a priori law definition
As the term a priori applies to the law, it refers to deductive reasoning, or an idea that is taken as a given. An a priori assumption may be brought out in a legal complaint, motion, or even at trial, as one party’s line of reasoning stems from something that has happened in the past. For example: a priori - involving deductive reasoning from a general principle to a necessary effect; not supported by fact; an a priori judgment. 1  analytical, analytic - of a proposition that is necessarily true independent of fact or experience; `all spinsters are unmarried' is an analytic proposition. A priori. Definition. A Latin term meaning from what comes before.. In legal arguments, a priori generally means that a particular idea is taken as a given. For example, the proposition that all bachelors are unmarried is a priori, and the proposition that it is raining outside now is a posteriori. The distinction between the two terms is epistemological and immediately relates to the justification for why a given item of knowledge is held. No one would have guessed a priori that this movement of a middle-aged man's body would cause fish to come out of the sea into his larder, but experience shows that it does, and the middle-aged man therefore continues to go to the City, just as the cat in the cage continues to lift the latch when it has once found it. An a priori proposition is one that is knowable a priori and an a priori argument is one the premises of which are a priori propositions. Correspondingly, an a posteriori proposition is knowable a posteriori, while an a posteriori argument is one the premises of which are a posteriori propositions. from a general law to a particular instance; valid independently of observation. Compare a posteriori (def 1). 2. existing in the mind prior to and independent of experience, as a faculty or character trait. Compare a posteriori (def 2). 3. not based on prior study or examination; nonanalytic: an a priori judgment. 1. Proceeding from a known or assumed cause to a necessarily related effect; deductive. 2. a. Derived by or designating the process of reasoning without reference to particular facts or experience. b. Knowable without appeal to particular experience. A given proposition is knowable a priori if it can be known independent of any experience other than the experience of learning the language in which the proposition is expressed, whereas a proposition that is knowable a posteriori is known on the basis of experience. The Latin term a priori refers to knowledge that comes from theoretical reasoning, rather than from actual observation or personal experience. In the term’s most basic use, a person could assume that, if Bobby went to Kindergarten at least six days, he went to Kindergarten more than five days.
It means deductive reasoning, or an idea that is taken as a given.