COMPARING THEORIES BY THEIR POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE CONTENTS

The 'positive content' and the 'negative content' (relative to the act ual world) of a propositional theory are defined. A theory is 'closer to the truth' the logically stronger its positive content and the logi cally weaker its negative content. This proposal delivers the same ver isimilar preordering of theories that has been defined by Brink and He idema as a 'power ordering'. The preordering may be collapsed to a par tial ordering and then embedded into a complete distributive lattice. The preordering may also be refined to a partial ordering by employing the 'convex content' and the 'non-convex content' of each theory. Phi losophical implications and historical relations are discussed.