advb. (and adj.) phr. [L. ā posteriōri ‘from what comes after’ (as opposed to ā priōri ‘from what is before’).] A phrase used to characterize reasoning or arguing from effects to causes, from experience and not from axioms; empirical, inductive; inductively.

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1710.  Berkeley, Princ. Hum. Knowl., § 21. I think arguments à posteriori are unnecessary for confirming what has been … sufficiently demonstrated à priori.

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1834.  Penny Cycl., II. 199/1. In common language, we reason à priori when we infer the existence of a God from the general difficulties in the supposition of the existence of what we then call the creation on any other hypothesis; but we reason à posteriori when we infer the same from marks of intelligent contrivance in this particular creation with which we are acquainted.

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1836–7.  Sir W. Hamilton, Metaph., xxi. (1870), II. 26. Knowledge a posteriori is a synonym for knowledge empirical, or from experience.

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