Focused Correlation and Confirmation

This essay presents results about a deviation from independence measure called focused correlation. This measure explicates the formal relationship between probabilistic dependence of an evidence set and the incremental confirmation of a hypothesis, resolves a basic question underlying Peter Klein and TedWarfield’s ‘truth-conduciveness’ problem for Bayesian coherentism, and provides a qualified rebuttal to Erik Olsson’s claim that there is no informative link between correlation and confirmation. The generality of the result is compared to recent programs in Bayesian epistemology that attempt to link correlation and confirmation by utilizing a conditional evidential independence condition. Several properties of focused correlation are also highlighted.