forum for week of 24 October: Inference to the Best Explanation

I'm a little confused about the difference between the best explanation and induction... Just to help me clarify: For the first, induction would conclude, for example, that the marathon times would continue correct? There will still be a steady incline in performance, however we mostly all would agree that there would be a plateau to the performance level and it couldn't continue infinitely as induction would suggest. This is a problem and we now need to come up with a response from the abduction (IBE) perspective to address the problem. However, I don't see how that is possible given my understanding of abduction. I'm aware that my understanding of the terms may be construed which is what complicates my response but is it not true that abduction is an inference to determine the cause of a result? Being that we don't know the end result of the examples given (population growth, marathon times)can we really apply abduction to them? I don't believe we can... Or it could be that abduction just requires us to look at the information we have, assuming now is the end result, in which case there is also a relatively gradual increase in population with slight fluctuations which would force us to conclude the same pattern in the future... although abduction is not about future projections (or at least my understanding). So I guess what I am saying is that abduction cannot address problems posed by induction.... And as for the second case "...everyone I meet meeting me" I don't understand so I can't address. Ha, I hope this counts as an adequate forum contribution. If any one could clarify the problem for me I would greatly appreciate it!