Anecdotal Evidence

[robvalue]

Falsifiable. It's the key word.

Any scientific theory can be retested, and found to be false; if it is indeed false.

No amount of staring at a piece of paper or someone's face can ever confirm or deny the truth of an anecdote. And even if it is "true", it still only tells you what the person thinks happened. It's gone through their filter. With science, you can retest the actual subject matter. So you're not only taking the word of the guy who found it out, but everyone else who subsequently retests it. And there's a lot of incentive to debunk things. Science doesn't carve things in stone when they are first printed. If they are wrong, they'll get found out eventually. Unlike anecdotes. There may be corner cases, but this is generally how it works.

Seriously, science and anecdotes are not in the same league. Science isn't perfect, but it's the best tools for learning about reality; virtually by definition. (Some people really don't seem to even understand what science is in the first place, not saying anyone in particular.)

Everyone assumes this is about religious stuff because of the lack of any other real examples to demonstrate whatever issue is supposed to be occurring here. No one cares what any random person makes of an anecdote. Believe anything you want. You don't have to justify it. I guess the problem could be feeling uncomfortable and wanting to justify it.