Evidence vs. Hearsay

[Mercer (John Mercer)]

@thoughtful

John, for my benefit, would you define:

1. Evidence
2. Hearsay

as they relate to discussion in this forum.

They relate to discussions here or anywhere else in the same way that they relate to the legal system or theology.

1. Evidence: aka data. In science, the stuff that makes up most of the figures and tables. In law, what can be physically examined.

2. Hearsay: in science, what someone says or writes about the evidence. In law, testimony about what someone else said, not what someone else did, and generally disallowed as evidence because it is unreliable (even noted in the Bible!). It can be true or false.

Examples:

@thoughtful

I had watched the moth video. And I just read through the mouse thread. Those are both interesting examples of evolution and natural selection but that data doesn’t show genetic entropy to be false.

Did you just read the words, or did you look at any of that data you made a claim about?

@thoughtful

I know this is an ID channel, but feel free to listen to him in your own words to decide if this is hearsay or evidence. I assume because he’s a chemist, he actually knows what he’s talking about.

There’s nothing to decide!
What anyone says in a video is always hearsay, whether he knows what he’s talking about or not. It doesn’t matter if it is true or false, it doesn’t matter if you agree or disagree, it’s still hearsay and more importantly, misrepresenting it as evidence is simply unethical.

@thoughtful

@T_aquaticus

We are also saying that all of the evidence we have is consistent with evolutionary mechanisms being responsible for those genetic differences. Why isn’t this a valid conclusion?

Well, because the evidence isn’t actually consistent with that.

Well, what actual evidence have you actually examined that would actually justify such a claim?