RE: Testimony is Evidence
August 30, 2017 at 1:47 pm
(This post was last modified: August 30, 2017 at 3:11 pm by LadyForCamus.)
Oh
No, it's really not. You just need it to be in order to rationalize your lack of skepticism.
A.K.A., The position supported by evidence. I noticed you haven't asked me for any yet. I'll get to it.
And what science has demonstrated, is that a perfectly healthy, cognitively intact person can still generate false memories. The rest of the factors from your list of background information are highly subjective and difficult to measure. Therefore, it remains up to us as individuals to decide which claims we're willing to accept on testimony alone, and which ones we aren't. Also, you're leaving out one important reason why we may feel comfortable taking, say, an expert's word in many of these "serious" situations. Corroborating evidence exists, and can be demonstrated. There exists data; dare I say facts behind the testimony.
No. What I'm saying is, one's judgements; one's personal level of skepticism is subjective, but the evidence on which we base these judgements is not. If one chooses to believe an extraordinary claim based solely on a highly subjective, inherently fallible form of evidence, well...I'd call that irrational.
Why would you make that assumption? Do you have evidence to back it up? Secondly, you don't get to say that people have testified to a "fact" until the thing they're testifying to has been demonstrated to be one. That's the whole point. Would you apply this reasoning to Fatima, or UFO sightings? Is it a fact that what people witnessed was god, or aliens, simply because they claimed it so?
My response to your syllogism is that it's pointless. It's unnecessary. It advances your position not one lick. We have real, tangible evidence that exists on one side of the argument, and nothing but a hypothetical logical argument on the other. Your conclusion:
"The reliability of the testimony depends on the witness and the context."
How do you propose to measure these factors with any objectivity, Steve? How are you going to test this alternative theory of evidential strength for accuracy? Can you show that it's a more precise alternative than the evidential hierarchy we use now, with testimony currently at the bottom? Can you show that assessing testimony via the method in your conclusion yields more true claims believed and less false claims believed, than simply withholding belief in a claim until corroborating evidence of a higher caliber arises? How will you do this? With more testimony? An argument without evidence is just an empty vessel, Steve.
That eye witness testimony is 'demonstrably prone to error, to a fault, and therefore inherently unreliable as a form of evidence' is a factual statement backed up by scientific research. Less than three minutes of research yielded these, and I haven't even scratched the surface of scholarly research studies on human memory:
http://www.apa.org/monitor/apr06/eyewitness.aspx
https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...s-have-it/
https://apps.americanbar.org/litigation/...iable.html[/b]
Trying to refurbish a form of evidence to appear stronger than it is in order to rationalize belief in an extraordinary claim is not rational. Take that for what it's worth.
(August 29, 2017 at 2:11 pm)ZSteveII Wrote: The reason you are not getting what I say is I have been trying (to no avail) to show you that the issue is way more nuanced that your simplistic approach--
No, it's really not. You just need it to be in order to rationalize your lack of skepticism.
Quote:Simplistic view:Witness testimony being "inherently unreliable as a form of evidence" needs more evidence for serious stuff if you wish to be "rational".
A.K.A., The position supported by evidence. I noticed you haven't asked me for any yet. I'll get to it.
Quote:More nuanced understanding: It depends.
1. This is apparent in the fact that we rely on testimony alone in hundreds of categories millions of time an hour all over the world--many in very serious situations. Why? Because we have background information that helps us determine if we can rely on it: the witness's character, cognitive ability, subject knowledge, experiences, and track record as well as the context of the event.
And what science has demonstrated, is that a perfectly healthy, cognitively intact person can still generate false memories. The rest of the factors from your list of background information are highly subjective and difficult to measure. Therefore, it remains up to us as individuals to decide which claims we're willing to accept on testimony alone, and which ones we aren't. Also, you're leaving out one important reason why we may feel comfortable taking, say, an expert's word in many of these "serious" situations. Corroborating evidence exists, and can be demonstrated. There exists data; dare I say facts behind the testimony.
Quote:You admit the threshold for needing more evidence is subjective. Having differences in thresholds between people significantly undermines your simplistic view by making it a matter of opinion. And if this threshold is a matter of opinion, then so is your determination of when it is rational to believe it.
No. What I'm saying is, one's judgements; one's personal level of skepticism is subjective, but the evidence on which we base these judgements is not. If one chooses to believe an extraordinary claim based solely on a highly subjective, inherently fallible form of evidence, well...I'd call that irrational.
Quote:Witness testimony can corroborate witness testimony. Wouldn't two or more people testifying to a fact increase the likelihood that it is true?
Why would you make that assumption? Do you have evidence to back it up? Secondly, you don't get to say that people have testified to a "fact" until the thing they're testifying to has been demonstrated to be one. That's the whole point. Would you apply this reasoning to Fatima, or UFO sightings? Is it a fact that what people witnessed was god, or aliens, simply because they claimed it so?
Quote:Your response to my little syllogism is confused. It was clearly in response to your simplistic view of the universal unreliability of witnesses (way back)--not as an alternative to other evidence. I think it more accurately characterizes what we are talking about than you propose.
My response to your syllogism is that it's pointless. It's unnecessary. It advances your position not one lick. We have real, tangible evidence that exists on one side of the argument, and nothing but a hypothetical logical argument on the other. Your conclusion:
"The reliability of the testimony depends on the witness and the context."
How do you propose to measure these factors with any objectivity, Steve? How are you going to test this alternative theory of evidential strength for accuracy? Can you show that it's a more precise alternative than the evidential hierarchy we use now, with testimony currently at the bottom? Can you show that assessing testimony via the method in your conclusion yields more true claims believed and less false claims believed, than simply withholding belief in a claim until corroborating evidence of a higher caliber arises? How will you do this? With more testimony? An argument without evidence is just an empty vessel, Steve.
That eye witness testimony is 'demonstrably prone to error, to a fault, and therefore inherently unreliable as a form of evidence' is a factual statement backed up by scientific research. Less than three minutes of research yielded these, and I haven't even scratched the surface of scholarly research studies on human memory:
http://www.apa.org/monitor/apr06/eyewitness.aspx
https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...s-have-it/
https://apps.americanbar.org/litigation/...iable.html[/b]
Trying to refurbish a form of evidence to appear stronger than it is in order to rationalize belief in an extraordinary claim is not rational. Take that for what it's worth.
Nay_Sayer: “Nothing is impossible if you dream big enough, or in this case, nothing is impossible if you use a barrel of KY Jelly and a miniature horse.”
Wiser words were never spoken.
Wiser words were never spoken.
