Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence.

I was thinking about assertions that ECREE should be a cornerstone of objective reasoning. Then I started to wonder about the usefulness of ECREE and its impact on everyday life.

I realize that ECREE may not be as sound of principle that it at first seems.

Let's break it down and analyze the principle in everyday situations.

Take the Extraordinary claim that I have recently won the lottery. Having about a 1 in 146 million chance of winning the powerball lottery, this is certainly an extraordinary claim. So what evidence would I need to prove this extraordinary claim. In order to collect my winnings or prove that I won the lottery, I would need the winning ticket and documentation of the winning numbers in order to prove that I won to another person.

Now let us look at the opposite situation. Say I lost the lottery. Now there is no one that would dispute that losing the lottery is an "ordinary" claim. Now what if someone demanded proof that I lost the lottery. How could I prove this? Well, I would need the losing lottery ticket and the documentation of the winning numbers in order to prove that I lost the lottery.

What is the difference? One claim is ordinary and one is extraordinary, yet the require the same evidence in order to prove both claims. If ECREE applied, wouldn't you need extraordinary evidence for the extraordinary claim? But this is not the case....ordinary evidence is sufficient to prove the extraordinary claim. This can be shown in that for every extraordinary claim there is an ordinary claim (like in the lottery example) that can be proved or disproved by the exact same level of evidence.

As I thought about more and more extraordinary claims, the more I realize while at first you think that extraordinary evidence is needed.....this is not the case at all. Extraordinary claims require evidence yes, but nothing further.

We may feel that one requires evidence while the other doesn't, but this is awful subjective for such a reported objective principle.

This subjectivity can be applied to both sides of the principle as well. How does one conclude whether an event or claim is ordinary or extraordinary? A claim for someone could be ordinary for them but extraordinary for others. Also, how does one conclude whether the evidence provided is ordinary or extraordinary? Once again, evidence could be ordinary for some but extraordinary for others.

For such a principle to be held by "objective" people, it is exceptionally subjective.

you could however consider the winning lottery ticket to be extraordinary evidence. but you woulden't need a losing lottery ticket to convince anyone that you didn't actually lose the lottery.

is the claim that extraterrestrial intelligent life exists, an extraordinary one? That reminds me of when 15thC explorers reported human-like but hairy animals. Now we know them as gorillas or apes. All one had to do was to see one to believe, if he hadn't believed the claims before.

How to objectively assess evidence as extraordinary?

The downfall of ECREE is that it's a function of individual epistemology. What one person will consider an extraordinary claim will not be considered a big deal by someone else. From that one might say that what the majority of rational people think should be the foundation of determining what is extraordinary. But this is just a version of an appeal to majority belief. Ultimately one will find that ECREE probably just reduces to something like "events that secularised, skeptical modernists find hard to believe" and as such is really nothing more than an opinion that a certain westernised perspective is culturally privileged as a kind of ideal observer to all other beliefs.

Functionally, there is no such thing as objective extraordinary claims or evidence. There are only appeals to subsets of people who think like us.

Originally posted by Augustine2004

How to objectively assess evidence as extraordinary?

Yes, exactly. Extraordinary claims require evidence. Non-extraordinary claims require evidence. Basically, any sort of claim requires evidence if you want to argue its validity. I often wonder where those who promote ECREE draw the line. "Yes, that's evidence. But it isn't extraordinary enough for me. Sorry!" ECREE is just another way to say "special pleading".

Originally posted by element771

Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence.

I was thinking about assertions that ECREE should be a cornerstone of objective reasoning. Then I started to wonder about the usefulness of ECREE and its impact on everyday life.

I realize that ECREE may not be as sound of principle that it at first seems.

Let's break it down and analyze the principle in everyday situations.

Take the Extraordinary claim that I have recently won the lottery. Having about a 1 in 146 million chance of winning the powerball lottery, this is certainly an extraordinary claim.

Not really.

People win the lottery all the time, dozens a day, hundreds a year.

I mean yeah, the odds that you, out of all people, won it are pretty low, but the odds that someone won it aren't.

So it's not really "extraordinary" at all.

So what evidence would I need to prove this extraordinary claim. In order to collect my winnings or prove that I won the lottery, I would need the winning ticket and documentation of the winning numbers in order to prove that I won to another person.

Yes, because that just is the type of evidence required to validate such a claim.

Pretty ordinary, huh?

Now let us look at the opposite situation. Say I lost the lottery. Now there is no one that would dispute that losing the lottery is an "ordinary" claim. Now what if someone demanded proof that I lost the lottery. How could I prove this? Well, I would need the losing lottery ticket and the documentation of the winning numbers in order to prove that I lost the lottery.

OK.

What is the difference? One claim is ordinary and one is extraordinary, yet the require the same evidence in order to prove both claims.

They both seem pretty ordinary to me.

People win the lottery all the time. People lose it all the time. There's nothing 'extraordinary' about either of those claims.

I think this is a pretty fundamental misunderstanding of 'extraordinary' in this context.

Odds don't necessarily imply extraordinary. If I take a tennis ball, submerge it in paint, and throw it at a wall, the odds of it making the exact arrangement it does are astronomical, yet there's nothing extraordinary about it.

If ECREE applied, wouldn't you need extraordinary evidence for the extraordinary claim? But this is not the case....ordinary evidence is sufficient to prove the extraordinary claim. This can be shown in that for every extraordinary claim there is an ordinary claim (like in the lottery example) that can be proved or disproved by the exact same level of evidence.

As I thought about more and more extraordinary claims, the more I realize while at first you think that extraordinary evidence is needed.....this is not the case at all. Extraordinary claims require evidence yes, but nothing further.

So you're telling me the claim that my cat likes milk requires as much evidence as the claim that my cat can fly?

Alright, I'll give you a picture of my cat drinking milk, and one of my cat suspended mid-takeoff.

Equal evidence, right? Photographic proof of my cat drinking milk and of its powers of levitation.

Or if I tell you "My cat's name is Sprinkes" vs. "My cat can play the play the piano."

You'll almost certainly be willing the accept the former sentence as evidence in most contexts, but you'll readily doubt the latter.

Why? They're both just verbal declarative statements about my cat.

Unless one of those claims seems more extraordinary than the other... If only we had some means of deciding this matter...

We may feel that one requires evidence while the other doesn't, but this is awful subjective for such a reported objective principle.

I don't know.

Maybe it is subjective. Lot's of things are, but that doesn't make them useless. Occam's Razor is subjective, to the extent that people can't agree on what constitutes "adding an entity unnecessarily."

It takes personal judgment too, and reasonable people can disagree with the application of that rule.

And yet I don't see any impetus to toss it out the window. Why? Because it's a good heuristic.

Same here.

There's disagreement over what constitutes an 'extraordinary' claim, but I assure you, some claims are more extraordinary than others.

And if you don't believe that, then I have a bridge to sell you.

This subjectivity can be applied to both sides of the principle as well. How does one conclude whether an event or claim is ordinary or extraordinary?

By using your judgment.

A claim for someone could be ordinary for them but extraordinary for others.

I guess.

You'll just have to compare your reasons for figuring the way you did and try to come to a consensus.

Which of these, if you were to here about them in your everyday life would regard as the ordinary claim vs. the extraordinary one?

1. It's raining water outside vs. It's raining ambrosia outside.

2. My car can hit 100 miles an hour vs. My car can travel back in time.

3. I like to read to pass the time vs. I like to drive a flaming motorcycle over 20 busses to pass the time.

Tell me, do you think there'll be much variation in people's answers, putting aside people who answer contrary to their actual opinions just to be obstinate and make a point?

No. It'd be ridiculous for anyone other than a child or a simpleton to answer that the latter is less extraordinary than the former in any of these cases.

This seems to be a pretty basic ability to me.

Also, how does one conclude whether the evidence provided is ordinary or extraordinary?

How did you just do it?

Once again, evidence could be ordinary for some but extraordinary for others.

I'm not seeing this as the damning flaw you are.

For such a principle to be held by "objective" people, it is exceptionally subjective.

I don't know. Maybe somewhat, but again, what's that prove?

Originally posted by GakuseiDon

Yes, exactly. Extraordinary claims require evidence. Non-extraordinary claims require evidence. Basically, any sort of claim requires evidence if you want to argue its validity. I often wonder where those who promote ECREE draw the line. "Yes, that's evidence. But it isn't extraordinary enough for me. Sorry!" ECREE is just another way to say "special pleading".

All claims are not equal.

Some claims are more extraordinary than others. I can produce an infinite amount of examples to demonstrate this, if you'd like.

And if you want to tell me that you'll accept the same evidence for some common-sense claim as you would for some ridiculous scenario I dream up, then go ahead, but I don't think you're being honest to how you function.

A simple photograph would suffice to prove to you that I can read a book. You make these judgments all the time, probably. You see someone on the subway looking at a newspaper and don't think a thing of it. But a picture of my cat looking an open book would hardly suffice to prove to you anything of the sort.

It's the same evidence: visual information on a creature looking at some text.

EDIT: Here's a real-world example of where ECREE would have proven useful.

Clever Hans (Wikipedia him) was a horse who supposedly could count, do various kinds of arithmetic, etc. People would go up to him, ask him a math problem, and he'd 'solve' it by stomping his foot. "Add 5 + 7" would result, invariably, in him stomping 12 times. And the larger the sum, it seemed, the faster he'd count, as if he were calculating.

Quite impressive, and it fooled many people, even Hans' owner/trainer, who truly thought the horse could count. But no, blindfold him and the ability goes away. It turns Hans would just look people as they leaned over after saying to him. When they leaned over to look at his hoof, he'd start tapping, and when they leaned up (after he'd hit the 'right' number), he'd stop. To everyone it appeared as if he could count. And they had all kinds of ordinary evidence to support this claim. And yet they were all horribly wrong. It took serious minded researches attempting to gather 'extrarodinary' evidence (Hans counting with a blindfold, say) to prove this claim wrong.

According to you, we'd have been fine at stopping at stage 1. Hans exhibits counting behavior. Kids count on their hands, Hans counts with his hooves. He listens to verbal commands, responds appropriately, etc.

And yet it was only because some people thought this claim, that a horse could count, was quite extraordinary that they went the extra mile to examine him.

This, it seems to me, is an absolutely open-and-shut example of the utility of a principle like ECREE.
And yet I think you'll grant that what would demonstrate one doesn't demonstrate the other.

Element, a few things:

* If you tell your friend at work that you lost the lottery, your friend is significantly less likely to ask you to produce the losing ticket before nodding and saying, "Aw that sucks." Less likely than additional inquiry if you had claimed to win, that is.

* If you go to claim your reward, your ticket and whatever else is involved (I've never gambled) will be looked at considerably more closely than if you dropped by to ask if your losing ticket won. Frankly no one is concerned about forgery or theft of a losing ticket.

So you can see, the difference isn't in what it takes to prove each scenario to the same degree...but whether such a degree of proof is called for.

Now in the case of whether non-Christians should believe miracles in the Bible took place as described, the lottery analogy would have to specify that lotteries were not generally proven to take place at all, ever. Sure some people believe they do, but whenever investigators get close to where one is reported *poof* no lottery to be found.

NOW to convince your friend you won the lottery, you not only have to show that you are the winner (specific historical event) but that lotteries exist at all (questionable universal fact).

Originally posted by element771

Take the Extraordinary claim that I have recently won the lottery.

For reasons others have noted, I would not consider that an extraordinary claim. I consider a claim extraordinary if it is inconsistent with everything else I think I know about how the universe works.

If you were to tell me that you had gone fishing and found the winning ticket in the mouth of a fish you had caught, then I would consider that an extraordinary claim. I probably could be convinced that it really happened. I'm not sure what kind of evidence I would need in order to be convinced, but I would need more than just your word for it.

Originally posted by GakuseiDon

Yes, exactly. Extraordinary claims require evidence. Non-extraordinary claims require evidence. Basically, any sort of claim requires evidence if you want to argue its validity. I often wonder where those who promote ECREE draw the line. "Yes, that's evidence. But it isn't extraordinary enough for me. Sorry!" ECREE is just another way to say "special pleading".

Yep I have been saying this all along. All claims require sufficient evidence. Period.

Originally posted by element771

Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence.

I was thinking about assertions that ECREE should be a cornerstone of objective reasoning. Then I started to wonder about the usefulness of ECREE and its impact on everyday life.

I realize that ECREE may not be as sound of principle that it at first seems.

Let's break it down and analyze the principle in everyday situations.

Take the Extraordinary claim that I have recently won the lottery. Having about a 1 in 146 million chance of winning the powerball lottery, this is certainly an extraordinary claim. So what evidence would I need to prove this extraordinary claim. In order to collect my winnings or prove that I won the lottery, I would need the winning ticket and documentation of the winning numbers in order to prove that I won to another person.

Now let us look at the opposite situation. Say I lost the lottery. Now there is no one that would dispute that losing the lottery is an "ordinary" claim. Now what if someone demanded proof that I lost the lottery. How could I prove this? Well, I would need the losing lottery ticket and the documentation of the winning numbers in order to prove that I lost the lottery.

What is the difference? One claim is ordinary and one is extraordinary, yet the require the same evidence in order to prove both claims. If ECREE applied, wouldn't you need extraordinary evidence for the extraordinary claim? But this is not the case....ordinary evidence is sufficient to prove the extraordinary claim. This can be shown in that for every extraordinary claim there is an ordinary claim (like in the lottery example) that can be proved or disproved by the exact same level of evidence.

As I thought about more and more extraordinary claims, the more I realize while at first you think that extraordinary evidence is needed.....this is not the case at all. Extraordinary claims require evidence yes, but nothing further.

We may feel that one requires evidence while the other doesn't, but this is awful subjective for such a reported objective principle.

This subjectivity can be applied to both sides of the principle as well. How does one conclude whether an event or claim is ordinary or extraordinary? A claim for someone could be ordinary for them but extraordinary for others. Also, how does one conclude whether the evidence provided is ordinary or extraordinary? Once again, evidence could be ordinary for some but extraordinary for others.

For such a principle to be held by "objective" people, it is exceptionally subjective.

Presumably, providing a losing lottery ticket is not extraordinary, since such tickets are very common. Providing the winning ticket is extraordinary, because they are so rare.

I agree with those who say that the threshold of evidence is, in reality, pretty much the same. I don't even know what people who demand "extraordinary" evidence are asking for. It usually seems to me like what they're doing is saying "give me evidence that is impossible to give - not normal evidence."

Originally posted by Dr. Jack Bauer

I agree with those who say that the threshold of evidence is, in reality, pretty much the same. I don't even know what people who demand "extraordinary" evidence are asking for. It usually seems to me like what they're doing is saying "give me evidence that is impossible to give - not normal evidence."

It usually comes up in debates about whether the evidence for the resurrection is good enough that -- without religious faith -- fair minded people who examine it should conclude that Jesus was probably resurrected.

Proponents of this idea would like the question of resurrection to require no more evidence than something more mundane, like whether Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey a week before his execution.

But miracles require more evidence for similar confidence than non-miracles. Why? Because we know people can ride into a city on a donkey. We don't know they can be miraculously raised from the dead.

Whether something did occur vs. whether something can occur.

In this case, both questions are put on the table at the same time. If I tell you that I teleported to Mars (in a space suit of course), I might be convincing enough for you to accept this fact if you already knew teleporting between planets was possible. You would know it can occur, so I only have to be convincing that it did occur in my case.

But since in real life you aren't convinced this even can occur, you would rightly demand either so much evidence it did occur that whether it can occur would be established from my own teleport to Mars, or you would first demand convincing evidence of it occurring in other cases.

Maybe I did teleport to Mars, but no one else has done so. Maybe I can't reproduce it myself. And maybe there aren't very convincing records of my own teleportation round-trip, even though in fact it did occur.

Should I expect any fair minded person to believe me anyway?

Originally posted by Seasanctuary

It usually comes up in debates about whether the evidence for the resurrection is good enough that -- without religious faith -- fair minded people who examine it should conclude that Jesus was probably resurrected.

Proponents of this idea would like the question of resurrection to require no more evidence than something more mundane, like whether Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey a week before his execution.

But miracles require more evidence for similar confidence than non-miracles. Why? Because we know people can ride into a city on a donkey. We don't know they can be miraculously raised from the dead.

Whether something did occur vs. whether something can occur.

So are you saying that the only real reason that you doubt miracles is that you've already taken a pretty firm stance about whether or not they can occur?

So in the end then, you're not saying that miraculous claims logically require extraordinary premises. You're just saying that because of your disposition, you would not concede that a miracle had occured unless you had something more than regular evidence.

Precisely what you would need is something I'm curious to hear. What exactly is "extraordinary evidence"?

I think a case study in the lottery analogy may show some of why ECREE is an incomplete principle as stated. Suppose I have a close friend of mine, and we have had many discussions over the years, and no history of playing pranks on each other or such. Out of the blue, I get an excited phone call from him telling me he won the lottery. Should I believe him? I mean, winning the lottery is pretty freaking extraordinary, right?

Except for the fact that, on the other hand, my friend has proven his honesty... so even granting that ECREE has even some validity as an approach, the "extraordinary claim" that he won the lottery has to compete with the also "extraordinary claim" that he's lying to my face.

Not to mention that most likely I'll be viewing it in terms that will bias it even more towards my believing that my friend won the lottery. After all "SOMEBODY winning the lottery" is not an extraordinary claim. However, there's no corresponding claim for the other side as long as I view my friend as an individual such that "My friend lying to me" is a completely different case from "Some general person lying to some other general person." Unless I'm paranoid, which I'm usually not without cause.

So however much ECREE fails as an epistemological principle, it even doesn't work that well in describing how people think. If my friend said he'd won the lottery, I doubt I'd make an estimate of the exact probability that he's lying to me, compare that number to 1/146 million or whatever, and then decide to accept or reject the proposition that he's telling the truth. It just doesn't work that way.

There are only three interpretations of ECREE that I think generate even remotely plausible principles:

1.) Read ECREE as an expression of methodological conservativism. That is, read it as the claim that, all things being equal, we ought to revise our current beliefs/theories in such a way that requires as little overall adjustment to the totality of our beliefs/theoretical commitments as possible. So, a claim the acceptance of which would require massive revision of our beliefs/theoretical commitments will have to be supported by extremely strong evidence before we accept it. Since I think methodological conservativism is a good methodological principle (if even for just pragmatic reasons – we can’t make any progress if we constantly question everything at once – but also, I think, for epistemic reasons), I agree with ECREE on this interpretation. The problem, however, is that, on this reading, what counts as an “extraordinary claim” (i.e. a claim the acceptance of which would require massive revision in our overall structure of beliefs/theoretical commitments) is a person/community relative matter. For Christians, for example, the claim that Jesus did not rise from the dead is an extraordinary claim by this interpretation of ECREE.

2.) Read ECREE as the assertion that claims with an extremely low antecedent epistemic probability on our background knowledge require fairly strong evidence to raise their epistemic probability to a level that makes them worthy of assent. This could be put more precisely in Bayesian terms, but I won’t bother with that right now. I agree with ECREE under this reading as well. But the problem with this reading is twofold. First, this reading of ECREE, like the previous one, makes its application person/community relative, since, at the very least, what the relevant background knowledge is is a person/community relative matter. Second, for many hypotheses, there are few agreed upon norms for what the proper assignment of the antecedent epistemic probability to those hypotheses are. In fact, some think that assignments of antecedent epistemic probabilities is a wholly subjective matter.

3.) Read ECREE in the second way, supplemented by the Humean thesis that miracle claims, by their very nature, are extremely antecedently epistemically improbable. Okay, then ECREE just becomes an expression of Humean skepticism about miracles in slogan form. Well, we can debate the merits of Humean arguments against rational belief in miracles another time perhaps (personally, I think Humean arguments against rational belief in miracles all suck). But the important point here is that on this reading, ECREE is nothing more than an expression of Humean skepticism about miracles.

Originally posted by element771

Now let us look at the opposite situation. Say I lost the lottery. Now there is no one that would dispute that losing the lottery is an "ordinary" claim. Now what if someone demanded proof that I lost the lottery. How could I prove this? Well, I would need the losing lottery ticket and the documentation of the winning numbers in order to prove that I lost the lottery.

Showing the the losing lottery ticket and documentation of the winning numbers would not do it. For example, you could have bought two tickets and be concealing the winning ticket. What you really need to do is to show that you do not hold the winning ticket -- for example, by producing the person who does have the winning ticket. So the type of proof is exactly the same in both cases.

But I think this shows something about ECREE.

ECREE is not intended to apply to logical proof. It is a rule-of-thumb heuristic for dealing with incomplete data.

In fact, it's a rule-of-thumb that all of us apply all the time, all day long. It's the same rule-of-thumb that keeps us from (for example), having to watch the news to make sure a volcano has not suddenly erupted at the shopping mall we are planning a trip to. This is because even if there has been no assertion that such a volcano exists, it is an assertion that could be advanced. And the same underlying principle that keeps us from worrying about volcanoes at the mall (in most parts of the world), leads to the succinct formula: ECREE.

Its related to logic vs. induction in a similar (though opposite) way as the famous “non-black, non-crow” paradox. That paradox demonstrates that every non-black, non-crow object is a confirming instance of the assertion “all crows are black.” It is logically true, but of very little import in dealing practically with the world. ECREE is the opposite case of the same idea: ECREE is logically weak, not because ECREE, but because non-ECREE require the same type of proof. However, ECREE is a dandy heuristic, and one that is probably so basic as to be built into our very neural biology.

-Neil