Testimony: Are we being hypocritical?

[Whateverist]

Neo once again pushes the argument from Spartacus

https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/7924

You can't compare Jesus to ancient persons . It's NOT the category he belongs in 

https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/7862

Exactly.  (My bold.)

[Amarok]

Neo once again pushes the argument from Spartacus

https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/7924

You can't compare Jesus to ancient persons . It's NOT the category he belongs in 

https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/7862

Exactly.  (My bold.)

Could you please elaborate ?

[paulpablo]

I wasn't quite sure where to put this.

In light of everything going on in the county right now with powerful men and sexual assault/harassment, it got me thinking about our past discussions regarding testimony as evidence.  Though there were some nuanced differences of opinion among the atheists who participated in those discussions, on the whole it seems most of us hold the position that testimony is not evidence, and that quantity speaks nothing of quality.  Are we being hypocritical then, in accepting these allegations at face value?  If we're being true to our stated position, then we're either:

1. Accepting a serious claim as true a despite total lack of evidence 

Or

2. Accepting the testimony as evidence 

To be clear, I'm not suggesting that we shouldn't believe these women.  I'm also not conceding that the Bible qualifies as eye-witness testimony.  I'm just wondering if we've been unfairly rigid to our theists in these debates regarding the nature of evidence.  

Thoughts?

There's some sort of argument that's just based on technical definitions of what evidence/testimony/eyewitness evidence is.

I would generally call testimony a type of evidence, by definition that it's some sort of indication of what is true and that comes under the definition of what evidence is.  An indication of what's true.

It is however not necessarily the most reliable evidence, and as other people have said it depends what the claims are as to how believable that evidence is.

We know women and men exist and sometimes men commit sexual assault.  So at the very least the claims are easier to believe than a lot of the claims contained in the bible in the sense that the bible contains claims of things that have never been shown to have ever been able to happen.

I've always said that the statement "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" is false.  Everything requires equal amounts of evidence, what makes some claims ordinary is that we already have evidence of them happening in an ordinary day.  Extraordinary claims are extraordinary to begin with because they start off with less evidence backing them up.


I haven't judged any sex allegations to be true or false personally so no one could really call me a hypocrite.  I know the names of some of the people accused of sex crimes but never bothered to check in detail about any of the stories.

What limited things I've heard is that Louis CK wanked in front of some girls and did it really fast.  Which actually sounded funny to me but I guess it could have been scary for a woman if he had her cornered and randomly started wanking at her. He apparently admitted he did these things so there's not much more to say about that.

The rest of the men who have claims against them I know so little about, but apparently their friends and people around them knew they were up to this kind of stuff a lot of the time.

In a court case though I would say it's obvious a person shouldn't be convicted of rape purely because someone said they did it.

[bennyboy]

This is true.  The practical application of this, though, is that it will be virtually impossible to charge a man for rape or sexual assault.  Even if semen is found inside a woman's body, he says, "Well, she said yes," and then it's 1:1 hearsay.

There's another case: that of political corruption.  When the powers that be deliberately work to cover up evidence, then what is to be done when the occasional whistle-blower has something to say about the conduct of, say, Trump?

What you say has merit, but I'd far rather reach for the higher goal and fall short than start locking people up based on nothing more than "the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act" (the minimum of evidence for treason where no admission of guilt is obtained as established by the constitution).

With all due respect, you are unlikely to be the victim of sexual harassment, as am I.

I think there's some point at which convergence of allegations might be considered evidence.  If dozens of women claim Bill Cosby, apparently one of the nicest and most wholesome entertainers, of a sexual crime, then how do we take that?  They weren't trying to get money.  They didn't seem to have been professionally disadvantaged by him.  What's the motivation?

I think all the motivations of accusing parties, and their relationships, have to be taken into account.  When a reasonable person would come to the conclusion that a variety of accusers have little connection other than their shared claim of abuse, and little to gain from the accusation, then maybe testimony is evidence.

[Ravenshire]

What you say has merit, but I'd far rather reach for the higher goal and fall short than start locking people up based on nothing more than "the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act" (the minimum of evidence for treason where no admission of guilt is obtained as established by the constitution).

With all due respect, you are unlikely to be the victim of sexual harassment, as am I.

I think there's some point at which convergence of allegations might be considered evidence.  If dozens of women claim Bill Cosby, apparently one of the nicest and most wholesome entertainers, of a sexual crime, then how do we take that?  They weren't trying to get money.  They didn't seem to have been professionally disadvantaged by him.  What's the motivation?

I think all the motivations of accusing parties, and their relationships, have to be taken into account.  When a reasonable person would come to the conclusion that a variety of accusers have little connection other than their shared claim of abuse, and little to gain from the accusation, then maybe testimony is evidence.

You know, I've said my piece. Hell, I've even agreed that Moore is more likely than not guilty. Same goes for Cosby. I'm simply not willing to convict in a court of law based on the level of evidence so far presented. I understand you want to continue the argument, apparently for the sake of the argument, but count me out.

[Edwardo Piet]

With respect to the OP, the issue largely comes up with respect to NT reliability. The point generally made by believers is that skeptics have ruled out the supernatural in advance or at least raised the burden of proof to an unobtainable level. As such the very nature of the thing we are trying to prove serves as the reason given for not accepting evidence of it. It's a no win situation.

Well you can't both claim something is supernatural and think that the evidence required wouldn't be supernatural.

Of course the kind of personal experiences theists speak of is not valid evidence. That's terrible evidence of anything.

[Whateverist]

Exactly.  (My bold.)

Could you please elaborate ?

No, sorry.  It made sense to me at the time but now I don't remember.  Weird.  But what you wrote originally still makes sense to me and I agree whole heartedly.  It isn't a question of one person vs another person, its about the category of being in question.

[GrandizerII]

OP, I'm guessing you already know about this, so as a relevant reminder:

Bayes' theorem

And, meh, I've always considered testimonies to be some form of evidence, albeit rather weak and mostly useless on their own.

[Neo-Scholastic]

That's fair. That's what biblical archeology is for. For example, we have a pretty good idea of where the pool of Bethesda was. At the same time, we do not require any physical proof of Socrates or Alexander the Great.

[/url][url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historiography_of_Alexander_the_Great]Caught out again, lying for Christ
Caught out yet again, lying for Christ

You do realize that you're proving my point. All the information about Socrates comes from contemporaneous sources, such as the Platonic dialogues and local playwrights. Even if I was completely mistaken, I would simply be mistaken. Calling someone a liar for a simple error is not rational; but rather the type of hysterical responses one would expect from unhinged individuals.

With respect to the OP, the issue largely comes up with respect to NT reliability. The point generally made by believers is that skeptics have ruled out the supernatural in advance or at least raised the burden of proof to an unobtainable level. As such the very nature of the thing we are trying to prove serves as the reason given for not accepting evidence of it. It's a no win situation.

Well you can't both claim something is supernatural and think that the evidence required wouldn't be supernatural.

That doesn't even make sense. If Sodom was destroyed by brimstone raining down from the sky then it is possible to unearth a city with a layer of char. If the walls of Jercho collapsed then you can possibly find the ruins of a breached city wall. I guess, skeptics will never be satisfied even if they find a sign saying "Welcome to Sodom: Home of World Famous Fudge."

It's also disingenuous.

Skeptics constantly demand physical evidence. That means that the believer, in order to satisfy that high bar, must present something that could not possibly exist. A supernatural natural object.

Of course the kind of personal experiences theists speak of is not valid evidence. That's terrible evidence of anything.

In your opinion.

[Mister Agenda]

As Steve and Neo have explained, testimony IS evidence. It may not be sufficient evidence, and it isnt necessarily proof... but it is considered evidence nonetheless.

And I have explained why, despite legalistic definitions, testimony is NOT evidence. It isn't evidence of anything but that the person giving it claims a particular thing. The evidence part is what is used to determine whether their claim is credible enough to justify finding someone guilty or not guilty, as the case may be.