You know how in some of the videos Shane is on about how creationists and statist and such are always on about you can't prove a negative, or absence of evidence is not evidence of absence?
I'm wondering if that's actually true... I'm wondering if there is ever a time when you can take an absence of evidence as evidence.
Since it is late, I'll give you the quick philosophical answers:
1. You can prove a negative, just not all negatives. Similarly, you can prove a positive, just not all positives. The simple reason is that all statements are positive and negative due to the rule of double negation.
2. Absence of evidence is evidence of absence; HOWEVER, while it does lend to strength, it cannot by itself be enough to surmount the Gettier problem with justification (if you are a JTB epistemologist).
Absence of evidence IS evidence of absence, if you look where the evidence is supposed to be and it isn't there.
Quote from: dallen68 on October 10, 2013, 06:57:49 PM
You know how in some of the videos Shane is on about how creationists and statist and such are always on about you can't prove a negative, or absence of evidence is not evidence of absence?
I'm wondering if that's actually true... I'm wondering if there is ever a time when you can take an absence of evidence as evidence.
I'm careful about my wording on these matters.
Most of the time to woo claims, I'll say "there is no evidence for X" and I need not elaborate. If they can't provide evidence, then my point stands.
Now, if something is contradictory and thus cannot be true, THEN I will say "X cannot be so" and back up my statement with an explanation as to why.
Quote from: Lord T Hawkeye on October 12, 2013, 10:49:07 PM
I'm careful about my wording on these matters.
Most of the time to woo claims, I'll say "there is no evidence for X" and I need not elaborate. If they can't provide evidence, then my point stands.
Now, if something is contradictory and thus cannot be true, THEN I will say "X cannot be so" and back up my statement with an explanation as to why.
Ok, along the same lines, how do you go about evaluating evidence? I'm not asking for what it says in the textbook here, I already know that. What I'm asking is how each of you, individually and collectively determine what is and is not evidence.
Let's say Dr. Woo comes up with Woo's Cure for the Common Cold. You challenge Dr. Woo's claims. Dr. Woo presents the following evidence:
A long list of letters behind his name.
A long list of academic looking papers, with abstracts, and many-lettered-authors, and impressive sounding "university medical facility" associations (for the purpose of this exercise, pretend you've actually heard of at least one of them).
How do you go about determining if the presented evidence is real, or something somebody made up?
In addition, please pretend the following:
Your Lexus search determines that there is a Dr. Woo associated with Random State Medical University, and this person is cited as a secondary or tricery author once or twice a year in the Journal of Bacterial Epidemiology.
Quote from: dallen68 on October 13, 2013, 02:27:20 AM
Ok, along the same lines, how do you go about evaluating evidence? I'm not asking for what it says in the textbook here, I already know that. What I'm asking is how each of you, individually and collectively determine what is and is not evidence.
I do an informal Bayesian inference. This is where you kind of guesstimate things without doing any math. You ask the following questions:
How likely is the hypothesis? (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.)
Have they provided evidence for their hypothesis? (If not, we're just left with how likely the hypothesis is—and again, if it's extraordinary, it's rejected.)
How well does that evidence explain the hypothesis? (Is it extraordinary enough for the extraordinariness of the claim?)
What are the chances we would see this evidence even if the hypothesis were untrue? (If the chances of this are big, it makes the evidence less extraordinary.)
Let's say you and I are the only two people on Earth, and we know everything humans know now EXCEPT how the solar system works. You are trying to convince me that the Earth rotates, as opposed to the sun going around it. I ask you for your evidence.
Let's say your evidence is to flip a coin: heads the Earth rotates, tails the sun goes around it. Flipping heads is not extraordinary enough to meet the claim; further, there is just as much of a chance that the coin will flip heads even if the sun goes around the Earth: 50/50. (In a formal Bayesian equation, the former is in the numerator and the latter in the denominator, so if the chances are equal as they are here they cancel each other out.) What that means is the evidence is useless, and we're left with just how probable the hypothesis is absent any evidence.
But if your evidence is to make a Foucault pendulum, things change. There's no reason to expect a Foucault pendulum to work if the Earth is stationary and the sun goes around it. That probability is low. But if the Earth rotates, it should work, so the evidence is extraordinary enough to meet the extraordinariness of the claim.
QuoteLet's say Dr. Woo comes up with Woo's Cure for the Common Cold. You challenge Dr. Woo's claims. Dr. Woo presents the following evidence:
A long list of letters behind his name.
A long list of academic looking papers, with abstracts, and many-lettered-authors, and impressive sounding "university medical facility" associations (for the purpose of this exercise, pretend you've actually heard of at least one of them).
How do you go about determining if the presented evidence is real, or something somebody made up?
The letters beside his name are pretty much worthless for this. You want to look at the academic papers. What you're really looking for is, have other scientists replicated his results? You also need to know enough about studies to understand proper methodology and how to interpret the results.
A good example is on the podcast a few weeks ago. The new IPCC report calculates the human component of Global Warming to at least 50% to a 95% confidence. Lots of people—even skeptics—interpreted this to mean that we're 95% sure humans are causing Global Warming. It doesn't mean that. It means we're 95% sure the measured value lies within the error bars. To calculate how sure we are humans are causing Global Warming, you need a Bayesian analysis.
Another example:
Let's say that someone claims to own a cat. Lots of people own cats, so the prior probability is high; you don't need that much evidence to meet it. You might just take his word, or if you're at all skeptical, ask for a picture.
Now let's say he claims to own a Bengal tiger. It's not unheard of, but it's rare enough that a picture might not be enough; to meet the prior probability you might have to go and see it for yourself.
Now let's say he claims to own a unicorn. The prior probability is VERY low. Even if you went over there and saw what appears to be a unicorn, this probably wouldn't satisfy you. Since no one has ever verified the existence of a unicorn, the evidence is actually more consistent with some sick vet grafting a horn onto some poor horse. Since it's evidence we could see if the hypothesis were untrue, it's not extraordinary enough to cover prior probability.
Get the idea?
the brony in me really wants to find osme truth to the last one.
Another one you can help me with, because apparently, I failed a logic quiz:
Person has music lessons on Thursday. He has music lessons today.
I'm told that I should know that today is Thursday. (by those conducting said test)
Difficulty: I had music lessons as a child, the only thing this statement proves is it's not Sunday or an odd numbered Saturday.
What gives?
Quote from: dallen68 on October 23, 2013, 05:12:18 AM
Another one you can help me with, because apparently, I failed a logic quiz:
Person has music lessons on Thursday. He has music lessons today.
I'm told that I should know that today is Thursday. (by those conducting said test)
Difficulty: I had music lessons as a child, the only thing this statement proves is it's not Sunday or an odd numbered Saturday.
What gives?
The person who says you failed the test does not understand the question.
The two statements:
1: Person A has music lessons on Thursday.
2: Person A has music lessons today.
Is NOT sufficient to conclude: Today is Thursday.
The reason for this is nothing in the statements precludes Person A from having music lessons on some other day or days as well as on Thursday. All that the two statements, as presented, allow us to conclude that today MAY be Thursday (that is, the conditions given do not preclude today being Thursday).
Quote from: evensgrey on October 23, 2013, 08:34:29 AM
The person who says you failed the test does not understand the question.
The two statements:
1: Person A has music lessons on Thursday.
2: Person A has music lessons today.
Is NOT sufficient to conclude: Today is Thursday.
The reason for this is nothing in the statements precludes Person A from having music lessons on some other day or days as well as on Thursday. All that the two statements, as presented, allow us to conclude that today MAY be Thursday (that is, the conditions given do not preclude today being Thursday).
Yes, this is exactly the sort of bad logic that Wason's Four-Card Task exposes. It's Confirmation Bias: the tendency is to look for something that confirms it's Thursday (having music lessons) while not looking for things that falsify it, or that test for it being other days of the week.
From the same test:
You and a friend go out to lunch. You agree to split the bill evenly.
A week later, your talking with said friend, trying to settle the bill. (Why you didn't do that in the café isn't explained) At any rate, friend remembers that you had one more coffee than they did, and Mr. Random in the next booth paid his $18 bill with a twenty. Since it was your birthday, friend agreed to pay for a slice of pie which was (a given number). How much do you owe your friend?
What the fuck does Mr. Random's bill have to do with me?
Why are we splitting hairs about one cup of coffee, a week later?
Why didn't we settle this when we were in the café (okay, it doesn't specify it was a café)?
I need better friends.
Quote from: dallen68 on October 23, 2013, 03:37:36 PM
From the same test:
You and a friend go out to lunch. You agree to split the bill evenly.
A week later, your talking with said friend, trying to settle the bill. (Why you didn't do that in the café isn't explained) At any rate, friend remembers that you had one more coffee than they did, and Mr. Random in the next booth paid his $18 bill with a twenty. Since it was your birthday, friend agreed to pay for a slice of pie which was (a given number). How much do you owe your friend?
What the fuck does Mr. Random's bill have to do with me?
Why are we splitting hairs about one cup of coffee, a week later?
Why didn't we settle this when we were in the café (okay, it doesn't specify it was a café)?
I need better friends.
None of that is relevant, since you agreed to split the bill evenly.
What was the answer supposed to be?
Quote from: MrBogosity on October 23, 2013, 03:43:43 PM
None of that is relevant, since you agreed to split the bill evenly.
What was the answer supposed to be?
"I don't know, because the total is not mentioned"
Quote from: dallen68 on October 23, 2013, 03:56:32 PM
"I don't know, because the total is not mentioned"
I notice a theme emerging.
Did ANY of the questions provide sufficient information to determine the actual answer?
Quote from: evensgrey on October 23, 2013, 05:47:06 PM
I notice a theme emerging.
Did ANY of the questions provide sufficient information to determine the actual answer?
Supposedly.
I once had to take one of those quizzes for a job. One of the questions was, a bus goes under a bridge; does it get louder or softer? They failed to say where the listener was standing.
Quote from: MrBogosity on October 23, 2013, 08:07:15 PM
I once had to take one of those quizzes for a job. One of the questions was, a bus goes under a bridge; does it get louder or softer? They failed to say where the listener was standing.
You're supposed to presume you're on the bus. (Don't ask me how you're supposed to pull that out of the ether.)
Today, I came across an article which claimed that the U.S. government is the current oldest active government in the world. I would have thought the governments of the UK and the Netherlands were older.
Quote from: dallen68 on October 28, 2013, 02:25:07 AM
Today, I came across an article which claimed that the U.S. government is the current oldest active government in the world. I would have thought the governments of the UK and the Netherlands were older.
I'm certain you're correct about the UK, it has continuity of government going back to before Georgian times, while the US starts near the end of the reign of George III.
The Netherlands is a more complicated one. Certainly, the current government was not active in the Netherlands during the occupation of WWII (the head of state, for instance, lived in Canada during the war, and we still have an annual festival deriving from providing the Dutch royals safe haven during that period), but it is continuous in exile with the government before WWII.
Quote from: evensgrey on October 28, 2013, 08:24:43 AM
I'm certain you're correct about the UK, it has continuity of government going back to before Georgian times, while the US starts near the end of the reign of George III.
The Netherlands is a more complicated one. Certainly, the current government was not active in the Netherlands during the occupation of WWII (the head of state, for instance, lived in Canada during the war, and we still have an annual festival deriving from providing the Dutch royals safe haven during that period), but it is continuous in exile with the government before WWII.
Then there's San Marino, Andorra, Liechtenstein, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia (al saud ruled nejd since the 18th century), Etc.
You know a lot of us criticize liberals for saying there has never been a communist country. And we point out all the fails.
I learned today it's a 3 step process:
1. The commoners take over the government
2. the government eliminates private property.
3. the government goes away.
Now, I know that a lot of you have a problem with 2, as do I. The point I'm making is 3 never happens.
Quote from: dallen68 on December 04, 2013, 05:42:58 AM
You know a lot of us criticize liberals for saying there has never been a communist country. And we point out all the fails.
I learned today it's a 3 step process:
1. The commoners take over the government
2. the government eliminates private property.
3. the government goes away.
Now, I know that a lot of you have a problem with 2, as do I. The point I'm making is 3 never happens.
The critical point is that 3 will NEVER happen of the volition of those operating the government. They get far to much personal benefit from operating the government to ever consider removing it.
(And for this, I'd like any responses to be as if you weren't forced to give the gifts) At some point earlier this week, John Stoessel, reporter extraodinaire donned a homeless costume, and then preceded to whine on national television that people might by beer. One of the problems I have with SNAP is that it tells people what they can and cannot buy. As far as I'm concerned, once the gift is given, it's yours to do with as you see fit. [If I was worried about it, I would have given you a salad] If you think beer, electricity, heating oil, and so forth is more important than salad; all the more power to you once I've given you the gift. [I'd prefer it was my choice to grant the gift, but...]
a most wonderful thing just happened:
I was responding to a conversation between Hawkeye and Nilcroc, and suddenly the typeface expanded so I could see what was said.
Yesterdays Psychology Today had an interesting article. Apparently, 50 years ago, or so somebody did some experiments that showed (supposedly) that ordinary people do evil things when under conditions that they can blame someone else for their actions (authority figure, "doing my duty") etc. So, this has been de riguer in psychology ever since.
So, any way - earlier this year, someone had the brilliant idea to ask "what kind of person volunteers for an experiment involving electrocuting people?" (and there was another one about being a prison guard they could choose as well) As it turns out, people that put themselves in situations (on purpose) where they have an opportunity to "do irreversible damage to others" are authoritarian, believe in hierarchies, are more aggressive, are narcissistic, and Machiavellian. In other words, according to the new study, evil people put themselves in situations to do evil things.
Resource:
Grant, A (2013) Do Good People Turn Evil We might have drawn the wrong conclusions from the Milgram and Zimbardo studies
Quote from: dallen68 on December 15, 2013, 12:21:47 PM
Yesterdays Psychology Today had an interesting article. Apparently, 50 years ago, or so somebody did some experiments that showed (supposedly) that ordinary people do evil things when under conditions that they can blame someone else for their actions (authority figure, "doing my duty") etc. So, this has been de riguer in psychology ever since.
I believe you're referring to Stanley Milgram's experiment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment
QuoteSo, any way - earlier this year, someone had the brilliant idea to ask "what kind of person volunteers for an experiment involving electrocuting people?"
They weren't told what it was when they applied for it.
Quote(and there was another one about being a prison guard they could choose as well)
That would be the Stanford Prison Experiment: http://www.prisonexp.org/
In that case, they were only told they would be studying "the psychological aspects of prison life." They weren't told of the possibility they could become a guard until later.
He also needs to account for the Robber's Cave Experiment: http://lesswrong.com/lw/lt/the_robbers_cave_experiment/
For those of you that aren't students, and aren't in professional fields, I've discovered a new resource at www.jstor.org which lets you read academic papers for free. You can only check out 3 at a time, and you have to keep the paper for 15 days, but given the costs otherwise; I thought some of you might find it of use.
Quote from: dallen68 on December 16, 2013, 10:50:34 PM
For those of you that aren't students, and aren't in professional fields, I've discovered a new resource at www.jstor.org which lets you read academic papers for free. You can only check out 3 at a time, and you have to keep the paper for 15 days, but given the costs otherwise; I thought some of you might find it of use.
Oh, yeah, I learned of that in this semester--I had to access a math article for a group project.
Quote from: dallen68 on December 16, 2013, 10:50:34 PM
For those of you that aren't students, and aren't in professional fields, I've discovered a new resource at www.jstor.org which lets you read academic papers for free. You can only check out 3 at a time, and you have to keep the paper for 15 days, but given the costs otherwise; I thought some of you might find it of use.
they only recently did that IIRC (I could be wrong). At least, I was never able to get in when I was in the University, and it was never recommended as a place to go (though it was known).
I'd like to do a little experiment, and I think 10 participants will suffice.
As you know, lists of top ten states that (whatever) are kinda ubiquitous on the internet now, and sometimes people compare one list to another and imply (or infer, whichever it is) causation.
I hypothesize that there will be ~20% match between any two lists of 10 states.
I'm going to PM Shane a list of 10 states.
If you want to participate, put your list here.
If there is sufficient participation, Shane can post the average of matches to my list. Then, we can call that percentage "matches that are attributable to co-incidence", a point at or below which no causation can be inferred.
You know, over my time here, I've seen a lot of complaining about statist saying Libertarianism=Somalia (or some such rot).
I think a better example of how a Libertarian society would work is the internet. Yes, there are those that are motivated by profit, but there are also lots of organizations/people that offer some services for a fee, and some level of service for asking.
So, like for fire service, in a Libertarian society, perhaps a paid subscriber would have priority, but those who had subscribed to the free service would not be refused.
Quote from: dallen68 on January 14, 2014, 12:51:24 AM
You know, over my time here, I've seen a lot of complaining about statist saying Libertarianism=Somalia (or some such rot).
I think a better example of how a Libertarian society would work is the internet. Yes, there are those that are motivated by profit, but there are also lots of organizations/people that offer some services for a fee, and some level of service for asking.
So, like for fire service, in a Libertarian society, perhaps a paid subscriber would have priority, but those who had subscribed to the free service would not be refused.
Actually, the likely model for how fire fighting services would work in a Libertarian society is the existing private fire departments. Private fire departments (both for profit and not for profit ones exist) generally manage at about half the cost of public fire departments (largely by going with the default equipment, rather than pricy extras like enlarged cabs and extra comfy seats in vehicles that are normally only driven for short periods of time and everyone in them is normally wearing not particularly comfortable equipment). If you subscribe to their service, you don't get billed for use, if you don't, you do get billed for use (and it typically costs a fortune). Subscription is quite reasonable (fires are rare events, so it works just like insurance). Many insurance companies give a discount for subscribing to these services that exceeds the cost of the subscription.
Does anyone know how much salt you would need to add to a cup of water for it to make a difference to the boiling point?
The claim is that adding salt increases the boiling point, but I suspect that the amount that someone that's cooking is going to put in won't make a difference.
Quote from: dallen68 on January 20, 2014, 07:56:14 PM
Does anyone know how much salt you would need to add to a cup of water for it to make a difference to the boiling point?
The claim is that adding salt increases the boiling point, but I suspect that the amount that someone that's cooking is going to put in won't make a difference.
According to this link, fully-saturated water boils at 110°C: http://www.nzifst.org.nz/unitoperations/evaporation4.htm
Standard saline (5% salt) seems to boil at around 101°C. In Fahrenheit, that means you'd have to get the water up to 213.8° instead of 212°.
The cook probably wouldn't notice.
Quote from: MrBogosity on January 20, 2014, 08:07:43 PM
According to this link, fully-saturated water boils at 110°C: http://www.nzifst.org.nz/unitoperations/evaporation4.htm
Standard saline (5% salt) seems to boil at around 101°C. In Fahrenheit, that means you'd have to get the water up to 213.8° instead of 212°.
The cook probably wouldn't notice.
Isn't that on a par with the change in boiling point due to normal variations in atmospheric pressure, which also don't get noticed by anyone who isn't into serious mountaineering?
Quote from: evensgrey on January 21, 2014, 08:23:44 PM
Isn't that on a par with the change in boiling point due to normal variations in atmospheric pressure, which also don't get noticed by anyone who isn't into serious mountaineering?
If you live at high altitudes, you have to change the cooking time on some recipes. So it can be significant in certain cases.
So I stopped smoking like a week ago (yeah, me, I guess)... So now, instead of smelling like the tobacco farm, I smell like the apples...even though I haven't had the ability (due to lack of teeth) to eat apple for like 20 yrs. WTF?
Quote from: dallen68 on May 04, 2014, 02:38:42 AM
So I stopped smoking like a week ago (yeah, me, I guess)... So now, instead of smelling like the tobacco farm, I smell like the apples...even though I haven't had the ability (due to lack of teeth) to eat apple for like 20 yrs. WTF?
if you smell like an apple (or any fruity smell), you might need to see a doctor.
Quote from: dallen68 on May 04, 2014, 02:38:42 AMeven though I haven't had the ability (due to lack of teeth) to eat apple for like 20 yrs. WTF?
Lack of teeth for 20 years? Damn. Major condolences. :(
Not sure what to file this under:
http://tylervigen.com/
So this dallen thread seemed the best
What's your take on the "check your privilege" fad of late? Personally, I think SOMETIMES it has a point BUT (and it's a huge but -a but so big that it cancels out any point the person using the phrase may have had) a) it pre-supposes that the person with the privilege is at fault for having said privilege and b) 8 out of 10 times, it makes the conversation more confrontational than it needs to be. I've never had it said to me, personally, but I can't really imagine saying "check your privilege" WITHOUT angry voice and Z snap. I understand that SOMETIMES it needs to be "jump down mutherfuckers throat confrontational", but there are other times (like most of the time) when something more inviting of conversation and consideration would be more productive.
Quote from: dallen68 on May 14, 2014, 12:57:13 AM
What's your take on the "check your privilege" fad of late? Personally, I think SOMETIMES it has a point BUT (and it's a huge but -a but so big that it cancels out any point the person using the phrase may have had) a) it pre-supposes that the person with the privilege is at fault for having said privilege and b) 8 out of 10 times, it makes the conversation more confrontational than it needs to be. I've never had it said to me, personally, but I can't really imagine saying "check your privilege" WITHOUT angry voice and Z snap. I understand that SOMETIMES it needs to be "jump down mutherfuckers throat confrontational", but there are other times (like most of the time) when something more inviting of conversation and consideration would be more productive.
My usual response is a lengthy period of laughter, followed by treating the person who used the phrase like a small child for the indefinite future. down to the phrase "Please don't interrupt, the adults are talking."
Quote from: evensgrey on May 14, 2014, 08:01:18 AM
My usual response is a lengthy period of laughter, followed by treating the person who used the phrase like a small child for the indefinite future. down to the phrase "Please don't interrupt, the adults are talking."
Or just this:
[yt]_n5E7feJHw0[/yt]
Quote from: dallen68 on May 14, 2014, 12:57:13 AM
What's your take on the "check your privilege" fad of late? Personally, I think SOMETIMES it has a point BUT (and it's a huge but -a but so big that it cancels out any point the person using the phrase may have had) a) it pre-supposes that the person with the privilege is at fault for having said privilege and b) 8 out of 10 times, it makes the conversation more confrontational than it needs to be. I've never had it said to me, personally, but I can't really imagine saying "check your privilege" WITHOUT angry voice and Z snap. I understand that SOMETIMES it needs to be "jump down mutherfuckers throat confrontational", but there are other times (like most of the time) when something more inviting of conversation and consideration would be more productive.
I will always personally adore Hawkeye's response to that stupid phrase:
"Dearie, if I had privilege, YOU would be the one being told to shut up right now. That's what privilege is. The idea that I have privilege and therefore should shut up is a contradiction."
Makes their heads explode with anger.
Do any of you know what "cirque du solei" actually is? I mean is it a band, a venue, a person, a random thing? I was under the impression that it was a trapeze act in vegas that performed to pop songs, but that's apparently a bogus interpretation.
Quote from: dallen68 on May 16, 2014, 06:55:01 AM
Do any of you know what "cirque du solei" actually is? I mean is it a band, a venue, a person, a random thing? I was under the impression that it was a trapeze act in vegas that performed to pop songs, but that's apparently a bogus interpretation.
It's a multinational entertainment company that operates a number of not-actual-circus shows and derivative ventures all over the world.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cirque_du_Soleil (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cirque_du_Soleil)