of induction as consisting of two largely independent claims. First, there is the claim that material facts license inductions - a claim which I interpret as a type of contextualism about induction. Second, there is the claim that there are no universal rules of induction. While a good case can be made for the first claim, I believe that Norton's arguments for the second claim are lacking. In particular, I spell out Norton's argument against the claim that all induction may be reduced to inference to the best explanation, and argue that it is not persuasive. Rejecting this part of Norton's theory does not however require us to abandon the first claim that material facts license inductions. In this way, I distinguish the parts of the material theory of induction we should happily accept from the parts about which we should be more skeptical.

我认为我们应该将诺顿的物质归纳理论视为由两个主要独立的主张组成。首先，有一种主张，即物质事实许可归纳——我将这种主张解释为一种语境主义关于感应。其次，有人声称没有普遍的归纳规则。虽然可以为第一个主张提出一个很好的理由，但我相信诺顿对第二个主张的论据是缺乏的。特别是，我阐明了诺顿的论点，反对所有归纳都可以简化为对最佳解释的推断的主张，并认为它没有说服力。然而，拒绝诺顿理论的这一部分并不要求我们放弃第一个主张，即物质事实许可归纳。通过这种方式，我区分了我们应该欣然接受的材料归纳理论部分和我们应该更加怀疑的部分。