Construct · 3 fields · 5 citations
One name. Different field. Different construct. One map.
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Charles Spearman's 1904 'General intelligence,' objectively determined and measured introduced the idea that an observed test score mixes a true value with error, and defined a reliability coefficient as the correlation between repeated or parallel measurements of the same thing. Cronbach's 1951 Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests gave the most widely used estimate, alpha, which gauges how consistently a set of items measures one attribute. Here reliability means the consistency or reproducibility of a measurement: how far the same instrument agrees with itself across occasions, items, or raters. It is the stability of a measuring procedure, not the failure-free running of a machine or the truth-tracking of a way of forming beliefs.[1][2]
Waloddi Weibull's 1951 A statistical distribution function of wide applicability gave the failure-time distribution that became the standard tool for modeling when parts break, and Barlow and Proschan's 1965 Mathematical theory of reliability consolidated the field's core result: reliability as the probability that a system performs its required function without failure for a stated period under stated conditions. A component or system has a reliability function giving the chance of surviving to any given time, from which figures such as mean time to failure follow. Here reliability is a probability attached to hardware over time, estimated from life tests and failure data. It is distinct from the consistency of a measurement or the justification of a belief.[3][4]
Alvin Goldman's 1979 What is justified belief? named and set out reliabilism, the view that a belief is justified when it is produced by a process that tends to yield true beliefs, such as sound perception or careful reasoning, rather than by a wishful or careless one. On this account justification depends on the truth-conduciveness of the belief-forming process, not on reasons the believer can state. Here reliability is a property of a cognitive process, its tendency to produce truth, assessed by philosophical argument about cases. It is the truth-tracking of a way of forming beliefs, not the consistency of a test score or the failure-free running of a machine.[5]
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