Testimony is Evidence

[SteveII]

Can you determine, on the basis of my testimony alone, whether or not it would be rational to believe that I had a cheeseburger?  

Walk us through the rational process, without exceeding the limits of the claim "I had a cheeseburger".  Keep in mind, the moment you reference something exterior to those four words, you've made a liar of yourself.  Good luck.

I have 6 a priori reasons to believe your statement that you had a cheeseburger.

1. All statement of what people had for lunch are overwhelmingly more true than false.
2. Truthfulness is a presupposition for the use of language. Deviation from truth can only be done in very small doses or language would lose its usefulness. 
3. My experience is that I have not been mislead previously on similar things so I have not developed a warranted constraint on accepting such statements.
4. It is reasonable to assume that you have been raised with and adhere to a basic moral development that includes, at the very least, honesty and concern for others--which is trivially easy to learn because of the obvious benefit of receiving accurate information.
5. It would be a rare occasion that lying about such a thing would be a benefit. I did not ask for the information, I will not act on the information, and the information has no value to me. In the absence of possible known motivations for lying, I have warrant to believe you.
6. I have prior knowledge that eating a cheeseburger is a plausible act. 

So, it would be reasonable to believe you.

---

I don't need to. The evidence is the evidence. It's the conclusions you draw from the evidence that is in question. Your position seems to be:

1. Witness testimony is unreliable for some % of cases
2. We don't know when a mistake will be made
3. Therefore witness testimony cannot be relied upon by itself

But the conclusion does not necessarily (in every case...therefore must) follow from the premises which is evident when we look at the opposing view:

1. Witness testimony is unreliable for some % of cases
2. We don't know when a mistake will be made 
3' Therefore care must be given when relying solely on witness testimony

This conclusion is completely circular and meaningless.  You're essentially saying:

1. Witness testimony is wrong sometimes 
2. We don't know when it will be wrong
3. Therefore, we must be careful not to accept wrong testimony, and only accept correct testimony

Your conclusion is just a re-stating of your premises, and to further its pointlessness, you offer no objective means of distinguishing between reliable/unreliable testimony as all your metrics are totally subjective:  character, track record, etc., experience.  

Totally valid argument.  You've essentially logically argued into existence that witness testimony is unreliable as a form of evidence, lol.  

Thanks!  😁

The phrase "when relying solely on witness testimony" is a key component to 3' and cannot be left out in your reformulation without substantially changing the meaning.

It is certainly no circular. It's probably the fact that it is so obvious that makes it seem that way. 

"Care" (from 3') would include assessing 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. If these things do not increase the likelihood of truth, then by all means reject the testimony. The point is that the GB's 3 does not allow for this possibility at all.

[SteveII]

I just want to spell my thoughts out a little more clearly than I did a few pages back, now that I have two free hands.  Steve's syllogism for the reliability of witness testimony alone as evidence is as follows (bold/italics are mine):

1. Witness testimony is unreliable for some % of cases
2. We don't know when a mistake will be made
3' Therefore, care must be given when relying solely on witness testimony, because it is unreliable for some percent of cases, and we don't know when a mistake will be made.

Is this not circular reasoning?  Really, it's just a re-stating of what we've been saying all along: be wary of witness testimony because it's inherently unreliable.

He simply shoehorn's into his conclusion "when relying solely on testimony," but the argument its self doesn't lead us to a conclusion that it is logical to do so.

All you did was tack 1 and 2 to the end of 3' which is both wrong and redundant. Anything that follows the word 'because' is by definition a premise and does not belong in the conclusion line.

[LadyForCamus]

Can you determine, on the basis of my testimony alone, whether or not it would be rational to believe that I had a cheeseburger?  

Walk us through the rational process, without exceeding the limits of the claim "I had a cheeseburger".  Keep in mind, the moment you reference something exterior to those four words, you've made a liar of yourself.  Good luck.

I have 6 a priori reasons to believe your statement that you had a cheeseburger.

1. All statement of what people had for lunch are overwhelmingly more true than false.
2. Truthfulness is a presupposition for the use of language. Deviation from truth can only be done in very small doses or language would lose its usefulness. 
3. My experience is that I have not been mislead previously on similar things so I have not developed a warranted constraint on accepting such statements.
4. It is reasonable to assume that you have been raised with and adhere to a basic moral development that includes, at the very least, honesty and concern for others--which is trivially easy to learn because of the obvious benefit of receiving accurate information.
5. It would be a rare occasion that lying about such a thing would be a benefit. I did not ask for the information, I will not act on the information, and the information has no value to me. In the absence of possible known motivations for lying, I have warrant to believe you.
6. I have prior knowledge that eating a cheeseburger is a plausible act. 

So, it would be reasonable to believe you.

---

This conclusion is completely circular and meaningless.  You're essentially saying:

1. Witness testimony is wrong sometimes 
2. We don't know when it will be wrong
3. Therefore, we must be careful not to accept wrong testimony, and only accept correct testimony

Your conclusion is just a re-stating of your premises, and to further its pointlessness, you offer no objective means of distinguishing between reliable/unreliable testimony as all your metrics are totally subjective:  character, track record, etc., experience.  

Totally valid argument.  You've essentially logically argued into existence that witness testimony is unreliable as a form of evidence, lol.  

Thanks!  😁

The phrase "when relying solely on witness testimony" is a key component to 3' and cannot be left out in your reformulation without substantially changing the meaning.

It is certainly no circular. It's probably the fact that it is so obvious that makes it seem that way. 

"Care" (from 3') would include assessing 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. If these things do not increase the likelihood of truth, then by all means reject the testimony. The point is that the GB's 3 does not allow for this possibility at all.

Damn!  I really thought I had something there, haha!  😛  But, my failed take down doesn't change what I was saying before; that all of this is theoretical, and based on heavily subjective metrics. Your conclusion basically says, "don't accept unreliable testimony." What practical purpose does that serve? How does that advance our ability to distinguish between good and bad testimony in any real world capacity? How do you suppose we apply this? By using more testimony?

 You say, "if these things do not increase the likelihood of truth," but you have no actual way of measuring or quantifying results. You have no way to demonstrate that "being careful", what ever that means (all this "background info" is similarly subjective, and so it may mean something different to you than it means to me) is a MORE reliable method, or at least AS reliable a method to the truth of a claim as simply withholding belief until stronger evidence arises.  All you have is syllogism hanging in space.

[The Grand Nudger]

I have 6 a priori reasons to believe your statement that you had a cheeseburger.

All of which are external to my "witness testimony". Next.

-This whole "care" business, about assessing "background information"... is about the weakest way to avoid saying "we assess testimony by reference to evidence" that I can think of.

[SteveII]

I have 6 a priori reasons to believe your statement that you had a cheeseburger.

All of which are external to my "witness testimony". Next.

So what?

You clearly asked if it was rational to believe your statement. That very question requires that I use reasoning internal to me. 

If you deny me my own reasoning to investigate your intended meaning, then your statement was not meant to convey meaning and so you have said the equivalent of nothing.

[The Grand Nudger]

None of the things you listed were rational, and none of them had anything to do with "testimony alone".  They were your rationalizations for belief based upon what you consider sufficient evidence of general cases (and in each example, they were inane). Using the terms "reasons for belief" in a colloquial sense and then shifting into reason as regards a formal system of knowledge is laziness of the -highest- order, and, itself...irrational.

You rattled off a list that shows us your a-rational credulity...at best...which, granted, is how most of us go through most of our lives and respond to most claims. We don;t care enough, for example, whether a person did or didn;t have a cheeseburger - we don;t apply any rational process to that claim -or- ask for evidence. We have no explicit reason to believe them, and whatever implicit reason we may suppose or posit ad hoc has nothing at all to do with the fact that they said a thing. Trying to shore this up to defend the sinking ship of testimony is pointless.

My "intended meaning"...btw, and any investigation thereof. External to my witness testimony. How has it come to pass that the very person who contends that we can or do rely solely on testimony can't seem to bring himself to do so?

[LadyForCamus]

H

1 A witness's recollection could be wrong
2 The witness's character, cognitive ability, subject knowledge, experiences, and track record serve can minimize the possibility of error
3 The context of the event can minimize the possibility of error
4 Therefore the reliability of testimony varies depending on the witness and the context.

Steve, could you explain how you would go about assessing this background data? Further, can you explain your reasoning behind the assumption that demonstrating the integrity and cognitive ability of the witness means you have also demonstrated the truth of their testimony to the degree that you would not require any further corroborating evidence? People of sound mind mis-remember all the time. How could you ever objectively distinguish, even using all this "background information," as you call it, between a false memory and a real one without referring to external, corroborating evidence?

It seems all you could do with this argument, at best, is demonstrate the reliability of the witness to tell the truth about what they believe they witnessed, not that the content of the testimony itself stands on its own. Those two things are indeed different.

I'll go back to my gremlin example that has gone unanswered by RR. Using your syllogism, you conclude that I am honest, moral, and of sound mind. Does this mean you accept my testimony, on its own, that I saw a gremlin eating the tires off of a Dodge Charger?

[Thumpalumpacus]

All of which are external to my "witness testimony". Next.

So what?

You clearly asked if it was rational to believe your statement. That very question requires that I use reasoning internal to me. 

If you deny me my own reasoning to investigate your intended meaning, then your statement was not meant to convey meaning and so you have said the equivalent of nothing.

You're making his point for him, Steve. If you're assessing the validity of testimony, you're not taking it at face value. That is an implicit admission of its doubtful utility. Also, I'm here to testify that he's right.

People lie. People hear, see, and remember things wrongly. People do not always get the context of a sequence of events. These are failings that testimony suffers.

If there is physical evidence contradicting testimonial, we all accept the former and not the latter, correct? (Well, maybe not all, but most of us). You know why? Because reality doesn't lie. Reality doesn't misinterpret events. And generally speaking, it is pretty easy to understand so long as you're not paying attention to the testimony of people who don't know their ass from third base about reality.

[Edwardo Piet]

None of that makes "witness testimony" evidence.  You;re looking for a solution as to when or if you accept witness testimony, but regardless of when or if you do or what line you draw it will still just be you -accepting- witness testimony.  

It is not transformed, by your acceptance of it, into evidence.  It is still entirely unlike those other reps of the set we've been discussing and which we call "evidence".  It still makes nothing of it's contents -evident-.  You can accept that I had a cheeseburger, or not...but neither my claim that I did nor your acceptance or rejection of my claim provides -evidence- of whether or not I had a cheeseburger.  It doesn't even provide evidence that -I- believe I had a cheeseburger (even if you accept my "witness testimony", and so you do believe).......it doesn't even provide evidence that cheeseburgers exist.........

That's a mighty fucking fail for something you accept as evidence.  But hey, you do you.

GB stated unequivocally in the post I was responding to that witness testimony is evidence--therefore I was not arguing that dead horse.

Well that makes both of you wrong then

[SteveII]

The phrase "when relying solely on witness testimony" is a key component to 3' and cannot be left out in your reformulation without substantially changing the meaning.

It is certainly no circular. It's probably the fact that it is so obvious that makes it seem that way. 

"Care" (from 3') would include assessing 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. If these things do not increase the likelihood of truth, then by all means reject the testimony. The point is that the GB's 3 does not allow for this possibility at all.

Damn!  I really thought I had something there, haha!  😛  But, my failed take down doesn't change what I was saying before; that all of this is theoretical, and based on heavily subjective metrics.  Your conclusion basically says, "don't accept unreliable testimony."[1] What practical purpose does that serve?  How does that advance our ability to distinguish between good and bad testimony in any real world capacity?  How do you suppose we apply this?  By using more testimony?  [2]

 You say, "if these things do not increase the likelihood of truth," but you have no actual way of measuring or quantifying results.  You have no way to demonstrate that "being careful", what ever that means (all this "background info" is similarly subjective, and so it may mean something different to you than it means to me) is a MORE reliable method, or at least AS reliable a method to the truth of a claim as simply withholding belief until stronger evidence arises. [3] All you have is syllogism hanging in space.

1. Remember the context of my post. I was comparing 3 and 3' --illustrating that both follow from the same premises (evidence) and the conclusions were written to address the specific question of relying solely on witness testimony. This means that both are opinion. There is no warrant in the evidence to say one is correct. My opinion matches most the world's opinion. 

2. The evidence presented addresses this question. There are way to improve reliable outcomes: double-blind lineups, sequential lineups, jury instruction, ask for confidence statements, etc. 

3. Witness testimony is subjective by definition. Similarly, assessing a complete witness testimony is also subjective. Does not change the fact that it is necessary nor will it ever be perfect. 

You do acknowledge that we accept witness testimony (sometimes on it own) every minute of every day right? Because the way you go on an on about this implies that the idea is irrational, and by extension, every legal system in the world is irrational.