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elliot svensson

 Discussion on question by Monkey Tues…

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elliot svensson
Sep 28, 2019 20:15
@Shadur, but only when n > 30...
 

 Discussion on question by Ivan Talano…

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elliot svensson
Feb 18, 2019 15:19
See reasonablefaith.org/writings/popular-writings/…
elliot svensson
Feb 18, 2019 15:19
It's such a good question that the answer has its own word in English: "theodicy". Theodicy:noun noun: theodicy; plural noun: theodicies the vindication of divine goodness and providence in view of the existence of evil.
 

 Discussion on answer by GendoIkari: I…

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elliot svensson
Feb 16, 2019 20:06
@Graham, using the lazy google definition for religion, a religion has two branches: theology and worship... the theology might be the same, but the worship might be different. Worship is not truth-claims, as far as I can tell.
elliot svensson
Feb 16, 2019 20:06
@Joshua, I think that you're on to something, but it might be smarter to say "there is at most one true theology", since a religion, depending on how you define it, may be different with another and still be compatible with all of another's truth-claims.
 

 Discussion on answer by anaximander: …

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elliot svensson
Feb 8, 2019 09:19
@probably_someone, "there's some matter and energy that we don't know about yet" is a big deal.
elliot svensson
Feb 8, 2019 09:19
@probably_someone, I don't mean, "things look different the farther you look" but "things are different the farther you get from here" (...as a simpler interpretation of the evidence than redshift + Cosmological principle + dark energy/matter)
elliot svensson
Feb 8, 2019 09:19
@probably_someone, I second-guessed myself and deleted the comment. I'll reproduce it now: The Cosmological Principle would have us interpret redshift as implying dark matter and dark energy. But the evidence could more simply be interpreted that things are different farther away.
elliot svensson
Feb 8, 2019 09:19
@probably_someone: for instance, I think that Occam's razor might be aligned against the Cosmological Principle, not in favor of it, based on the evidence.
elliot svensson
Feb 8, 2019 09:19
@probably_someone, why do you suppose that young-Earth creationists in particular might want to reject Occam's razor?
elliot svensson
Feb 8, 2019 09:19
@probably_someone, it's a good heuristic, but it's not the only heuristic. I have been led to believe that plausibility, explanatory scope, and explanatory power have seats at the table together with Occam's razor, though I acknowledge that some folks dispute that.
elliot svensson
Feb 8, 2019 09:19
@probably_someone, it's probably because they have escaped the Matrix.
 

 Discussion on question by vorpal prof…

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elliot svensson
Feb 7, 2019 09:16
@JimmyJames, no true scientist!
 

 Discussion on answer by elliot svenss…

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elliot svensson
Feb 6, 2019 21:41
@JMac, it's a fair objection, but the analogy is not perfect. Here we have not one but two sources of witness testimony, and also here I pasted the words from a personal witness in addition to the reporter's witness. Granted, that's not a different kind of evidence but simply more evidence. Still, I think it's not wrong to encourage the OP that the evidence is enough to make a good judgment today.
elliot svensson
Feb 6, 2019 21:41
@JMac, I disagree: I think the matter of hard evidence was a digression. The real question asked is, "is Ginsburg alive?" which is repeated in the title and at the end of the writing. The OP didn't exclude other kinds of evidence, I would say, by mentioning "no hard evidence". Besides, a named, living witness testimony nowadays is not really different from a photo.
elliot svensson
Feb 6, 2019 21:41
@Rekesoft, extraordinary claims require evidence. Here we have no evidence, so the assumption is the sensible one, not the unlikely hypothesis.
 

 Discussion on answer by elliot svenss…

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elliot svensson
Feb 4, 2019 18:56
@Alexander, certainly? How do you know?
elliot svensson
Feb 4, 2019 18:56
@immibis, note that it doesn't anymore appear in this answer. For what it's worth, I don't hate people who disagree with me politically.
elliot svensson
Feb 4, 2019 18:56
@Obie2.0, I would not have brought up radiation hormesis and I don't think it's particularly relevant to questions of the safety of nuclear power.
elliot svensson
Feb 4, 2019 18:56
@CramerTV, I would do that if I knew. I'm afraid I don't!
elliot svensson
Feb 4, 2019 18:56
@jamesqf quora.com/…
elliot svensson
Feb 4, 2019 18:56
@jamesqf, point taken... sorry!
 

 Hub of Reason

General discussion about skeptics.stackexchange.com
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elliot svensson
Jan 29, 2019 19:19
I just figured that out... I guess Nostradamus got that one wrong! Nobody else wanted to talk about it!
elliot svensson
Jan 28, 2019 23:50
0
Q: Climate change question: not a duplicate I say!

elliot svenssonMy question... Does the climate change on an astronomical cycle? ...was marked as a duplicate of... Do the recent CLOUD results have significant implications for global warming? . But the author of the other question specifically says, "To be clear, the claim I am interested in is this studie...

discussion
 

 Discussion on question by niels niels…

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elliot svensson
Jan 29, 2019 00:33
So sorry to hear your story, man. But don't forget that "do nothing" is a coherent strategy, too. I would not feel bad about the six months... they assigned the root cause to one of their senior workers, who developed a coherent proposal, which they were free to accept or reject. After your study was done, they were confident about both the proposal and the problem, and they made up their mind. If your work had been less sound, they would have kept studying the problem until they got a better answer. I suggest that you keep talking about what you learned for the benefit of the rest of us!
 

 Discussion on answer by Oddthinking: …

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elliot svensson
Jan 22, 2019 00:07
@Oddthinking, another form of my criterion: wouldn't you say that "ordinary evidence" for an extraordinary claim would still satisfy P(e | h) >> P(e | not h)?
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:48
Here's my criterion: in how many times when you have thought or said or written "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" would you have said that it would be just as well if the extraordinary claim was supported by "evidence"?
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:46
I think that the sentence, "the Sagan standard is either false or it is trivially true" is very helpful, as Dr. Craig asserts. I think that your understanding of the Sagan standard makes the Sagan standard out to be trivially true.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:44
/"
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:44
the interesting questions are whether the assertion merits belief and whether the enterprise is conducive to producing well-founded belief. [4] The answers cannot be supplied by a simple litmus test, but can only be reached by detailed, case-by-case investigations.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:43
The history of these twin quests has been a history of failure [2]. One of the morals to be drawn from a failure to find a litmus test of the pseudo-scientific is relevant here: namely, it does not much matter what label one sticks on a particular assertion or enterprise; [3]
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:43
An apt analogy for Hume's project is the search for a "demarcation criterion." As originally conceived by the logical positivists, such a criterion would separate genuine assertions having cognitive significance from meaningless gibberish. More recently, there has been a quest for a criterion to cleave genuine science from pseudo-science.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:39
[new paragraph]
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:38
Worse still, the essay reveals the weakness and the poverty of Hume's own account of induction and probabilistic reasoning. And to cap it all off, the essay represents the kind of overreaching that gives philosophy a bad name. These charges will be detailed and supported below, but at the outset I want to elaborate on the last one.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:38
Most of Hume's considerations are unoriginal, warmed over versions of arguments that are found in the writings of predecessors and contemporaries. And the parts of "Of Miracles" that set Hume apart do not stand up to scrutiny.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:38
Section X ("Of Miracles") of Hume's Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding [1] is a failure. In philosophy, where almost all ambitious projects are failures, this may seem a mild criticism. So to be blunt, I contend that "Of Miracles" is an abject failure. It is not simply that Hume's essay does not achieve its goals, but that his goals are ambiguous and confused.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:34
"
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:34
I'll copy the first two paragraphs of Earman's book.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:34
Here,
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:33
It looks like Craig's 2018 writing was in reference to a 2000 book from Oxford Univ. Press, "Hume's Abject Failure: The Argument Against Miracles" by John Earman.
elliot svensson
Jan 21, 2019 15:01
It's funny that you brought up Hume ---- The second of my two WL Craig links is titled, "Hume's Abject Failure". Not that a title proves anything, but that I was aware of Hume!
elliot svensson
Jan 18, 2019 20:03
@Oddthinking, I agree with pretty much everything you said. I think the entire thing can be summarized as a matter of defining "extraordinary evidence"; is it an enormous amount of evidence? An unusual "amount of evidence"? Or is it an ordinary amount of evidence for something that we deem unusual?
elliot svensson
Jan 18, 2019 16:15
@Oddthinking, first, you're right: I think the 1/2 symbol is an ASCII / HTML / etc issue and he plainly means to be drawing a division symbol.
elliot svensson
Jan 17, 2019 21:59
I do have a math background!
elliot svensson
Jan 17, 2019 21:59
Maybe part of that is that the longer article is in fact a transcription of a classroom presentation, discussion section included. It might make more sense in the audio.
elliot svensson
Jan 17, 2019 21:59
If it seems like gibberish, I do suggest that you work on it some more. Craig has debated various smart folks and not embarrassed himself.
elliot svensson
Jan 17, 2019 21:59
Thanks for reading the Craig article[s]! Regarding unicorns, yes: I suppose that we expose ourselves to rational belief in unicorns under Craig's Bayesianism. But applying the calculation again and again, we do have P(witness is crazy | unique claim of unicorns) >> P(witness is not crazy | unique claim of unicorns) and thus plenty of rationality at our disposal without tossing out the belief-math.
elliot svensson
Jan 17, 2019 21:59
Politely, but firmly: "No. [end of paragraph]" is much more than a provisional conclusion! It's a slap in the face for somebody with a photograph in his hand. Especially since the answer doesn't address the interpretation of the photographs at all. What justification is there for dismissing the claim to a precambrian rabbit? Doesn't skepticism mean that we take such claims seriously?
 

 Discussion on answer by Bob Knighton:…

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elliot svensson
Jan 20, 2019 05:02
Now give critical review for this PBS documentary image! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang#/media/…
 

 Discussion on question by chasly from…

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elliot svensson
Jan 18, 2019 03:35
Did you read "Slaughterhouse Five" by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.? His book covers a very similar scheme, except that he could not control to which moment in his life he would be jumping.