probabilisticadj.

1864 Chambers's Encycl. VI. 131/1 In that [R.C.] church his [sc. Liguori's] moral theology,..a modification of the so-called ‘probabilistic system’ of the age immediately before his own, is largely used in the direction of consciences.

1873 New Englander (New Haven, Connecticut) Jan. 115 The probabilistic controversy, which was the legitimate fruit of the system, showed that its governing principle, the security of the confessional, worked almost of necessity in the interest of license.

1895 Internat. Jrnl. Ethics 5 335 Among all the theologians of the laxer or probabilistic school..full deliberation and advertence of the malice of the act are requisite to constitute a mortal sin.

1909 New Schaff-Herzog Encycl. Relig. Knowl. V. 226 As a casuistic moralist, Henriquez contributed much to the probabilistic tradition of the Jesuits.

2003 First Things (Nexis) 1 Feb. 71 For most priests, ‘moral theology’ continued to mean probabilistic casuistry, with the very big difference that, after the Council, there was no limit to the number of ‘approved authors’ offering probable opinions.

1928 Jrnl. Philos. 25 629 The essence of this doctrine is..in its second phase that mechanism can be reduced to a probabilistic basis.

1951 Philos. Sci. 18 216 The recognition of the probabilistic character of environmental cue–object and means–end relationships through replacement of the traditional absolute right–wrong alternatives..by cues or means of lower statistical validity.

1965 C. H. Springer et al. Advanced Methods & Models i. 11 Models which are based on the mathematics of statistics and probability, into which we introduce the uncertainties which usually accompany our observations of real events, are called probabilistic models.

1972 Computers & Humanities 7 17 His lengthier treatment of two stochastic models notes that probabilistic stylistics is somewhat more advanced than deterministic approaches.

1991 Oxf. Jrnl. Legal Stud. 11 409 The common law cannot handle ‘probabilistic relationships’ (as with the link between exposure to asbestos and the development of asbestosis).

2003 J. Haldane Intelligent Person's Guide to Relig. ii. 49 Most philosophers who favour theism are now inclined to think that there simply cannot be a strict demonstration of the existence of God, but only a probabilistic proof.

1944 Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) B. 231 354 The variance of the estimated mean value of z based on..basic cells drawn from any micro-state will probabilistically (over the micro-states) converge.

1965 Language 41 201 Between the total workings of such a determinate system..and the sound a speaker produces there is a layer of indeterminacy that can only be handled probabilistically.

1978 Sci. Amer. June 99/2 The processes that govern the placing of telephone calls are so complicated that it is more fruitful to view them probabilistically than to do so deterministically.

2002 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 24 Oct. 55/2 Think of four other appositions that we find most pervasive and puzzling..between that person's or thing's behavior being explained by reference to its goals, teleologically, or by reference to laws of motion, deterministically or probabilistically.