Standards of Evidence

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Dimmesdale
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Standards of Evidence

Post #1

Post by Dimmesdale »

It is said that there does not exist sufficient evidence to warrant belief in a deity.

But this can be said of almost anything which we perceive to be real.

How do I know there exists anyone else besides me? How do I know the images I see day in and day out are not simply my own hallucinations and I am simply the dreamer of a great dream?

You may say that I have empathy. But that proves nothing besides the fact that I have dream-empathy. By itself empathy does not have to imply other minds. After all, what if it's simply another trick which my mind dreamed up?

Now, I do actually believe in other minds. Why? Not on any rigorous philosophical basis, but simply because of COMMON SENSE. Indeed, I would argue that just about everyone believes in other minds due to COMMON SENSE.

So what if a theist claims he believes in God, but admits his reasoning for his position does not hold strict philosophical water. He admits to "FAITH." Now isn't FAITH for him no different than COMMON SENSE for us? If so, wouldn't FAITH and COMMON SENSE be, in a sense, interchangeable terms?

If so, what right do atheists have to deride the common sense of one person when they themselves rely on the same? Doesn't that smack of some degree of hypocrisy?

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Re: Standards of Evidence

Post #11

Post by dakoski »

[Replying to wiploc]
No. There's plenty of evidence for many things. My foot for instance. I can touch it, weigh it, measure it, see it, have other people touch it, and so on. A commission of independent investigators would all agree that I have a foot.

The same is true for the earth, red shift, protons, Crayolas, vinegar, standing rib roasts, oak leaves, and many many other things.

If your god had as much evidence as these other things, almost everybody would believe in him. Skepticism would be rare, negligible.
People slip into extreme positions in epistemology. Yes you're correct to challenge the view that we cannot know anything on the basis of scientific evidence. Of course there are many things we can scientifically evaluate and therefore can have knowledge about on the basis of that evidence.

However, its an equally extreme position to claim we cannot know anything without scientific evidence. There are many things we don't know on the basis of scientific evidence:

1) I know I had bacon and eggs for breakfast this morning- can I present any scientific evidence that's the case? No, is it therefore irrational of me to claim I know? It would be irrational of me to be agnostic until I can accumulate sufficient evidence against the null hypothesis that I didn't eat bacon and eggs (unless I have dementia or am a vegetarian).

2) If my wife tells me she went shopping am I irrational to take that as knowledge that she went shopping? It might be if she's a serial liar or the fridge is completely empty. But otherwise its a reasonable position. What would be irrational is if I required her to present sufficient scientific evidence to refute the null hypothesis that she didn't go shopping today before I accept what she said- e.g till receipts, mileage before and after the shopping trip that match the distance to the shops.

3) I know that Mount Fuji is beautiful - can I present you any scientific evidence for that? No, none at all - but I still know its the case.

4) I know that its wrong to rape someone. Can I present scientific evidence for that? No, I can describe people's moral judgments but that would simply be saying what is rather than what ought to be. Is it unreasonable for me to say I know rape is wrong? No, of course not.

5) I know that logic is valid but I cannot scientifically evaluate this - as all scientific research presupposes the validity of logic. Am I therefore irrational in thinking logic is valid? Not at all.

6) I know that my senses give me a reasonably valid representation of reality. Can I scientifically validate that view, not without circularity as again scientific research presupposes the ability of our senses to accurately represent reality. Again, its not irrational to claim I know about the validity of my senses.

There are many other examples. We need to try to avoid overly narrow epistemologies that claim we can know nothing with scientific methods, or that we cannot know anything other than through scientific methods.

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Re: Standards of Evidence

Post #12

Post by rikuoamero »

[Replying to post 11 by dakoski]
I know I had bacon and eggs for breakfast this morning- can I present any scientific evidence that's the case?
Yes.
You could examine your cooking ware. What did you use that is typically used for bacon and eggs?
You could examine receipts for food bought, and see if bacon and eggs are missing from your fridge.
You could examine food containers, and see if they're missing the food they normally contain.
You could even go so far as to examine your poop. I hear palaeontologists are able to find out what a dinosaur last ate, so surely your own should be easy pickings for such an examination.
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Re: Standards of Evidence

Post #13

Post by dakoski »

[Replying to rikuoamero]
Yes.
You could examine your cooking ware. What did you use that is typically used for bacon and eggs?
You could examine receipts for food bought, and see if bacon and eggs are missing from your fridge.
You could examine food containers, and see if they're missing the food they normally contain.
You could even go so far as to examine your poop. I hear palaeontologists are able to find out what a dinosaur last ate, so surely your own should be easy pickings for such an examination.
Haha I like it. Unfortunately these kind of retrospective analyses are open to risk of bias.

-Receipts get thrown away
-maybe my wife had a sneaky bacon and eggs while I was asleep without telling me which makes interpretation of inventories more tricky (and the fact that few if any actually keep such inventories)
-I'd also need to know whether the sensitivity and specificity of the instrument measuring the poop is sufficient to rule in the presence of bacon and eggs - it most probably would be confounded by my eating custard for dessert.

Fortunately, I don't require any of these data to know that I had bacon and eggs for breakfast.

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Re: Standards of Evidence

Post #14

Post by Neatras »

[Replying to post 13 by dakoski]

Sure, but it's well within expected values for you to eat bacon and eggs. Do you know what would happen if you claimed to eat the crown jewels? Or molten tungsten? These would be extraordinary claims outside the parameters of normalcy. As such, you would be expected to justify this, because people want to know if such occurrences are possible or realistic.

One component of "believability" is the understanding that normal events follow naturally.

What theists try to do is remove their religion from the verification process while simultaneously insisting on the most extraordinary claim of all, that some divine being actively intervenes in reality and performs miracles.
However, its an equally extreme position to claim we cannot know anything without scientific evidence. There are many things we don't know on the basis of scientific evidence:
I say that this is a case where you had a blind spot: The very fact we know what is normal or not is down to our repeated observation and verification that feeds into the scientific method. We know that eating breakfast is normal not through divine revelation or intuition. It's not right to call it "scientific" outright, but that's because the scientific method is an abstraction of what we use in conventional terms every day: Observation and verification. And these are the foundation of all knowledge that actually contributes to humanity's progress.

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Re: Standards of Evidence

Post #15

Post by dakoski »

[Replying to Neatras]
Sure, but it's well within expected values for you to eat bacon and eggs. Do you know what would happen if you claimed to eat the crown jewels? Or molten tungsten? These would be extraordinary claims outside the parameters of normalcy. As such, you would be expected to justify this, because people want to know if such occurrences are possible or realistic.
The problem of course is expected values for whom? It maybe normal for you it might be outside the parameters of normalcy if I was talking to a Bhuddist, Muslim and someone from other cultures that don't eat bacon and eggs. In either context would I be any more or less justified in claiming I had bacon and eggs? Not at all, I'd still be justified as I know that I did.
One component of "believability" is the understanding that normal events follow naturally.

What theists try to do is remove their religion from the verification process while simultaneously insisting on the most extraordinary claim of all, that some divine being actively intervenes in reality and performs miracles.
Again its subjective, you're simply stating a component of believability is to believe that Naturalism is true. That's true for Naturalists, its not true for those who don't hold to Naturalism.

If you wanted to be consistent in your thinking you would also seek to put Naturalism under empirical test rather than presupposing it.

I say that this is a case where you had a blind spot: The very fact we know what is normal or not is down to our repeated observation and verification that feeds into the scientific method. We know that eating breakfast is normal not through divine revelation or intuition. It's not right to call it "scientific" outright, but that's because the scientific method is an abstraction of what we use in conventional terms every day: Observation and verification. And these are the foundation of all knowledge that actually contributes to humanity's progress.
My point wasn't on whether it was normal or not to have breakfast in general. Because of course it is subjective - for some its normal to have breakfast for others not. Whether it is normal for me to eat bacon and eggs in general is irrelevant - if I never ate breakfast ever before but did today I would still be justified in claiming I ate bacon and eggs because I did. If I ate a snake for breakfast I would still be justified in claiming I ate a snake because it would be true.

The reality is that you don't go through elaborate processes of keeping inventories of food to verify whether you had breakfast in the morning, nor do you use elaborate technologies to assess the content of your stomach. You just know.

Its also the case when you see beauty you don't attempt to test the null hypothesis that its in fact not beautiful. Nor do you ask your friend whether Mount Fuji meets the 'normal' criteria for beauty, and I hope you don't try to verify the beauty of people's faces by measuring the symmetry of their features. When you hear of someone being raped, you don't think that's outside the range of normalcy, you think 'that's wrong' (I would hope).

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