Falsifiability and 'Just a Theory'.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 11:04 pm

Goddammit, I thought this was obvious but apparently it's not.

To say something has falsifiability does not mean that it is false, it means that it could be proven to be false. Claiming that Thomas Jefferson raped slaves is a true statement but it's also falsifiable. Claiming that Thomas Jefferson was not hopped up on crystal meth when he did the deeds is not unfalsifiable. Claiming that Yahweh possessed Thomas Jefferson as his avatar is not.

A scientific theory is just a series of statements that attempts to explain something. When you say something retarded like 'evolution is just a theory' you are intentionally trying to equivocate the literal definition with the common usage of 'currently inchoate explanation'. And you need to knock that shit off.

TarkisFlux · Post by **TarkisFlux** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 11:23 pm

Yes, generic you, quit that shit. It's fucking retarded.

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 4:08 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote: When you say something retarded like 'evolution is just a theory' you are intentionally trying to equivocate the literal definition with the common usage of 'currently inchoate explanation'.

What the Creationists actually mean, of course, is "Evolution is just a hypothesis." Which it is not.

If it hasn't been tested and proven to some degree, it's a hypothesis. If it has, it's a theory.

Ganbare Gincun · Post by **Ganbare Gincun** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 5:17 am

Evolution is a fact. Scientists know this. Bacteria are the ultimate "proof-of-concept" of evolution. We've been handing out antibiotics like candy since WWII and since no one can ever seem to finish their prescriptions properly, we've managed to "naturally select" for drug-resistant bacteria. So now we have staph infections and the like that can't be fought by normal drugs and have to be attacked with 3rd or 4th generation antibiotics... which people aren't finishing properly, so now we are starting the cycle of evolution anew.

The reason we can't come out and say that this is a fact here in the United States is because we'd have religious mobs marching around with torches and pitchforks lynching scientists.

Maj · Post by **Maj** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 10:14 pm

Not that I'm disagreeing with you entirely, Ganbare, but I think one of the largest contributors to biotic evolution has been the widespread use of antibiotics in animals/livestock. Not only does it get into the food we eat, but it passes through the animals' waste and into the ecosystem.

Ganbare Gincun · Post by **Ganbare Gincun** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 11:51 pm

Maj wrote:Not that I'm disagreeing with you entirely, Ganbare, but I think one of the largest contributors to biotic evolution has been the widespread use of antibiotics in animals/livestock. Not only does it get into the food we eat, but it passes through the animals' waste and into the ecosystem.

You are correct. I had overlooked this in my post. This is a significant - perhaps even more significant - driver of antibiotic-resistant bacterial evolution then humans misusing antibiotics. Alas, this is yet another source of fail on our part that makes the future look oh-so-bright for our new bacterial overlords!

ubernoob · Post by **ubernoob** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 12:36 am

Eh, I'm in favor of plague. We could use a little thinning of the herd anyways.

Count Arioch the 28th · Tue Mar 17, 2009 12:41 am

Humanity is too diverse to be wiped out by one disease, regardless of how drug-resistant it is.

We're not like Cheetahs here.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 8:31 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote: Claiming that Thomas Jefferson raped slaves is a true statement but it's also falsifiable.

That's actually not really falsifiable. Claiming that Thomas Jefferson never raped a slave is falsifiable, because you can point to an instance where he did. Claiming he did is not falsifiable in any practical way because it requires point to everything he ever did, which would be pretty much impossible.

EDIT: To clarify, the issue is making sure the burden of proof is placed on the correct side of the argument. Something not having happened is the default, proof is require for the side claiming something happened.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 9:54 am

Claiming he did is not falsifiable in any practical way because it requires point to everything he ever did, which would be pretty much impossible.

Tests show that his genes are in one of his slave descendents. Having sex with a slave is by definition rape, so there you go.

Now, our statement could be proven false with what we have available if someone was able to provve that they fabricated the parentage tests or they screwed up the tests on the way, such as accidentally using Alexander Hamilton's DNA. There is conceivably a way to disprove the phrase 'Thomas Jefferson is a slave-rapist' so it is falsiable.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 10:29 am

Lago wrote:Having sex with a slave is by definition rape, so there you go.

It's way more complicated than that. Slaves in this case were more like feudal serfs. The society was incredibly fucked up, but while there were definite and immense power disparities in that relationship, it wasn't necessarily rape in the way we think of it.

Thomas and Sally ran off to France for a while and swanned around Paris together. At that point he had no ability to enforce a claim of ownership on her because he was in France. Also while in France no one cared if a Black Woman and a White Man went to fancy restaurants together on dates, so they did. Jefferson was just as much prevented from marrying Hemmings as the other way around, as their steamy love notes to each other strongly indicate. The only way they could "be together" in Virginia was for him to continue owning her. That says more bad things about Virginia than it does about Jefferson.

You can't prove that he never raped her, because that would require you to have an itemized list of every time they had sex and check for consenuality for each one. You can prove that he did rape her by finding even one instance where he used his powers to coerce sex. The claim that he did is essentially unfalsifiable and the claim that he did not is falsifiable.

The falsifiability of a statement is only tangentially related to the standard of evidence. If a statement is not falsifiable, we want some evidence that is is true before we bother considering it. If a statement is falsifiable, we can look both at evidence that it is true and evidence that it is not. And that makes scientists very happy. Jefferson raping or not raping Sally is an argument that scientists don't like to have, because the evidence is incredibly sketchy. Jefferson having impregnated Sally is something we can answer definitively and genetically: he did. The statement that he did not have sex with her at some point is falsifiable, and we have falsified it. The statement that he did have sex with her would not have been falsifiable by the same method, if Sally's modern descendants had different genetic markers it could mean almost anything, up to and including the chance that all of Jefferson's markers got weeded out by simple genetic drift.

As it is, we've been destructively testing evolution for a hundred and fifty years. And while we've altered the theory quite a few times to encompass more information, the basic concepts of varied inheritance and natural selection have held up remarkably well. The theory is essentially bullet proof at this point.

-Username17

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 6:56 pm

Lago PARANOIA wrote:
Claiming he did is not falsifiable in any practical way because it requires point to everything he ever did, which would be pretty much impossible.
Tests show that his genes are in one of his slave descendents. Having sex with a slave is by definition rape, so there you go.

Now, our statement could be proven false with what we have available if someone was able to provve that they fabricated the parentage tests or they screwed up the tests on the way, such as accidentally using Alexander Hamilton's DNA. There is conceivably a way to disprove the phrase 'Thomas Jefferson is a slave-rapist' so it is falsiable.

Uh, no.

The statement "Thomas Jefferson raped slaves" is not realistically falsifiable. You'd need a recording of every moment of his entire life to prove it. That's not even remotely reasonable, and therefore effectively not falsifiable.

The statement "Thomas Jefferson did not rape any slaves" is falsifiable. All you have to do is point to an instance of it happening.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 8:39 pm

The statement "Thomas Jefferson raped slaves" is not realistically falsifiable. You'd need a recording of every moment of his entire life to prove it. That's not even remotely reasonable, and therefore effectively not falsifiable.

My reasoning hinged on the assumption that sex w/slaves = rape. Frank offered a very strong counterpoint that nixes that assumption.

If the 'rape' part bothers you, replace it with 'sex' and then the meaning will be upheld.

Judging__Eagle · Post by **Judging__Eagle** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 9:14 pm

Frank, that story was rather interesting.

Neeeek · Post by **Neeeek** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 10:49 pm

Lago PARANOIA wrote:
The statement "Thomas Jefferson raped slaves" is not realistically falsifiable. You'd need a recording of every moment of his entire life to prove it. That's not even remotely reasonable, and therefore effectively not falsifiable.
My reasoning hinged on the assumption that sex w/slaves = rape. Frank offered a very strong counterpoint that nixes that assumption.

If the 'rape' part bothers you, replace it with 'sex' and then the meaning will be upheld.

The rape part doesn't bother me. The position the statement holds bothers me. You can't show the non-existence of something or some event. You can show that Jefferson nailed his slaves. You can't show that he didn't, even if he hadn't.

eeuuugh · Post by **eeuuugh** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 11:06 pm

I strongly recommend Steve Erickson's (not the Malazan author) novel about Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemmings, Arc d'X, if you can deal with some heavily surrealistic parts. Last time I checked (2004) copies were one cent on Amazon.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Thu Mar 19, 2009 5:52 am

Lago, you're right, but that individual we have no evidence of outright coercion, at least, nomoreso than any other hetero relationship of the time.

It's not like women held property without husbands and whatnot, slave or no. According to our mores, most sex from those days was coercive and rape.

-Crissa

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Falsifiability and 'Just a Theory'.

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