Quotes About Evidence

the more lethal the risks, the less visible they will be, since the severely victimized are likely to be eliminated from the evidence. The

How can we logically go from specific instances to reach general conclusions? How do we know what we know? How do we know that what we have observed from given objects and events suffices to enable us to figure out their other properties? There

But we have evidence that collectively society doesn't advance with organized education, rather the reverse: the level of (formal) education in a country is the result of wealth.*2

do not use this argument to avoid trying to learn from history. All I am saying is that it is not so simple; be suspicious of the "because" and handle it with care—particularly in situations where you suspect silent evidence.

One single observation can invalidate a general statement derived from millennia of confirmatory sightings of millions of white swans.

One single observation can invalidate a general statement derived from millennia of confirmatory sightings of

Mother Nature is not perfect, but has so far proven smarter than humans, certainly much smarter than biologists. So my approach is to combine evidence-based research (stripped of biological theory), with an a priori that Mother Nature has more authority than anyone.

In addition, there seems to be curious evidence of a link between leadership and a form of psychopathology (the sociopath) that encourages the nonblinking, self-confident, insensitive person to rally followers.

naïve empiricism, we have a natural tendency to look for instances that confirm our story and our vision of the world—these instances are always easy to find. Alas

I can find confirmation for just about anything, the

a series of corroborative facts is not necessarily evidence. Seeing

disconfirming instances are far more powerful in establishing truth. Yet

naïve empiricism—successions of anecdotes selected to fit a story do not constitute evidence. Anyone

law: innocent until proven guilty as opposed to guilty until proven innocent

As much as it is ingrained in our habits and conventional wisdom, confirmation can be a dangerous error.

If you believe that witnessing an additional white swan will bring confirmation that there are no black swans, then you should also accept the statement, on purely logical grounds, that the sighting of a red Mini Cooper should confirm that there are no black swans.

that the burden of evidence is on those who disturb natural systems

Como veíamos antes, los casos de desconfirmación tienen mucha más fuerza para establecer la verdad. Sin embargo, tendemos a no ser conscientes de esta propiedad.

It is true that 1,000 days cannot prove you right, but one day can prove you to be wrong.

Popper introduced the mechanism of conjectures and refutations, which works as follows: you formulate a (bold) conjecture and you start looking for the observation that would prove you wrong. This is the alternative to our search for confirmatory instances.

Mother of all harmful mistakes - mistaking absence of evidence for evidence of absence.

You can test a given rule either directly, by looking at instances where it works, or indirectly, by focusing on where it does not work. As we saw earlier, disconfirming instances are far more powerful in establishing truth. Yet we tend to not be aware of this property.

that there is no evidence of the possibility of large events, i.e., Black Swans. You are likely to confuse that statement, however, particularly if you do not pay close attention, with the statement that there is evidence of no possible Black

It will take a lot of statistical information to override your hesitation.