Abstract

This paper applies a new theory of explanatory coherence to the early history of the idea of continental drift. The new theory consists of seven principles that establish coherence and incoherence relations among propositions. It has been implemented in a connectionist computer program called ECHO. Analysis of the arguments of Alfred Wegener, the first major proponent of continental drift, provided input to ECHO which evaluated the explanatory coherence of his hypotheses. ECHO has also been used to analyze the coherence of the views of Wegener 's critics. The paper concludes by contrasting our explanatory coherence account of Wegener and his opposition with a decision-theoretic account recently offered by Ron Giere