Facts vs evidence

[danieldemol]

It seems to me that when a scientist or a scientifically minded person asks "what is the evidence that supports your claim?", what they are really asking is "what facts support your claim?"

I think it may help resolve our debates on whether such things as alleged witness testimonies of the Bible constitute "evidence", because whilst a testimony could be factual or fabricated it may be considered "evidence" from a purely legal perspective, the legal perspective considers there to be "false evidence".

From wikipedia;
'False evidence, fabricated evidence, forged evidence, fake evidence or tainted evidence is information created or obtained illegally in order to sway the verdict in a court case.'

Source: False evidence - Wikipedia.

By comparison i would argue there is no such thing as a false fact, only things believed justifiably or unjustifiably to be fact.

So I think it would help to separate witness testimony which could be considered admissible in a court as evidence whether false or true from fact and instead ask the question, "what facts support your claim" in the place of "what evidence supports your claim" so as not to invite the potentially false evidence of testimony being presented as valid where I think it can be argued that it is not such as with regard to supernatural or miracle claims.

Your thoughts?

 

[osgart]

You are trying to eliminate testimony in religious debates. This will be the shortest debate in history.

Many faithful feel strongly that revelation of God is evidence for God. Revelation is prophetic, and subjective.

Argument from Revelation. There is an argument to prove that god exists. It is based upon sacred scripture. It is based on the belief that god has revealed god's existence to humans through the creation or inspiration of the text, which is then thought to be a sacred text.
Queensborough Community College › intro_text
Argument from Revelation



If we remove this type of argument and stick to facts and what can be inferred from facts then it'll end up being a philosophical debate.

There's no way to proceed with debate strictly using objective facts. Imo.

I think debate is more fruitful if one introduces a claim and the opponent makes a counter claim. That way both have to defend their claims.

 

[Ponder This]

It seems to me that when a scientist or a scientifically minded person asks "what is the evidence that supports your claim?", what they are really asking is "what facts support your claim?"

I think it may help resolve our debates on whether such things as alleged witness testimonies of the Bible constitute "evidence", because whilst a testimony could be factual or fabricated it may be considered "evidence" from a purely legal perspective, the legal perspective considers there to be "false evidence".

From wikipedia;
'False evidence, fabricated evidence, forged evidence, fake evidence or tainted evidence is information created or obtained illegally in order to sway the verdict in a court case.'

Source: False evidence - Wikipedia.

By comparison i would argue there is no such thing as a false fact, only things believed justifiably or unjustifiably to be fact.

So I think it would help to separate witness testimony which could be considered admissible in a court as evidence whether false or true from fact and instead ask the question, "what facts support your claim" in the place of "what evidence supports your claim" so as not to invite the potentially false evidence of testimony being presented as valid where I think it can be argued that it is not such as with regard to supernatural or miracle claims.

Your thoughts?

Evidence such as testimony is evaluated by its source = a method that works for courtrooms and for debates.
Science evaluates hypotheses via experimentation, which is why it is not well-suited to a courtroom or to a debate.
Placing too much emphasis on science to resolve every question leads to the problem that science doesn't actually resolve every question.

 

[Daemon Sophic]

It seems to me that when a scientist or a scientifically minded person asks "what is the evidence that supports your claim?", what they are really asking is "what facts support your claim?"

I think it may help resolve our debates on whether such things as alleged witness testimonies of the Bible constitute "evidence", because whilst a testimony could be factual or fabricated it may be considered "evidence" from a purely legal perspective, the legal perspective considers there to be "false evidence".

From wikipedia;
'False evidence, fabricated evidence, forged evidence, fake evidence or tainted evidence is information created or obtained illegally in order to sway the verdict in a court case.'

Source: False evidence - Wikipedia.

By comparison i would argue there is no such thing as a false fact, only things believed justifiably or unjustifiably to be fact.

So I think it would help to separate witness testimony which could be considered admissible in a court as evidence whether false or true from fact and instead ask the question, "what facts support your claim" in the place of "what evidence supports your claim" so as not to invite the potentially false evidence of testimony being presented as valid where I think it can be argued that it is not such as with regard to supernatural or miracle claims.

Your thoughts?

Your OP is well-phrased and extremely good to keep in mind.... but far too optimistic/overly hopeful that the religious folks would even attempt to hold to scientific methodology. As stated above, the faithful consider testimony (by those supporting their beliefs) to be true and unbiased, and their holy text(s) to be infallible.

Unfortunately, we have lost the "Optimistic" frubal.

 

[danieldemol]

Evidence such as testimony is evaluated by its source = a method that works for courtrooms and for debates.
Science evaluates hypotheses via experimentation, which is why it is not well-suited to a courtroom or to a debate.
Placing too much emphasis on science to resolve every question leads to the problem that science doesn't actually resolve every question.

I think there are some testimonies a reasonable person would consider to exclude the source as being reliable even if they were otherwise known to be reliable. For example if I just claimed to have seen a shape shifting cat, would you believe it even if I was known for my reliablility? Or would you doubt my reliability based on the content of my testimony?

And why couldn't science be used to determine that miracles are (if they exist at all) of such statistical rarity that they are in the highly unlikely to be true basket? After all, science is about observation, and I have never personally observed anything which could certainly be described as suspension of the laws of nature, nor have all the scientists I've ever known observed it.

In my opinion.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

It seems to me that when a scientist or a scientifically minded person asks "what is the evidence that supports your claim?", what they are really asking is "what facts support your claim?"

I think it may help resolve our debates on whether such things as alleged witness testimonies of the Bible constitute "evidence", because whilst a testimony could be factual or fabricated it may be considered "evidence" from a purely legal perspective, the legal perspective considers there to be "false evidence".

From wikipedia;
'False evidence, fabricated evidence, forged evidence, fake evidence or tainted evidence is information created or obtained illegally in order to sway the verdict in a court case.'

Source: False evidence - Wikipedia.

By comparison i would argue there is no such thing as a false fact, only things believed justifiably or unjustifiably to be fact.

So I think it would help to separate witness testimony which could be considered admissible in a court as evidence whether false or true from fact and instead ask the question, "what facts support your claim" in the place of "what evidence supports your claim" so as not to invite the potentially false evidence of testimony being presented as valid where I think it can be argued that it is not such as with regard to supernatural or miracle claims.

Your thoughts?

Facts are just observations; pieces of data.

Facts only become evidence when you have an explanatory model that makes testable predictions.
Within that specific context, relevant facts can either match the predictions or contradict them.
That's when facts become evidence.

Facts can also be considered evidence if and when they help in building that explanatory model.

So before you even CAN have evidence, you REQUIRE an explanatory model that makes testable predictions, or a reasonable attempt at creating such a model.

Explanatory models explain facts. Facts support such models or contradict them.

Without such models, facts are such facts.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

You are trying to eliminate testimony in religious debates. This will be the shortest debate in history.

Many faithful feel strongly that revelation of God is evidence for God.

They can "feel" whatever they like.
Doesn't change the fact that "testimony" are just claims. Claims aren't evidence. Claims require evidence.

I think debate is more fruitful if one introduces a claim and the opponent makes a counter claim. That way both have to defend their claims.

yes. But one defends claims with evidence. One does not defend claims by piling on more claims.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Evidence such as testimony is evaluated by its source = a method that works for courtrooms

Is that why the vast majority of innocent people that were nonetheless convicted for crimes they didn't commit, were convicted based on such "testimonial evidence"?
Because it "works"?

Science evaluates hypotheses via experimentation, which is why it is not well-suited to a courtroom or to a debate.

Not just via experimentation. Rather via independently testable predictions that naturally flow from the hypothesis. Not all such tests require experimentation.
And that's why science is so good at obtaining accurate answers to questions.

That's why the vast majority of innocent people convicted to jail time based on "testimony" that are set free, see their conviction reversed based on scientific evidence instead.

Placing too much emphasis on science to resolve every question leads to the problem that science doesn't actually resolve every question.

There doesn't seem to be an alternative if and when we are going to consider it important that we get accurate answers to questions.
So if for whatever reason we can't get to an answer through science, we should perhaps more often dare to say that we simply don't know (yet?).

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

It seems to me that when a scientist or a scientifically minded person asks "what is the evidence that supports your claim?", what they are really asking is "what facts support your claim?"

I think it may help resolve our debates on whether such things as alleged witness testimonies of the Bible constitute "evidence", because whilst a testimony could be factual or fabricated it may be considered "evidence" from a purely legal perspective, the legal perspective considers there to be "false evidence".

From wikipedia;
'False evidence, fabricated evidence, forged evidence, fake evidence or tainted evidence is information created or obtained illegally in order to sway the verdict in a court case.'

Source: False evidence - Wikipedia.

By comparison i would argue there is no such thing as a false fact, only things believed justifiably or unjustifiably to be fact.

So I think it would help to separate witness testimony which could be considered admissible in a court as evidence whether false or true from fact and instead ask the question, "what facts support your claim" in the place of "what evidence supports your claim" so as not to invite the potentially false evidence of testimony being presented as valid where I think it can be argued that it is not such as with regard to supernatural or miracle claims.

Your thoughts?

I am all for it as long as it is used in all cases.

The problem you run into, is in practice folk beliefs about morality and psychology.
Your rule is that if I state something, I must either state it with evidence or note that there is no evidence.
But there is no evidence for the ought part in the is-ought problem so your standard is that all humans must stop using any claim of in effect objective morality, as there is no evidence for that.
And that one, is not limited to theists.

 

[Augustus]

So I think it would help to separate witness testimony which could be considered admissible in a court as evidence whether false or true from fact and instead ask the question, "what facts support your claim" in the place of "what evidence supports your claim" so as not to invite the potentially false evidence of testimony being presented as valid where I think it can be argued that it is not such as with regard to supernatural or miracle claims.

Your thoughts?

Applying those standards would rule out most historical evidence for everything that happened in the pre-modern world, and many things we know about the modern world too.

If we set ourselves the standards of rejecting everything but facts as evidence, we'd be much worse off than using a standard of the careful and critical evaluation of evidence.

 

[exchemist]

It seems to me that when a scientist or a scientifically minded person asks "what is the evidence that supports your claim?", what they are really asking is "what facts support your claim?"

I think it may help resolve our debates on whether such things as alleged witness testimonies of the Bible constitute "evidence", because whilst a testimony could be factual or fabricated it may be considered "evidence" from a purely legal perspective, the legal perspective considers there to be "false evidence".

From wikipedia;
'False evidence, fabricated evidence, forged evidence, fake evidence or tainted evidence is information created or obtained illegally in order to sway the verdict in a court case.'

Source: False evidence - Wikipedia.

By comparison i would argue there is no such thing as a false fact, only things believed justifiably or unjustifiably to be fact.

So I think it would help to separate witness testimony which could be considered admissible in a court as evidence whether false or true from fact and instead ask the question, "what facts support your claim" in the place of "what evidence supports your claim" so as not to invite the potentially false evidence of testimony being presented as valid where I think it can be argued that it is not such as with regard to supernatural or miracle claims.

Your thoughts?

Hmm, I think the use of "facts" is liable to be tendentious, so I prefer"evidence" as the better term. "Facts" has a tone of dogmatic certainty that invites challenge.

Even in science, it can be dangerous to speak of "facts", when speaking about observational evidence. The data from research will often have degrees of confidence associated with it (3 sigma, 5 sigma etc.). It may turn out to be reproducible or not. There may be a degree of interpretation of the basic observed data that can later be shown to be wrong. And so on.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Hmm, I think the use of "facts" is liable to be tendentious, so I prefer"evidence" as the better term. "Facts" has a tone of dogmatic certainty that invites challenge.

Even in science, it can be dangerous to speak of "facts", when speaking about observational evidence. The data from research will often have degrees of confidence associated with it (3 sigma, 5 sigma etc.). It may turn out to be reproducible or not. There may be a degree of interpretation of the basic observed data that can later be shown to be wrong. And so on.

Yeah, but as viewed from the really soft end of science, it is all about different narratives of how we ought to think and feel.

 

[PureX]

Facts are just reasoned deductions based on limited information sets and on the relative logic applied to them. They are true or false only within these contexts and are thus not 'truth'.

"Evidence" is nothing more than a set of inter-related facts. And proof is only the point at which one chooses to accept the evidence as having produced and convinced them of a conclusion.

There is no truth in any of this. The facts are only relatively true via context, the evidence is a subjective selection of facts to create a cognitive narrative, and the proof is only the point at which one decides to accept this narrative as their conclusion.

 

[RestlessSoul]

A fact is something that is known to be true. How is something known to be true? Through consensus? Through repeated observation, perhaps? But then it was known to be true for millenia, that the sun rose every morning in the east, and set every evening in the west. Only relatively recently was this shown to be a grand illusion, an illusion nevertheless confirmed by centuries of repeated observation. So what are these facts that "scientifically minded persons" are supposedly asking for, and in what way are they more reliable than all other evidence?

 

[wellwisher]

Facts are true, but facts can also be incomplete, in terms of being used for evidence. For example, say there is a robbery and I state, as a fact, supported by a cell phone picture, that I saw Joe standing near the robbed house, in the time frame of the robbery. This hard fact would be called circumstantial evidence by any defense attorney. It may be true, but by itself, it it may not be sufficient evidence to be called hard evidence to get a conviction. It is would be more like evidence light or circumstantial evidence. Circumstantial evidence may appear true, by itself, but more facts are needed, to reach the level of hard evidence. Hard evidence often requires more than one fact. Science will generate hundred of factual data points per study, with all these facts combined, as the evidence. Facts; plural, are a subset of evidence.

Does anyone remember the Russian Collusion Coup. The Left offered some facts of Trump Russian Collusion, such as Trump and this team had talked to Russians Representatives. This was not much different from what all previous Presidents elects had done, since Russia was a big international player, and you would have to eventually deal with them. Based on that limited circumstantial evidence, they tried to infer that this partial truth was enough to draw a hard conclusion; collusion. This lack of understanding of facts and evidence divided the country. It would proven to be circumstantial but damage was done.

The Left must be teaching misinformation in the Public Schools they run, since this was not a valid application of facts and hard evidence, yet so many on the Left didn't seem to know the difference to remain objective. This simple confusion may be why the rest of the world is worried; powerful nation of misinformed and con artists, using partial fact games as evidence.

For example, If we use animals behavior, to justify how humans wish to behave, the animal behavior may be a fact, but this is circumstantial evidence, at best, since each species has unique instincts and humans have lost their naturals instincts, in favor of learned knowledge. That same animal behavior fact can just as easily be used to support circumstantial evidence for public schools conditioning students, with teachers not teaching critical thinking skills, nor the nature of facts and evidence.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

A fact is something that is known to be true. How is something known to be true? Through consensus? Through repeated observation, perhaps? But then it was known to be true for millenia, that the sun rose every morning in the east, and set every evening in the west. Only relatively recently was this shown to be a grand illusion, an illusion nevertheless confirmed by centuries of repeated observation. So what are these facts that "scientifically minded persons" are supposedly asking for, and in what way are they more reliable than all other evidence?

It is about in a sense power, authority and morality.

In another sense, the world is in some cases black or white, in others it is different shades of grey, but some people make it all about black or white.
Or truth, real, fact, evidence, logic and so on, versus "you are so wrong!"

 

[danieldemol]

Applying those standards would rule out most historical evidence for everything that happened in the pre-modern world, and many things we know about the modern world too.

If we set ourselves the standards of rejecting everything but facts as evidence, we'd be much worse off than using a standard of the careful and critical evaluation of evidence.

Okay, but for example how do you carefully and critically evaluate miracle claims? It seems to me as though since there has never been a confirmed miracle we should consider miracle claims to be most probably fabricated evidence if we are to consider them as evidence at all.
Thoughts?

 

[PureX]

Okay, but for example how do you carefully and critically evaluate miracle claims? It seems to me as though since there has never been a confirmed miracle we should consider miracle claims to be most probably fabricated evidence if we are to consider them as evidence at all.
Thoughts?

By definition, "miracle claims" cannot be explained.

 

[danieldemol]

By definition, "miracle claims" cannot be explained.

I believe that would make them arguments from ignorance, ie "I don't know what happened therefore the laws of nature were broken". Can you spot the fallacy there?

 

[exchemist]

Okay, but for example how do you carefully and critically evaluate miracle claims? It seems to me as though since there has never been a confirmed miracle we should consider miracle claims to be most probably fabricated evidence if we are to consider them as evidence at all.
Thoughts?

I'm not sure why you focus on miracles. They just seem to be one rather doubtful detail of some religious narratives.

I'd have thought the thing to keep in mind is we live in a world of shades of grey, not black and white. As @Augustus says, if you throw out everything but "facts" you are not left with much. And different people have different standards and opinions as to what can be taken as a fact. Almost everything we think we know about the world is information provided indirectly, by trusted sources, rather than from direct experience. Even direct experience involves a measure of inference by our own minds, from the basic inputs to our senses. All of these can be tricked, or suffer from misconceptions or delusions.

So what's a fact? The advantage of evidence is that it deals in likelihood rather than fact, accommodating the real-world experience that there are only relative degrees of certainty, in so many things. (Miracles, having no modern evidence to support the idea, must rank as fairly improbable.)