Simulation Theory according to Dilbert

[GrandizerII]

When some skeptics use the term anecdote usually they do so as a way to dismiss personal statements about that do not fit in with how they think the world 'should' work.  Except 90% of what history is made of is anecdotes - letters, inscriptions, records, artifacts, etc.  For example, if I think my ancestors came from Reading, England to Wheaton, Illinois sometime around the turn of the century, then I would expect to find them listed in the census around that time. And lo and behold, I did find them. Theory confirmed.

My point is that anything that happened in the past is a reconstruction. We cannot go back and run experiments in the past. Evolution and geology are basically history. You cannot run an experiment about speciation any more than you can for the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. All you can do is see if new information fits together with what is already known.

The content in the letters, inscriptions, records, and such may be anecdotes (testimonials), yes. But this isn't to say that such objects cannot be scientific evidence as well. It depends on the scientific hypothesis/theory at hand and what the hypothesis/theory predicts.

For example: if some scientific theory says that one should expect to see certain fossils in these layers here rather than in the layers over there, then the fossil record would constitute scientific evidence if these certain fossils do happen to be found in these layers and not in other layers.

I would say the example you gave does suggest that what the census lists is evidence that your ancestors came from a certain area to another at a certain time, and it would certainly be a much better evidence than a mere anecdote from one of your relatives. But it would also be good to do some dating analysis of the census manuscript (based on the science of dating methods) to determine when it was written just to strengthen the collective evidence for your claim. The more evidence, the better, provided they're not merely anecdotes/testimonials (because anyone can say anything really, so it's not much support if any).