Evidence to Convict?

[Mister Agenda]

No... not taking anything away from the matter.   It was just a re-cap.
I think that it is intriguing , that you said the only people who know the truth  of the matter is the other witnesses and myself.  Can the witnesses not transfer this truth of the matter to others through testimony?

Yes they can. It's just not possible to know if they are correct and truthful without evidence to support that. The testimony is the claim. Evidence is the body of facts that support or undermine the claim. Going through life taking everyone's word for everything will land you in trouble.

  I would assume that if there was DNA evidence, I don't witness these facts first hand, but rely on the testimony (either documents or expert testimony) in court to relay this information. Why can't the same be done with testimony?    Are you saying that my testimony in confessing to the crime would be evidence, whereas anyone else who saw is somehow not evidence?  Couldn't someone just bring up the false convictions based on confessions?

Sigh. The testimony is the claim. The evidence is what makes you justified in accepting it as accurate. People give false confessions all the time. Police interrogations are practically designed to elicit them. Plenty of people have been falsely convicted based on their own confessions.

'I beat Joe with a chair' is a claim. If I did, in fact, beat Joe with a chair; the evidence should support that claim: Joe should show signs of being beaten, the chair should show signs of being used to beat someone, and my story should hold up under cross examination and investigation of the circumstances, nothing found that would motivate me to claim I beat Joe when I didn't, no one says I was somewhere else when it happened, etc. I should be convicted if no evidence is found to exonerate me despite my confession. It makes a difference if the confession was freely given or obtained by interrogation.

Why is this so hard for you? It's like you have some motivation to not be able to get the difference between a claim and evidence for or against a claim.

[RoadRunner79]

No... not taking anything away from the matter.   It was just a re-cap.
I think that it is intriguing , that you said the only people who know the truth  of the matter is the other witnesses and myself.  Can the witnesses not transfer this truth of the matter to others through testimony?

Yes they can. It's just not possible to know if they are correct and truthful without evidence to support that. The testimony is the claim. Evidence is the body of facts that support or undermine the claim. Going through life taking everyone's word for everything will land you in trouble.

  I would assume that if there was DNA evidence, I don't witness these facts first hand, but rely on the testimony (either documents or expert testimony) in court to relay this information. Why can't the same be done with testimony?    Are you saying that my testimony in confessing to the crime would be evidence, whereas anyone else who saw is somehow not evidence?  Couldn't someone just bring up the false convictions based on confessions?

Sigh. The testimony is the claim. The evidence is what makes you justified in accepting it as accurate. People give false confessions all the time. Police interrogations are practically designed to elicit them. Plenty of people have been falsely convicted based on their own confessions.

'I beat Joe with a chair' is a claim. If I did, in fact, beat Joe with a chair; the evidence should support that claim: Joe should show signs of being beaten, the chair should show signs of being used to beat someone, and my story should hold up under cross examination and investigation of the circumstances, nothing found that would motivate me to claim I beat Joe when I didn't, no one says I was somewhere else when it happened, etc. I should be convicted if no evidence is found to exonerate me despite my confession. It makes a difference if the confession was freely given or obtained by interrogation.

Why is this so hard for you? It's like you have some motivation to not be able to get the difference between a claim and evidence for or against a claim.

Thanks,   I do share some of your concerns, but come to a different conclusion.  I think that those testifying that someone hit Joe over the head with a chair, is similar to an expert testifying that this someones DNA was on the chair.  One is testifying to what the tests result where, the other is testifying to what they had seen.  Are these both just claims and not evidence?  Does a person need to see for themselves, in order for it to be considered evidence? 

I would have preferred for someone else to start a thread (because when I do, my motives seem to need to be questioned).  But it does seem like people are interested in discussing and I am thinking, that I might do so (and do better to just ignore the trolls this time).

[LadyForCamus]

Aaaand there it is. This is the point in the "discussion" where RR attempts to conflate scientific evidence with testimony. We have done this as nauseum with you, dude.

---

It wouldn't of took 20 some pages, if I didn't have to keep repeating myself (which is probably my fault for indulging people as much as I did).  Why is it so difficult to understand that I may just be trying to gather what peoples different opinions are about the subject.

becsuse your OWN words in this thread are evidence that you have other motivations you refuse to admit to.  As quoted in the very post you are responding to.

You say that I left you no choice in the two options - how do you figure that?  You where free to choose, and if you think the evidence was not sufficient or there was no evidence; then the option of "no" would follow... that is your choice.

Correct.  False dichotomy.  As I have explained above.  You know what a false dichotomy is,
right?

not demanding or arguing for a certain outcome.  I do find it interesting, and out of the norm, but I wasn't making an argument.  And if you want to expand, and offer an opinion that it is either not sufficient or not evidence at all, then anyone was free to do that as well.

Are you guys going to tell seriously tell me, that they have no evidence with which to hold and convict me?

Lol, no, that doesn't sound like you're arguing for a certain outcome at all!  Your words speak for themselves.

As to wanting everyone to stop saying that eyewitness testimony isn't evidence.  Sure I do... do you not think you are justified in your position and think that others should feel the same?   However I wasn't saying that here. I wasn't attempting to get people to make that shift.  In light of the questions and the scenario they re-evaluate their positions then I think that is good.  If they re-evaluate and come to the same position, that is good also. I didn't give them any reason to change their position, but they are thinking about it. And even if they didn't really think about it, that is OK too, because all I asked for was their opinion.

More flapping.  You're trying to censor and draw lines in the conversation by refusing to discuss the topic in full, including the spectrum of types of claims people offer testimony as evidence for.  Like the supernatural.  It's relevant and pertinent to the subject matter no matter how much you bleat that it's not.

no one took me up on the offer to make a thread to discuss (apparently that was some great thing to ask of people)  I was thinking that I may.  If nothing else, people can see what the difference is, between making an inquiry, and presenting an argument for my position.
However I am learning, I am going to just start ignoring; appeals to motive, arguments attacking the person rather than the proposition, and also those who don't really say anything but just re-state their position with more insistence.

Oh, please.  I was one of the few people actually attempting to engage with you instead of slinging vulgar insults, but if you're going to place limits on what you're willing to talk about (and for suspect reasons), then that's NOT honest, and I'm not going to waste my time.

[RoadRunner79]

Oh, please.  I was one of the few people actually attempting to engage with you instead of slinging vulgar insults,

Good, if I decide to make a thread to discuss, then I hope we can continue that.

[The Grand Nudger]

-and in that thread, as in every thread before it..and however many more threads you'll make after it, "testimony" will still be as insufficient as it's always been.

[paulpablo]

No... not taking anything away from the matter.   It was just a re-cap.
I think that it is intriguing , that you said the only people who know the truth  of the matter is the other witnesses and myself.  Can the witnesses not transfer this truth of the matter to others through testimony?

Yes they can. It's just not possible to know if they are correct and truthful without evidence to support that. The testimony is the claim. Evidence is the body of facts that support or undermine the claim. Going through life taking everyone's word for everything will land you in trouble.

  I would assume that if there was DNA evidence, I don't witness these facts first hand, but rely on the testimony (either documents or expert testimony) in court to relay this information. Why can't the same be done with testimony?    Are you saying that my testimony in confessing to the crime would be evidence, whereas anyone else who saw is somehow not evidence?  Couldn't someone just bring up the false convictions based on confessions?

Sigh. The testimony is the claim. The evidence is what makes you justified in accepting it as accurate. People give false confessions all the time. Police interrogations are practically designed to elicit them. Plenty of people have been falsely convicted based on their own confessions.

'I beat Joe with a chair' is a claim. If I did, in fact, beat Joe with a chair; the evidence should support that claim: Joe should show signs of being beaten, the chair should show signs of being used to beat someone, and my story should hold up under cross examination and investigation of the circumstances, nothing found that would motivate me to claim I beat Joe when I didn't, no one says I was somewhere else when it happened, etc. I should be convicted if no evidence is found to exonerate me despite my confession. It makes a difference if the confession was freely given or obtained by interrogation.

Why is this so hard for you? It's like you have some motivation to not be able to get the difference between a claim and evidence for or against a claim.

It's basically an argument based on semantics but from what I can tell, in a court of law witness testimony is considered evidence.

It might be insufficient evidence or fabricated evidence or it might be considered reliable witness testimony.

In science then obviously witness testimony isn't evidence.

To cut through the bullshit all this amounts to is trying to connect the word "evidence" to religious eye witness testimony to make the events described seem to be "evident".

In my opinion, as a non religious person, any religious person who wants to call religious witness testimony "evidence" that's fine by me, as long as that isn't confused with scientific evidence and my argument would be that 2000 year old testimony concerning claims of the supernatural is ridiculous, laughable anecdotal evidence.

There's a similar tactic in Islamic apologetics relating to the hadith, they call it the science of the hadith.  Which basically amounts to the science of anecdotal evidence.

[Ravenshire]

RR, no one wants to start a thread to help you push your agenda.

[Amarok]

let the whining about "insults " and "not thinking critically when you use critical thinking to expose him" And showing something has been debunked only to have him deny it. Then hilariously accuse us of doing so .  Etc etc etc

[Astonished]

Well it makes perfect sense, if they're made in god's image, since god is such a fuckwad, the forbidden apple didn't fall far from the tree.

[Cyberman]

Question: if humans are made in "God's" image, why aren't we invisible?

I want my X-Men power, dammit!