Category Archives: Science

Science

Don’t accept the Burden of Dis-Proof

Posted on by

Suppose one person or some people say that something is true. And other people, perhaps you, are inclined to think that it is false. Should the burden of proof be on the second set of people, such as you, to prove that this idea is false? Or should the burden of proof be on those who say it is true to prove it true, by some reasoning or by some evidence?

I write this now because I heard some people, whom I know a little and whom I value, being unwilling to say they think a particular thing does not exist, because they do not have any evidence to prove it does not exist. These people do not have any belief that it does exist. That is close to the words they said themselves.

One of them wrote that, if he were to state that the thing does not exist, he would be taking the burden of proof, to prove that the thing does not exist.
I agree with both these people that there is no evidence disproving this thing’s existence. We also agree that there is no evidence in favour of it.
But I think that to say it does not exist is not taking the burden of proof. I explain this here below. It is about the huge ratio of false propositions to true propositions.

Propositions true, false, and ones whose truth we don’t know

Some propositions (statements) about the world are true, and some others are false. Also, the sum of all humans’ knowledge includes whether various propositions are true or false; and there is another set of propositions for which humans have no knowledge whether they are true or false.

How big are these 3 sets of propositions, in comparison to each other?

1. True propositions (whether humans know this or not). To be in this set, a proposition must correspond with some actual aspect of the world or part of the world. (in order to be even able to correspond, the proposition must be composed in a coherent and meaningful way).

2. False propositions (whether humans know this or not). To be in this set, a proposition must be able to correspond to some state of the world, that is, the proposition must be composed in a coherent and meaningful way. As it is not required to correspond with some actual aspect of the world or part of the world (being false, it conflicts with some aspect of the world), these propositions are less constrained. So there are a much larger number of false propositions than true propositions.
Here is a slightly different way to look at the huge ratio of false propositions to true propositions. Consider a proposition like “John is x metres tall”. The true proposition may be “John is 1.75 metres tall”. This would be true if John is indeed that size.
You can modify the true proposition by substituting another number for 1.75. Such a proposition is false. You can make many similar false propositions, “John is 1.9 metres tall”, “John is 1.5 metres tall”,….
For each true proposition there are many false propositions.

3. Propositions, that we don’t know if they are true or false. Well, for the propositions, which we do know are either true or false, there exists some way to obtain evidence about them, and some humans have worked to get that evidence.
For the propositions whose truth or falsehood we do not know, there may not be a route to obtain evidence, or there is a route but no human has done the work to get the evidence yet.
That there would be a route to get evidence is a constraint on the status of a proposition being known, while there is no such constraint on the proposition whose truth is not known.
The set of propositions, which humans do not know are true or false, is vastly greater than the combined sets of propositions which we do know are true, or false.

Of propositions whose truth or falsehood we do not know, nearly all of them are false, as follows from the reasons why the set of false propositions is many times the size of the set of true propositions. So, for any proposition for which we don’t know its truth, it is considerably more likely to be false than true.

Propositions of which we read or hear: true, false, and status unknown

Of the propositions that any reader hears or reads, the true ones are not such a tiny set compared to the false ones; and the combined set that we know to be either true or false could easily be larger that the ones with which we are familiar but do not know if they are true or false.
Why are both these ratios so different from the minuscule size of the true compared to the false and of the known compared to the unknown, as I wrote above?
Because humans are fairly rational. So, for most propositions proved to be false, people stop thinking about them; books and older people stop telling younger people about them. Similarly, people cannot sustain attention to many untested propositions which have no consequences on people (if they had some consequence, that could be evidence towards truth or falsehood, or at least would suggest a route towards a test of truth).

Where to lay the burden of Proof

A proposition, for which there is no evidence in favour, and also no evidence against, is a member of the set whose truth or falsehood we do not know.
Contrary to what may be a common perception that this set is not large, this set is enormous by comparison to the set where we know the proposition is either true or false.
Also contrary to a similar common perception that there is not a huge excess of false propositions over true propositions, a proposition whose truth or falsehood we do not know is vastly more likely to be false than true.

Suppose that, on knowing of a proposition which some other person or persons believe or claim to be true, but with no evidence in its favour, you do not decide that it is false, because you do not have evidence to prove that it is false.
Whatever are your reasons to think at least briefly about this idea, when you do not think very often about such not-proved-or-disproved propositions, this particular idea belongs in a set of propositions that is enormous when compared to the set of propositions known to be false, and even more enormous when compared to the set of propositions known to be true.
If you do not decide it is likely to be false, because you can’t prove it to be false, you would in principle be accepting as possibly true a very large number of ideas – and nearly all propositions in that set are false. You would be accepting that you carry the burden to disprove this particular idea now, but in principle you would be accepting the burden of proof for a very, very large set of propositions for which just now there is no evidence.

As an alternative to that, because the idea with no evidence in either direction has a very large chance of being false, you could say that you think it is not true. You could lay the burden of proof on any person who would say that it is true.

Do not accept the burden of proving that a proposition is false (a proposition that something exists).
The burden of proof rests fairly on any person who wants to say that the proposition is true.

We think…so freedom of expression is good for you

Posted on by

I think.

Other people think and, though not exactly the same as my thoughts, I think people’s schemes of thinking are fairly similar.

I think mostly about doing things, about their advantages and disadvantages. I will later do only a very small portion of these things.

The actions that I later do: while I do some of them soon after I think, there are many that I only end up doing months or years later. For some, the opportunity or the need for the action has not come yet.

From their conversation, I understand that other people do some similar thinking. Their conversations include talk of actions, and alternative actions, of which I have not thought. Some of these are about situations or opportunities that had not come to my mind before I heard them from others.

The bulk of thoughts are about situations and questions that I never face in person

My own spontaneous thoughts about actions in various situations, coupled with what I hear from others about similar and some quite different situations, have throughout life stimulated me to think about the choice of actions in situations that neither I nor the people I meet have experienced.

From that thinking I decide that one or more actions would be wiser than some of the other actions.

I reach these judgements about what I should do, many without testing the choice as I have not faced that situation. I reach judgements that some actions and plans are more sensible and rational than others. I hear other people in conversation also make these judgements. So, much as other people judge things, when I decide that an action or plan is the wise choice, I see my judgement as being a wise choice for people in general.

Thinking is also about knowledge

Some of the time I think about facts about parts of the world, about what is real knowledge about the world. This is important sometimes for the judgements about the right thing(s) to do in a situation.

I, and other people, make judgements about others’ judgements

I come to think that some actions are right for people in various situations (some I have faced, and some not).

I may make sensible judgements, or I may make judgements that are wholly or partly mistaken. I hear other people also considering these matters. They make judgements about what is best to do in situations. As people do not all reach the same conclusions on how best to act (or on what is true), I and every other person can make judgements about other people’s judgements (both their moral judgements and their factual judgements). If you think your idea is right, that implies that you think a contrary idea is at least partly wrong.

Some people don’t approve of people making judgements about other people. Here I am not writing about making judgements about other people, about the person. I only make judgements about people’s ideas or views. If I decide that one judgement or idea of a person is wrong, that is not a judgement that the person is a bad person.

Improving my judgements with help from other people

With people reaching different judgements, some people think that the other people’s rights to hold their own views means it is not correct to say to them that there is any fault with their ideas or judgements.

I think a lot about facts that I can never check out myself; and I reach judgements on what it’s best to do in situations I have not faced. I have reached these judgements in as rational a way as I can. I have a critical voice inside my head that sometimes asks the rest of my mind if I might have things wrong.

My internal critical voice has sometimes led me to change my view. But it is part of me. It can never criticise my views as objectively as another person could. So I value other people’s judgements on my ideas, because I want to get as close as I can to the sensible and correct judgement.

I welcome other people telling my views are wrong. I look forward to their rational arguments or evidence that point to the weak parts of my ideas.

I want this, because I want to reach more sensible ideas. If you respond to the great diversity of people’s judgements by never criticising an idea with which you do not agree, you contribute to other people remaining mistaken. And the social rule to avoid criticising other ideas contributes to you remaining mistaken.

I do not notice people giving the view that it is good to keep to mistaken thinking or actions.

Freedom of expression helps other people

I want to improve my ideas and judgements. I can improve them a lot by myself, while never conversing with other people. But to be sure of improving my ideas, I need to live in a society where people are free to express criticism of my views. These other people who would be criticising my views would be helping me. People have helped me in this way.

I am not alone on this desire about society. I know lots of other people who also want society to have a rule in favour of freedom of expression. If I express my views about their ideas, I could be helping them.

People’s first response to criticism of their ideas is often to feel uncomfortable. But it is not the person’s only reaction. After some seconds or minutes people may listen. At the end people often say that they value the criticism of their idea.

Freedom of expression helps societies

In a society, people will have different views on a lot of subjects. Variety on some subjects may not cause trouble to other people and so not to the society. But there are sure to be some subjects on which it is important that most or all of society will agree, the subjects where people’s actions can harm others or interfere with their rights.

If criticism of other people’s ideas is muted because of a rule that such criticism is wrong, the difficulties that come from lack of agreement will persist.

The people who may end up having to change their views will do this most easily and peacefully if the process of change is peaceful, and if it is a normal process and not one commenced particularly for the particular subject. In other words, criticism and discussion of ideas should be going on all the time in the society.

Freedom of expression is good for all of us, all of the time.