RE: popular opinion as evidence
April 12, 2014 at 8:40 am
(This post was last modified: April 12, 2014 at 9:06 am by Cato.)
I think people are abusing the concept of probability and forgetting to account or the fact that people imagine things all the time. Imagining something doesn't necessarily make the imagined more probable.
I can imagine waking up tomorrow with a stalk of broccoli having grown out of my left eye. Will anyone argue that the probability meter for this event has moved off the low peg simply because I have imagined it?
Someone also asked for the definition of evidence. I am inclined to believe this person is being coy, but this should help if the inquiry was sincere:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evidence/
I've always enjoyed this quip:
Personally, I think it's ridiculous to talk of evidence divorced from observation; i.e., treating claims as evidence. If someone says "Godzilla exists" the only proper reply should be something along the lines of "Oh yeah? Show me." At this point there is simply not enough information to suggest Godzilla is possible, let alone probable to any degree. Claims must also be weighed against all current knowledge. This means that not all claims merit the same consideration or deserve investigation: claim - "I woke up with broccoli protruding from my eye"; reply - "Bullshit".
I can imagine waking up tomorrow with a stalk of broccoli having grown out of my left eye. Will anyone argue that the probability meter for this event has moved off the low peg simply because I have imagined it?
Someone also asked for the definition of evidence. I am inclined to believe this person is being coy, but this should help if the inquiry was sincere:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evidence/
I've always enjoyed this quip:
Quote: “The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd; indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widely spread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible.”
― Bertrand Russell, Marriage and Morals
Personally, I think it's ridiculous to talk of evidence divorced from observation; i.e., treating claims as evidence. If someone says "Godzilla exists" the only proper reply should be something along the lines of "Oh yeah? Show me." At this point there is simply not enough information to suggest Godzilla is possible, let alone probable to any degree. Claims must also be weighed against all current knowledge. This means that not all claims merit the same consideration or deserve investigation: claim - "I woke up with broccoli protruding from my eye"; reply - "Bullshit".
