When people deny needing evidence, what do you do?

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

What do you say to people who say that you don't need evidence to justify a belief? I was talking with someone, and he continually says that he does not need evidence, and then he goes off on a very verbose philosphical explanation for why it's an arbitrary requirement.

I said that to have useful meaning in dicussion, he has to provide some evidence, and to that I was directed to:

You've confused several issues here so let's start with logical positivism. In your previous posts you alternately called for evidence or proof as the standard by which one's claim of the existence of a god is to be "taken seriously." Proof is the standard by which the philosophy of logical positivism evaluates the justification for a belief, and the instances in which you demanded proof your standard coincided with that of the positivists. The positivists are ultimately shown to be unreasonable, by way again of the Problem of the First Principles (you know this, but others may not).

He says that asking for evidence or proof is unreasonable, since it is just like the logical positivists, who were unreasonable. Proof/evidence cannot be used as a standard for the usefulness of information in discussion or justification of a belief. The concept "you need evidence" is not, itself, verifiable.


So let's assume you simply misstated the requirement of proof, and meant evidence. Continuing on in the paragraph above, you contrast "science" with logical positivism. However, the two are not analogous. Logical Positivism, as I have said, is a philosophy. Science, on the other hand, is a method which is designed to systematically gather information about the natural world. It of course uses logic, which is designed to evaluate competing claims of fact. Neither science nor logic, however, can make claims as to the worth of the information obtained through those methods. This is the role of philosophy in this context.

Here, science isn't philosophy, but he says that neither science nor evidence can measure the worth of an idea. So all ideas seem equally worthy of note, whether they have evidence or none.


When you suggest that science is based on Falsificationism you are of course referring to a method employed by Karl Popper. It is not strictly speaking a philosophy in the context we are discussing, nor is it the basis alone of science. The basis of science remains logical deduction, but falsification provides a way of more efficiently eliminating (or eliminating at all) the logical dead-ends of positivism.

I never said it was the basis alone of science, but he seems to think I said that. Science is logical deducation? All my textbooks seem to say it's based on induction. This confuses me.


So, what you are really doing when you suggest that the claim of the existence of a god comply with some set of scientific principles is implicitly demanding that the claim conform to a set of philosophical criteria independent of science. So there are two aspects to your demand for proof or evidence for the claim. One, that the claim must show its value by relating to science; and two, that the claim must show its quality by conforming to logic (as the basis of science). The first claim is totally arbitrary, while the test of the second is much less certain than you pretend.

There, he's saying that you cannot apply the criteria:

1. You need evidence for a belief to justify it
2. An idea needs to be falsifiable.

Essentially, his entire spiel was put up in defense of someone saying he needs to provide evidence for his claims. Instead of providing it, he simply says he does not need to, because attatching such criteria to his belief is an unjustified, arbitrary assumption. You are forcing another system to conform to the rules of another philosphical system (logic/science etc).

THis is what he uses to say logic is basically not needed:

We've already discussed the findings of Aristotle and the Problem of the First Principles, which clearly demonstrates that there is no provable foundation from which logic proceeds, which ultimately renders logic itself unable to absolutely prove anything. Hardly the sort of beginning one would hope for in an all encompassing law of all existence.

It doesn't seem to make sense to me. Can someone help me with this paragraph? Logic isn't needed because it cannot be used to prove anything absolutely? Therefore, since it cannot, he says you cannot use it to form an encompassing law everyone is bound to.

[Darth Wong]

It is nothing more than long-winded solypsism. He's just pointing out that you can't absolutely prove anything, not even the validity of logic. He then assumes that if you can't absolutely prove anything, then a belief without evidence is no less credible than a logical conclusion drawn from evidence (this is, of course, a common religionist black/white fallacy). Naturally, he concludes that he doesn't need to produce any evidence in order for his belief to be taken any more seriously than, for example, the idea of Santa Claus.

His argument relies upon turning this simple fallacy into long-winded bullshit. Take real-world examples of his logic and ask him why he doesn't take the idea of Santa Claus as seriously as the idea of magnetism.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

It seems like the logical conclusion of his argument is that you cannot apply logic or evidence to his belief, and that all beliefs are equally valid. I tried to point this out, and he said I was guilty of an appeal to consequence fallacy.

[Darth Wong]

It seems like the logical conclusion of his argument is that you cannot apply logic or evidence to his belief, and that all beliefs are equally valid. I tried to point this out, and he said I was guilty of an appeal to consequence fallacy.

He's obviously just throwing out fallacy names without really understanding them. It is an appeal to consequence fallacy to say that bad things will happen if argument A is true. It is not an appeal to consequence fallacy to say that the logical conclusion of argument A is clearly false, therefore argument A is false as well.

[Big Phil]

He sounds like a college student who has taken a philosphy class or might be majoring in that useless field. My brother pulled this crap during college too, regarding evolution. Since scientists couldn't provide every single link, and prove everything beyond a shadow of a doubt, maybe evolution didn't exist. Everything was fucking relative and it was annoying as hell. Fortunately, he got smarter once he graduated and realized that he didn't know everything, but that's not going to help you in your discussion with this guy.

[Jay]

As a newly crowned BA in philosophy, I'd like to officially proclaim that he is blowing smoke out of his arse. I've been studying philosophy for the last three years, and in the last year in particular I've scarcely had my nose out of psychology, law, biology, physics and god knows what other journals and text books.

If someone makes a claim in philosophy, you back it up, with evidence, studies, reading, logic, research and observation.

I could send him a copy of my dissertation's bibliography if you like...

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

Well then. I hope you can help explain that, because I can't lol. I send you a PM about the weirdness.

[Jay]

recieved.

joined.

on it

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

Thanks. Wait till you get a load of those two. Haha.

[Kuroneko]

Mr. Wong's criticism is the most pertinent, but some additional comments may apply.

He says that asking for evidence or proof is unreasonable, since it is just like the logical positivists, who were unreasonable.

Classic ad hominem. Just because the logical positivist programme was a failure doesn't mean that all their ideas are automatically invalid; they could be valid for reasons other than what the logical positivists... posited.

Proof/evidence cannot be used as a standard for the usefulness of information in discussion or justification of a belief. The concept "you need evidence" is not, itself, verifiable.

Only according to the logical positivist's idea of verification. The concept of "you need evidence" is repeatedly verified according to falsificationism, for example: theories that have evidence for them are usually enormously more successful than those simply made up.

never said it was the basis alone of science, but he seems to think I said that. Science is logical deducation? All my textbooks seem to say it's based on induction. This confuses me.

Ah, it's not like there is a commonly accepted view. Exchanges like the following are not uncommon in philosophy (exaggerated):
Scientists: Astrology is a pseudoscience.
Philosophers: Agreed. But why?
Philosopher A (Karl): It is wrong and has been falsified.
Team Q (Pierre and Willie): This is all very suspect.
Philosopher B (Tom): Wrong, Sir Karl; it is a pseudoscience because it lacks the puzzle-solving character of normal science.
Philosopher C (Imre): What kind of research programme does it have?
Philosopher D (Paul): Imre's right, Tom; it is a pseudoscience because it is a failure as a research programme. This is what separates science from pseudoscience... well, for the most part... in a manner of speaking... er... .
Scientists: Oh, so is creationism.
Philosopher E (Mike): Right on! Because of A, B, and C.
Philosopher F (Larry): What are you talking about, Mike? Creationism satisfies A and B, and C is an outright ad hominem. But it doesn't matter anyway, since if some nincompoop tries to pass it off as science, we can certainly prove that it is at least very bad science. Actually, we might be better off if it was judged as scientifically meaningful and proven wrong, rather than judged as scientifically meaningless and immunized from scientific criticism.
Philosopher E (Mike): You're wrong, Larry, because X.
Philosopher F (Larry): No, you're wrong, because Y.
Philosopher E (Mike): No, you're wrong, because X. X! X! X!
Philosopher G (Phil): [Drabbles philosophers of science and academics and the capability of deciding this issue.]
Philosopher F (Larry): Bah. It. Does. Not. Matter. The whole concept of a precise criterion for separating science and pseudoscience is flawed. You're all just wasting time. Go do something useful.

He sounds like a college student who has taken a philosphy class or might be majoring in that useless field. My brother pulled this crap during college too, regarding evolution. Since scientists couldn't provide every single link, and prove everything beyond a shadow of a doubt, maybe evolution didn't exist. Everything was fucking relative and it was annoying as hell. Fortunately, he got smarter once he graduated and realized that he didn't know everything, but that's not going to help you in your discussion with this guy.

That's the most annoying part, really--most people who go into philosophy seriously grow out of it and at least try to get things done, but the beginning philosophy student usually just tries the utmost to get rid of everything and leave a little Pyrrhic-skeptic/solipsist haven. Yes, complete skepticism in everything is one of the most unassailable of positions, but that doesn't mean squat once one realized that it doesn't actually go anywhere and is completely uninteresting besides.

[Darth Wong]

That's the most annoying part, really--most people who go into philosophy seriously grow out of it and at least try to get things done, but the beginning philosophy student usually just tries the utmost to get rid of everything and leave a little Pyrrhic-skeptic/solipsist haven. Yes, complete skepticism in everything is one of the most unassailable of positions, but that doesn't mean squat once one realized that it doesn't actually go anywhere and is completely uninteresting besides.

Indeed. I have long theorized that the uber-skeptic is more interested in demonstrating his intellectual superiority (via unassailable but utterly pointless argument) then he is in actually accomplishing anything constructive whatsoever. I surmise that more advanced philosophy students grow out of this as they mature and become less neurotic about their self-esteem issues.

[Jay]

Indeed. I have long theorized that the uber-skeptic is more interested in demonstrating his intellectual superiority (via unassailable but utterly pointless argument) then he is in actually accomplishing anything constructive whatsoever. I surmise that more advanced philosophy students grow out of this as they mature and become less neurotic about their self-esteem issues.

The uber-skeptic is the one who revels in unintelligable arguements, produces crap essays full of handwaving and smoke-blowing and scores a low-low mark (or in the case of many that I met, fail outright). Then in the pub, for weeks on end, they make bloated ego-ridden statements like "The lecturer cannot understand me!" or "My thoughts were to high to put into simple language" (oddly remniscient of 'None of you can percieve my brilliance!!!1!!')

I am rid of them at last. Huzzah!

[Construct]

One of the first things they'll hammer into your head when you take Philosophy of Science is that the arguments "it is true to me" or "you can't prove anything with regards to solipsism" are complete deadends and can easily be countered.

The more I learn about science, not just the sciences but the scientific approach to knowledge the more awe I feel for it. It is probably the best thing ever invented by mankind! Few things have so effectively erradicated ignorance than science has!

Go in enlightened glory!

[Construct]

Kurenoko: Speaking of Astrology... I read an article about it. Thing is, dismissing it as pseudoscience is harder than it might seem at first. I could dig up that article if you want to read it. It was good.

[HemlockGrey]

"My thoughts were to high to put into simple language" (oddly remniscient of 'None of you can percieve my brilliance!!!1!!')

Never bother with anyone who cannot put a common thought into the language of the common man.

[Kuroneko]

[Kuroneko]: Speaking of Astrology... I read an article about it. Thing is, dismissing it as pseudoscience is harder than it might seem at first. I could dig up that article if you want to read it. It was good.

This is not only unsuprising, but also almost exactly my point: while almost no philosophers of science [1] would seriously entertain the idea that astrology is scientific, there is nevertheless a very wide disagreement over the precise reasons for its pseudoscientific status, whether or not it was scientific in some distant past, and, if so, additional dispute about the point in history at which it stopped being scientific also follows. The reason for all this fuss about astrology is not because there is anything perceived as particularly important about astrology itself, but merely the fact that it is an almost standard example to be contrasted with science when a philosopher writes an attempt of describing science. Very many volumes of books have been written on that more general topic; the above exchange regarding astrology is quite real, if exagerrated, in the sense that it is based on actual published views of some influential philosophers of science--namely, Sir Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn, Imre Lakatos, and Paul Thagard. Many more have written on these topics, of course, but the their work is more commonly known than most others.

[1] The only exception that springs to mind would be the proponents of a particularly radical form of the Duhem-Quine thesis, but I think all of those are extinct already.

[Jay]

Never bother with anyone who cannot put a common thought into the language of the common man.

My sentiments exactly.

Oh, Tigerlilly, I just delivered round twelve of the smack on those guys for you. I'm getting bored of their wall of ignorance, so I pointed out their fallacious premise one last time, told them to chock on my fuck and signed out. Let me know if they call me out any, but I can't be bothered with them anymore.

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

No one can give them a smack down. I tried talking to them for ages. That thread has like a zillion pages. I just wanted to see if I was not doing something correctly, but thanks. I wasn't. It's just them.

[Construct]

Kuroneko: It was Thagard. Recalled the name had a Scandinavian ring to it. You've probably read the article too.

[Darth Wong]

No one can give them a smack down. I tried talking to them for ages. That thread has like a zillion pages. I just wanted to see if I was not doing something correctly, but thanks. I wasn't. It's just them.

You can deliver a smackdown, but only an intelligent observer will recognize it.

When it comes to religion, your opponent in a debate is often like a punching bag with a happy-face painted on it. No matter how many times you bash the fuck out of it, it will just come right back at you with that idiotic happy-face until you get tired and stop.