[I had originally moved this to another thread because I had perceived Maj's starting the new thread as a signal that this discussion might be hijacking his original thread.  However, since Cogito did not want to move to that thread, I am reinserting the post here, for the convenience of anyone else who may be following this discussion.]

The courts are in the business of determining truth, so their use of evidence is very apt..

So you really do believe that this thread is about juries, judges and ambulance chasers.

No, I said it was very apt.

Wow. That's too funny. I suppose I should just be thankful that you're not a salesman or else you'd think this thread is about truth in advertising.

The sales profession does not have the determination of truth as one of its primary objectives.  The legal system does.  

To determine what is true in a given situation is not to analyze "truth" as a concept; those are two different processes. Epistemology is about the latter; our legal system, the former.

You cannot analyze truth as a concept completely divorced from practical application.  See also below.  

The law is about the "truth" in the same way that medicine is about the truth. The attempt to determine what is the truth in a given situation is a tool used in many fields.

But law is unique in its broad reach in determining truth.  The legal system embraces all other fields in its in inquiry.  Science, medicine, history, and even philosophy are part of the truth determining function of the legal system.

Epistemology, however, is about the study of the tool itself.

No, I'm afraid you're wrong. This thread concerns epistemology directly -- not jurisprudence, not medical science, not advertising.

Your answer misunderstands the nature of the inquiry in the legal system.  Jurisprudence -- the study of what the law is -- is only part of that inquiry.  Medical science is a specific field of inquiry that the legal system can utilize.  And advertising is just a laughable example.

"Epistemology is the branch of philosophy which studies the nature and scope of knowledge. . . . Much of the debate in this field has focused on analyzing the nature of knowledge and how it relates to similar notions such as truth, and belief." -- Wikipedia

We are discussing what it means when we say that we 'believe' a proposition is true; we are discussing how it is that we come to believe the things that we believe; we are discussing the process that is necessary for a belief to become justified; we are discussing the relationship between 'belief' and 'truth.'

And your article in Wikipedia acknowledges a wide variety of different views within epistemology, as well as hybrid views.  Part of the problem is that the main competing theories are inadequate to the task of completely explaining how we know what we know.

I see no reason to use a word to describe your definition, as it is not relevant to epistemology.

"A perception that makes a thing evident" is NOT relevant to epistemology?  This will come as quite a surprise to people who have spent their professional lives studying the role that perception plays in belief and knowledge. I suppose they all can go and find real jobs now.

I did not say perception was irrelevant.  I said your definition of evidence was irrelevant.  Or perhaps it is just better to say your particular usage of it is archaic.  According to the Blackwell Dictionary of Western Philosophy Evidence for the purpose of Philosophy of Law and epistemology is viewed as follows:

Originally meaning evident or obvious, the term has developed into meaning evidence for rather than self-evident.  Evidence is something or some consideration used to support or reject some claim, to confer a certain degree of probability upon a proposition, or to decrease its probability

[Take a look at the source for greater elaboration.  I'm sure you can find some stuff to like about it   ].

Are you a coherentist AND a Christian?

I won't try to label myself.  I see problems with both the traditional foundationalist and coherentist approaches.

In point of fact, there are few issues more essential to an understanding of epistemology than that of perception. All experiential knowledge is based on that which we see, hear, touch, smell, and taste. Even coherentists agree with that, though they will quickly add that our perceptions do not justify experiential knowledge.

I'd agree with your point on perception as it relates to outside of the self.  Perception of self is independent of those senses, as it would still occur even if all of those were lacking.  

Is it because your God cannot be perceived that you deny the centrality of perception to justified belief?

To say that experiential information about the outside world comes wholly through the senses is not the same as saying that one must personally experience a phenomenon to have evidence of its existence.  I cannot perceive CO, but I have plenty of evidence that it exists.  Not everything is directly perceived by the senses.

Whatever. If you insist that perceptions of our environment are not a reason for belief and that they have no role to play in the formation of our doxastic attitudes then it is true that you do not need a term to describe the perceptions that we have of the things that make up our environment.

That's not what I said.  My definition of evidence takes into account those perceptions.   But my definition is not artificially constrained in the way yours is.

I have to believe, however, that you are out on an island all alone in this respect. I doubt that anyone else on the board denies the supreme importance of the role that perception plays in the formation of belief and knowledge.

That's a strawman, since I have never denied that perception is important in playing a role in the formation of belief.  
 

cimics wrote: "I do have evidence that a monkey is not sitting on my keyboard. I look at my keyboard, and no monkey is there. My perceptions are evidence."

Cogito wrote: "Your perceptions? What perceptions? Your perceptions of nothing? How is it possible to perceive nothing?"

I perceive transparancy and the lack of solidity.  Many Big Bang theorists would say "space" is not nothing, but something that did not always exist.  But even if it were nothing, I perceive it.  If I were blind, then I would not see transparency, and if I had no nerve endings, I would not feel lack of solidity.  But I can see and touch, so I perceive both.  

cimics wrote: "I look at my keyboard and I see an empty space above it. I pass my hand in the immediate area above my keyboard and it meets no solid resistance. Since I know monkeys are solid and are not invisible, I have clearly perceived that a monkey is not on my keyboard.

Nope, you do not "perceive" a monkey not on your keyboard any more than you perceive an elephant not there or a God not there.

I also perceive that an elephant is not there.  As for God, I would not expect to see him any more than I would expect to see a molecule of CO.

What you mean is that you have no perception of anything -- which includes monkeys, elephants, Gods, and Cogito-driven vehicles, and everything else -- on your keyboard.

Oh but I do.  Some of those things are by their nature visible.  If the view of my keyboard doesn't include those things, then I perceive their absence.  On the other hand, I do not perceive the absence of CO because it is undetectable through my five senses.  It would be as if I were blind with respect to that substance.  

Since the proposition "I have no perception of anything on my keyboard" is contrary to the proposition "A monkey is on my keyboard" you must, to be rational, disbelieve the latter proposition.

But I do affirmatively perceive a transparent, non-solid space above my keyboard.  I am not blind nor do I lack the sense of touch.

Godists, in effect, do not do this. They accept both propositions when the unseen subject is God. They say "Although I perceive God nowhere, I still have faith that he's there [somewhere]."

I don't perceive argon (the third most common gas in our atmosphere) or CO anywhere, but I have evidence that they exist.

On the other hand, a single molecule of carbon monoxide might be hovering right above my keyboard. I can't refute that possibility with my eyes or my hands, so I have no evidence that it's not there. I have no evidence it is there either.

No matter how long you investigate the situation, you'll never find "evidence" (evidence: a perception that makes something evident) that it is not there. Instead, you'll either find evidence that it is there or you'll find no evidence that it is there which will be a "reason" (reason: a basis for belief) to believe that it's not there.

Again, you are using an artificially narrow definition of evidence.  I can have evidence of the presence CO even if what I have only shows the probability that CO is present.  The detecting method need not be infallible, but to produce strong evidence it ought to be generally reliable.

If you find no evidence that the molecule is there then you have no more reason to believe that a single molecule of carbon monoxide hovers in that location than you have to believe that an invisible monkey or your invisible God hovers there. . . well, OK, maybe slightly more reason if you accept the conclusions of science to be generally reliable, but still not enough to justify a suspension of disbelief.

That would just have to depend.  Science indicates that CO is produced by insufficient burning of fuel.  So, if there is no burning of fuel in the vicinity, then I would agree that I could disbelieve the existence of CO simply because I have no evidence of CO.   I think my CO detector not going off, however, would be some evidence that there is no CO, since a CO detector is supposed to detect CO.  

But suppose fuel is burning (a gas log fireplace for example).  A CO detector could be considered an "investigation."  Do we say, "I don't perceive any CO here, there is no need for a CO detector."?  

Again, mere possibility of existence is trivial. You seem to think it's important. You're wrong.

Again, I do not rely upon a "mere possibility."  Your attempt to characterize my view as such is a strawman.

I perceive a transparent, non-solid space.

Describe that space to me.

I did that already.

What is the difference between a transparent, non-solid space and what in general parlance is usually called "nothing"?

When you look at your keyboard and perceive "no thing" (which is what you are saying) to remain rational either you must then have a good reason to deny your lack of perception or you must deny the proposition that says "A monkey is sitting on my keyboard."

But it is not merely a lack of perception.  I perceive the transparent, non-solid space.  That allows me to deny that there is something non-transparent or solid in that place.  It does not allow me to deny something that is transparent and non-solid.

Close, but no cigar. Actually, you have no perceptions of a monkey and therefore you assume that no monkey is present just as you should assume no god is present when you have no perceptions of a god.

I do not perceive a monkey, but I perceive a transparent non-solid space.  A monkey is solid and non-transparent.  CO, argon, and God are not.

Your epistemology is screwy. Although in your defense it probably has to be that way in order for you to maintain the illusion that unless you "perceive" a thing's nonexistence, the thing exists!

Strawman.  I never said that I must perceive a thing's nonexistence to disbelieve its existence.

According to your reasoning, since you do not perceive your God's nonexistence, your God exists.

No, I believe in God's existence because of evidence that affirmatively points to His existence.  I can have evidence without being able to perceive God directly with my five senses, just as I have evidence of CO, even though I cannot perceive CO through my five senses.

No, I can use at least two of my senses to show that the monkey is not there. Sight and Touch.

But why should the mere fact that you don't see or feel something lead you, of all people, to the conclusion that it doesn't exist? Maybe it moves too fast for you to see. Maybe it changes color to blend in seamlessly with its surroundings and you just cannot distinguish it.

We were talking about a monkey here.  Let's assume for a moment that what we are talking about is the ordinary visible, substantial monkey.  Your alleged criticism would not apply in that event.

Now you suggest that there might be an invisible, insubstantial monkey out there.  I am not aware of anyone believing that there exist invisible, insubstantial monkeys.  But lots of people believe in the existence of God.

There are lots of possible reasons that might explain why you don't see a monkey sitting on your keyboard -- and since there are, to be consistent with your beliefs, you should suspend disbelief in the proposition "A monkey is sitting on my keyboard." If you're going to be silly then you should at least strive to be consistently silly.

No, you miss the point of my argument on lots of people believing God exists.  That raises the issue for consideration.  

It's not as if a thing's having the traits of visibility and tactility are exactly necessary to your belief that a thing exists. You don't see or feel a god there either, yet you believe that a god is there.

I don't see or feel CO or argon either.

BTW, how is it that you can see a monkey's nonexistence? What does it look like? Does a monkey's nonexistence look a whole heckuva lot like God's nonexistence? No? Well, then what's the difference?

You make it sound like I'm investigating a particular monkey, Semos perhaps, and saying he doesn't exist.  That's not what I'm saying.  I see transparent space.  I feel through that space and it is non-solid.  Two confirming pieces of evidence that there is no monkey present.

In point of fact, you 'see' nothing on your keyboard which leads to the conclusion that no thing is there, which rules out the existence of monkeys, elephants, etc., on your keyboard and should also rule out the existence of God on your keyboard, but, for you, doesn't.

That assumes God is seeable.  There are lots of things that are not seeable that you believe exist, if you are even slightly rational.

Certainly could be. But 'could be' is no reason to suspend disbelief in a nonintuitive, physical-law-defying claim.

Non-intuitive is your subjective opinion -- one that is not shared by many, many others.  As for physical-law-defying -- you are just begging the question.

I don't perceive argon (the third most common gas in our atmosphere) or CO anywhere, but I have evidence that they exist.

But you can observe argon and carbon monoxide. If you could not, you could not know that they exist.

Again, you are using an artificially narrow definition of evidence.

No, I use 'evidence' consistently in this discussion. I use it in its second-most often used sense which is "a percept that makes a 'thing' evident." I do this in this thread to distinguish it from another of its usages, 'a basis for belief.' If I did not do so, then my use of the word evidence would be at the least confusing and might easily become equivocal. (For 'a basis for belief' I use the word 'reason.')

I hope by this time that that's clear.

Since you acknowledge the primary importance of perception to epistemology, what term will you use for the phrase 'a percept that makes a thing evident' in order to distinguish it from the term 'evidence'  which you use to mean 'basis for belief'?

I can have evidence of the presence CO even if what I have only shows the probability that CO is present. The detecting method need not be infallible, but to produce strong evidence it ought to be generally reliable.

All you can ever have is the probability that carbon monoxide (or that anything else besides percepts) is present since no 'detecting method' is infallible.

But suppose fuel is burning (a gas log fireplace for example). A CO detector could be considered an "investigation." Do we say, "I don't perceive any CO here, there is no need for a CO detector."?

Yes, unless we have a reason to believe that we need a CO detector.

For example, if one person says "I'm telling you this fireplace is not emitting CO" and another says "Yes, it is," then there is a need for a CO detector to reasonably resolve the dispute.

But what if a person says "I'm telling you this fireplace is emitting Satan's vapors and we'll all be doomed to hell unless it is extinguished immediately!"

How do we test that person's claim?

What will an apparatus that detects 'satan's vapors' detect?

What will a 'god detector' detect?

Again, I do not rely upon a "mere possibility."

Do you then agree that only that which has a probability of existence beyond mere possibility can be known to exist and thus it is only that which can be rationally believed to exist?

But it is not merely a lack of perception. I perceive the transparent, non-solid space. That allows me to deny that there is something non-transparent or solid in that place. It does not allow me to deny something that is transparent and non-solid.

Again, we are discussing the nonexistence of an entity, not an existing entity's transparency. This is because 'transparency' is a quality of existing entities.

I do not perceive a monkey, but I perceive a transparent non-solid space. A monkey is solid and non-transparent. CO, argon, and God are not.

Again, we're not discussing an existing object's transparency. We're discussing a putative object's nonexistence. Carbon monoxide and argon are observable, thus, they are known to exist. Gods are unobservable, thus, gods cannot be known to exist.

I can have evidence without being able to perceive God directly with my five senses, just as I have evidence of CO, even though I cannot perceive CO through my five senses.

But your senses can give you evidence of CO's existence. Carbon monoxide can be smelled if present in sufficient quantities. Carbon monoxide can be detected with a simple device. If carbon monoxide could not be detected in any way, then carbon monoxide could not be known to exist. God, like a nonexistent monkey, is entirely undetectable. God, like a nonexistent monkey, cannot be known to exist.

But lots of people believe in the existence of God.

Lots of people believe in the existence of the Christian God. Lots of people believe in the existence of the Jewish God. Lots of people believe in the existence of the Islamic God. Lots of people believe in the existences of the gods of the Hindu pantheon.

Since these are contrary beliefs, they cannot all be correct. Lots of people, therefore, MUST be mistaken -- and what's more, since their beliefs are not contradictory, possibly ALL are mistaken.

Lots of people believe that laetrile cures cancer. Lots of people believe that copper bracelets cure rheumatoid arthritis. Lots of people believe that mailing prayer cloths to Robert Tilden (along with the appropriate bribe) will cure anything.

But if you believe that the conclusions of medical science are generally accurate then you must be extremely skeptical of the truth of those people's beliefs.

Given the simple fact that lots of people believe in superstitions and in magical occurrences is no reason to take those beliefs seriously if those beliefs fly in the face of scientific knowledge unless A) you are ignorant of science or B) you disbelieve that scientific methodologies are very likely to result in accurate representations of reality.

Even after Columbus returned from the New World many people continued to believe that the world was flat. Some people believe that even to this day. Some people believe that Man has never walked on the moon.

And you know what? Those people may be right. The earth may be flat. Man may have never walked on the moon. Those are possibly true beliefs.

But we're not discussing "possibly" true beliefs, are we? No. We are discussing rational beliefs. We are discussing what it is that is most likely to be the case. And if you believe that scientific methodologies are very likely to result in accurate representations of reality then you, rationally, are required to believe (note: this is not a choice) that the earth orbits the sun and is spherical not flat, that Man has walked on the surface of the moon and NOT upon the surface of a lake, etc.

To be rational, we must be bound by the dictates of reason as painful as that can be at times, as much as we might desire it to be otherwise at times. I sincerely wish that you were right and that reality was what each of us wished, hoped, desired it to be; alas, I am persuaded otherwise.

No, you miss the point of my argument on lots of people believing God exists.

This implies that people have very similar beliefs about gods. I don't subscribe to that. I prefer to say that lots of people believe that their personal god exists and as a necessary consequence of that belief, believe that other folks' gods do not. Most people do not believe in an abstract god. Instead, they believe in a very personal god who can make a positive difference in their personal lives even if it is at the expense of others'. It's as if their god were a guardian angel who exists only for their personal benefit.

If a god were known only to be the creator of the universe and nothing more then not many people would believe in that god and fewer still would care about him. It's only because people believe that a god is out there somewhere in the cold, otherwise indifferent universe fighting somehow for THEIR personal best interests that people care about a god in the first place.

Precisely where this god is located and precisely how he carries on this fight are of secondary importance to the belief that we are not alone, that we have an advocate, that we have a personal champion. People need to be comforted. Always have, always will.

You must get some of that in your law practice.

There are lots of things that are not seeable that you believe exist, if you are even slightly rational.

Because I am rational, there is no thing which is entirely undetectable that I can know exists. This includes the various claims about the existences of gods that I know anything about.

Maybe one day someone will demonstrate or provide persuasive evidence that a god of some stripe exists. This is not beyond possibility. Personally, nothing would please me, or probably any other atheist, more.

Do you believe that God gave us the ability to know, to reason? If God gave us the ability to reason then God, if God is just, ought to give us persuasive evidence of his existence so that we will have a reasonable basis upon which to form a belief that he exists.

Or do you believe with Martin Luther that reason should be deluded, blinded, and destroyed? . . . that reason is the devil's greatest whore?

Really, you probably should believe the latter because it makes your position more consistent.

Non-intuitive is your subjective opinion -- one that is not shared by many, many others. As for physical-law-defying -- you are just begging the question.

Not really.

I mean 'non-intuitive' in the sense of 'sensing directly; sensing without the use of rational processes.' If, for example, we perceive a shape and color consistent with that of a man sitting in a chair, then we are justified in holding the belief that a man is sitting in that chair. It is an 'intuitive' belief -- although it may be a false belief.

If OTOH we perceive ONLY a chair, then to believe that a man, whom we do not perceive, is sitting in that chair is a 'non-intuitive' belief -- although it may be a true belief.

'Physical-law-defying,' I mean in the sense of 'supernatural.' If a claim involves a going-beyond of well-confirmed physical law then my contention is that, if we believe that scientific methodologies are very likely to result in accurate representations of reality, we should disbelieve the claim. There is no reason to suspend our disbelief in such a case since experience, upon which all science is based, argues so strongly in favor of disbelief.

First, a response to a couple of cimics' earlier replies. . .

Propositions held by lots of people are different from propositions held by no one, or only a few people.

Yes, they are different, but not for the reason you seem to suppose. Propositions that are held by lots of people differ from those held by a few people ONLY in the fact that they are held by more people. You commit a fallacy when you argue that a proposition that is held to be true by more people is more likely to be true than is a proposition held to be true by fewer people. This fallacy is called an argumentum ad populum.

You seem to think that there is some logical connection between the number of people who believe that a proposition is true and the proposition's actual truth. There is, however, no such connection -- and that's really too bad. It would be kind of nice if truth in the real world could be determined by a mere show of hands as it so often is in your line of work.

Again, as I said, a proposition that is held by LOTS of people should be investigated, with a suspension of belief pending investigation, rather than presumed false.

 
What makes you think belief or disbelief in a proposition can be suspended? This would seem to be possible only in regard to a proposition either about which no belief in the proposition's likely truth has yet been formed or about which the reasons to believe and not to believe roughly cancel out.

We should not suspend disbelief in astrology, a thing in which LOTS of people believe, EVEN if we decide to spend years of our lives investigating astrology.

"What you actually mean is that 'There is evidence that no thing is sitting on my keyboard and that evidence is inconsistent with the claim that a monkey (or a unicorn or a god or anything else) is sitting on my keyboard.'"

Now I think you are contradicting yourself. I don't see how you can say I have evidence that nothing is sitting on my keyboard but at the same time say I do not have evidence that a monkey is not sitting on my keyboard. The monkey is simply a subset of everything that exists.

No, the monkey is NOT simply a subset of everything that exists. The monkey is NONEXISTENT. To believe that all possibly existent but actually nonexistent entities are subsets of that which exists is to misunderstand the nature of nonexistence.

We have or can obtain evidence for that which can be known to exist. We cannot do so for the nonexistent because the nonexistent, be it a nonexistent monkey or a nonexistent god, emits no evidence. Both your God and the nonexistent monkey on your keyboard have an equivalent ontological status: nonexistence.

Now, on to his last:

As for your claim that epistemology is the