What is Evidence: Definition and 367 Discussions

Evidence for a proposition is what supports this proposition. It is usually understood as an indication that the supported proposition is true. What role evidence plays and how it is conceived varies from field to field. In epistemology, evidence is what justifies beliefs or what makes it rational to hold a certain doxastic attitude. For example, a perceptual experience of a tree may act as evidence that justifies the belief that there is a tree. In this role, evidence is usually understood as a private mental state. Important topics in this field include the questions of what the nature of these mental states is, for example, whether they have to be propositional, and whether misleading mental states can still qualify as evidence. Other fields, including the sciences and the legal system, tend to emphasize more the public nature of evidence. In philosophy of science, evidence is understood as that which confirms or disconfirms scientific hypotheses. Measurements of Mercury's "anomalous" orbit, for example, are seen as evidence that confirms Einstein's theory of general relativity. In order to play the role of neutral arbiter between competing theories, it is important that scientific evidence is public and uncontroversial, like observable physical objects or events, so that the proponents of the different theories can agree on what the evidence is. This is ensured by following the scientific method and tends to lead to an emerging scientific consensus through the gradual accumulation of evidence. Two issues for the scientific conception of evidence are the problem of underdetermination, i.e. that the available evidence may support competing theories equally well, and theory-ladenness, i.e. that what some scientists consider the evidence to be may already involve various theoretical assumptions not shared by other scientists. It is often held that there are two kinds of evidence: intellectual evidence or what is self-evident and empirical evidence or evidence accessible through the senses.
In order for something to act as evidence for a hypothesis, it has to stand in the right relation to it, referred to as the "evidential relation". There are competing theories about what this relation has to be like. Probabilistic approaches hold that something counts as evidence if it increases the probability of the supported hypothesis. According to hypothetico-deductivism, evidence consists in observational consequences of the hypothesis. The positive-instance approach states that an observation sentence is evidence for a universal hypothesis if the sentence describes a positive instance of this hypothesis. The evidential relation can occur in various degrees of strength. These degrees range from direct proof of the truth of a hypothesis to weak evidence that is merely consistent with the hypothesis but does not rule out other, competing hypotheses, as in circumstantial evidence.
In law, rules of evidence govern the types of evidence that are admissible in a legal proceeding. Types of legal evidence include testimony, documentary evidence, and physical evidence. The parts of a legal case that are not in controversy are known, in general, as the "facts of the case." Beyond any facts that are undisputed, a judge or jury is usually tasked with being a trier of fact for the other issues of a case. Evidence and rules are used to decide questions of fact that are disputed, some of which may be determined by the legal burden of proof relevant to the case. Evidence in certain cases (e.g. capital crimes) must be more compelling than in other situations (e.g. minor civil disputes), which drastically affects the quality and quantity of evidence necessary to decide a case.

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  1. Astronuc

    Evidence of large submarine volcanic eruption 520 kyrs ago in Aegean

    Evidence of one of the largest explosive eruptions ever recorded in the Aegean Sea https://phys.org/news/2024-01-evidence-largest-explosive-eruptions-aegean.html https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-023-01171-z I wonder it ranks against Tambora (1815) and Krakatoa (1883)...
  2. I

    Evidence that the Earth rotates in Space

    I was wondering if the Foucault pendulum experience was an evidence that earth does rotate on itself.
  3. M

    A New paper claims there is evidence of suppression of structure growth

    A paper by Nhat-Minh Nguyen, Dragan Huterer, Yuewei Wen titled "Evidence for suppression of structure growth in the concordance cosmological model" https://arxiv.org/abs/2302.01331 The abstract says: We present evidence for a suppressed growth rate of large-scale structure during the...
  4. Ranku

    I CMBR Evidence for Non-Baryonic Dark Matter

    It is said that CMBR indicates that dark matter is non-baryonic. How so?
  5. Slavik Komarova

    I Any evidence of white holes in the Universe?

    We have much evidence of the existence of black holes in our universe ... so why does not the same occur in relation to white holes since they are also the result of the same theoretical prediction ?
  6. racerunner

    B Muon Tomography Evidence for Special Relativity?

    Muons are a popular way to provide evidence for Special Relativity. But, does Muon Tomography provide evidence for SR? Can you calibrate your muon detectors without reference to SR? Is there any need to refer to SR when interpreting the data? I tutored a high school student who argued the...
  7. Bastion

    B Experimental evidence for effective mass increasing with speed

    I am new to this forum and in line with its rules I am trying not to repeat a question already asked. I find that Jeremyfiennes original question I.e Experimental evidence for effective mass increasing with speed” is the question I want to ask but I am not satisfied with the answers given so...
  8. apostolosdt

    A Multiverse and observational evidence?

    Cosmology and multiverse are beyond my limited knowledge, but I came across the following article that aroused my curiosity. Although I am extremely cautious with "exotic" theories, I'd like to read any comments on that part of the article that a model proposed by cosmologist Laura...
  9. T

    A Which galaxies have the best studied evidence for dark matter?

    Unsurprisingly the Milky Way seems to have been studied a lot. We have really good luminous mass profiles (e.g. McMillan 2011) and increasingly accurate circular velocity observations for stars at various radiuses (e.g. Eilers 2019) meaning we can confidently infer dark matter models. So the...
  10. zrek

    B Experimental evidence on cosmological redshift

    The space expands due the dark energy, so the light wavelength also stretches during its journey between galaxies, causing a measurable redshift. How can I argue that this is the right reasoning for the measured redshift? What if someone states that the photon maybe simple loses its energy over...
  11. Cerenkov

    I Edwin Hubble and the Evidence for Universe Expansion

    [Moderator's note: Spin off from previous thread due to topic change.] It's my understanding that Edwin Hubble used the Hooker telescope to measure the red shift of galaxies only within the Local Group of galaxies to determine that the universe was expanding. As we see here...
  12. Zeeshan Ahmad

    I Evidence for existence of a 9th Planet in the solar system

    Could the existence of the 9th planet of the solar system is possible under these arguments of existence of it some where in the out scurt of solar system? The evidence for Planet 9 comes from its gravitational pull on other bodies. If the planet exists, its gravity will affect the orbits of...
  13. M

    Is there any evidence to suggest that there is no limit to technology?

    I am currently obsessed with futurism but I am terrified I will run out of novums to contemplate about. A novum is an idea like “FTL travel” or “Gene splicing”. I was wondering if their is any proof that their is an unlimited amount of ideas that humans can come up with. My uncle was reading...
  14. P

    I C in a Vacuum: Evidence of Constant?

    I understand that it is one of Einstein's postulates, however I don't know of any direct experiments which show that it is true.
  15. B

    Python Laplace approximation in Bayesian inference

    Hello everybody, I am working on a Python project in which I have to make Bayesian inference to estimate 4 or more parameters using MCMC. I also need to evaluate the evidence and I thought to do so through the Laplace approximation in n-dimensions: $$ E = P(x_0)2\pi^{n/2}|C|^{1/2} $$ Where C...
  16. J

    B Experimental evidence for effective mass increasing with speed

    What is the best recent experimental evidence for effective mass increase (momentum/velocity) with speed, with experimental details? Searching the web all I find is either very old ones (early 1900s). Or vague generalized statements like (Wikipedia) "Many additional experiments concerning the...
  17. F

    MHB True or False: Statements Explained w/ Evidence

    Please help. Is those statement true or false? With some proofs
  18. jim mcnamara

    Avi Loeb + ʻOumuamua and evidence for extraterrestrial intelligence

    Pop Science reporting example above. The book "Extraterrestrial The first sign of intelligent life beyond Earth" Avi Loeb, has not yet been published. I put this in General Discussion, if someone thinks sound byte previews of a yet unpublished book warrant something different please report...
  19. ohwilleke

    I Evidence of Strong Equivalence Principle Violations?

    This paper appears to be a major break though in observational evidence of a strong equivalence principle violation, something predicted in MOND and contrary to general relativity. The analysis is model dependent, but it seems to rule out the most plausible conventional GR based alternatives...
  20. L

    Is there Scientific Evidence of Biorhythms?

    Biorhythms have been "known" about for many decades There are 3 rhythms - 23, 28 and 33 day cycles - physical, emotional and mental respectively. biorhythms pic These must have been calculated using observation of human qualities and noting them down My question is - are there any external...
  21. bhobba

    Exploring the Evidence for Visible Light as EM Radiation

    Hi All In discussing another issue it occurred to me the only experiential evidence I know that normal visible light is EM radiation is Faraday Rotation. I strongly suspect we have a lot more these days. Amusing story. Fermi's wife had a degree in general science that did not cover...
  22. Merlin3189

    Can a Test be 100% Accurate? Examining the Evidence

    I read in this morning's newspaper, that we now have a test which was "found to be 100% accurate by experts". My personal crap detector pinged. (If you were not around in the 60's, just say I was sceptical.) Maybe they were not implying that the test IS 100% accurate, just that in their tests...
  23. G

    MHB Linear Correlation: Is Evidence Sufficient?

    The accompanying table lists the numbers of Internet users per 100 people and numbers of scientific award winners per 10 million people for different countries. Construct a​ scatterplot, find the value of the linear correlation coefficient​ r, and find the​ P-value of r. Determine whether there...
  24. Evo

    There's "no evidence" coronavirus survivors can't be reinfected, WHO

    I know Dr Fauci said that the virus might mutate by September and that we are likely to see another round of the virus then (if we have a reprieve in the summer). But I've been reading that they don't know if people that have had the virus are immune for weeks, or months. It's not very...
  25. J

    A Is this evidence that Venus originally had a nitrogen atmosphere?

    Has MESSENGER found evidence that Venus originally had a nitrogen atmosphere, and might have been more habitable, and the present amount of CO2 was released by some cataclysm afterwards? https://phys.org/news/2020-04-lucky-messenger-upends-long-held-idea.html
  26. mfb

    I T2K sees ~3 sigma evidence for neutrino CP violation

    Publication: Constraint on the matter–antimatter symmetry-violating phase in neutrino oscillations Edit: arXiv: Constraint on the Matter-Antimatter Symmetry-Violating Phase in Neutrino Oscillations Article: Neutrino Asymmetry Passes Critical Threshold Previous measurements already hinted at...
  27. Jorrie

    I Has the evidence for anisotropy of cosmic acceleration been discussed?

    I have searched the forum a bit but could not find a discussion of this Astrophysics letter: 'Evidence for anisotropy of cosmic acceleration', Jacques Colin et. al, 18 Oct 2019. Can someone please direct me to any forum discussion?
  28. G

    I Strongest Evidence for Trapping Light in Schwarzschild Radius

    The concept of that when a photon's trajectory intersects with the Schwarzschild Radius/event horizon, said photon will never exit the Schwarzschild Radius/event horizon. Or any other object besides a photon for that matter. So far what has been the strongest evidence for this prediction?
  29. spacecapitalist

    B I don't understand the evidence or possibility of the Big Bang

    I don't understand how observations of the universe and theories behind the cosmos support the Big Bang Theory. For example, the microwave background could be explained through different mechanisms in space. Couldn't the red shift in galaxies be explained by something that occurred in the...
  30. Cerenkov

    B Other lines of evidence for Dark Energy? (Besides supernova data)

    Hello. My current understanding (please correct, if wrong) is that the expansion of the universe is observed to be accelerating, rather than coasting or slowing down. The tentative cause of this acceleration has been given the placeholder name of 'Dark Energy'. One line of evidence for this...
  31. Buzz Bloom

    I Some new evidence that the Dark Energy Concept is wrong

    The reference in the summary refers to an article which has been recently accepted by The Astrophysical Journal. A draft version of the article dated December 10, 2019 is https://arxiv.org/pdf/1912.04903.pdf . The content of the draft article is way over my head, so I am hoping that...
  32. fsonnichsen

    Historic experimental evidence of Kirchhoff's radiation law

    I am curious about the historic experimental evidence that lead to Kirchhoff's radiation law. It is easy to take for granted the ubiquitous temperature/wavelength curve that lead Planck to the quantization concept. But I wondered historically how the curve was derived. To clarify, we...
  33. gmax137

    No evidence for globally coherent warm and cold periods

    No evidence for globally coherent warm and cold periods over the preindustrial Common Era This is being reported in the popular news, here's a link to the Nature abstract. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1401-2
  34. Cerenkov

    B Examples of theoretical proofs overturned by evidence?

    Hello. https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rspa.1970.0021 The Singularities of Gravitational Collapse and Cosmology The above paper by Hawking and Penrose is presented in the form of a mathematical proof. To my knowledge the predictions it makes about the initial cosmological...
  35. Auto-Didact

    A Experimental evidence of non-local quantum forces

    Becker et al. 2019, Asymmetry and non-dispersivity in the Aharonov-Bohm effect The paper is open access and published in Nature Communications.
  36. fluidistic

    A Exploring Cooper Pairs & Superconductivity: Physical Evidence?

    I am wondering what is the physical evidence that Cooper pairs are indeed the ones responsible for superconductivity. These pairs consist of two electrons with opposite momentum, forming a boson with null momentum. But what about pairs that would consist of, say, 6 electrons (or even more)? Of...
  37. pinball1970

    I Helium Hydride data, Early universe chemistry evidence?

    I don't think there is a thread on this? R Gusten et al, Nature, 2019, DOI: 10.1038/s41586-019-1090-x
  38. H

    I Any direct evidence of gravitational mass increase?

    Is there any evidence that objects moving increasingly closer to light speed gain gravitational mass, in the sense of attracting surrounding (and not co-moving) masses more strongly, rather than solely possessing the increased inertial mass implied by the greater force necessary to...
  39. PaulCam

    B Exoplanets - Suspicious evidence and fantastical conclusions

    Hi, I thought I would come and ask here as something has been bugging me for quite a while. Exoplanets. I'm not being bugged by the fact we are looking for them or that they exist. I am a bit suspicious of some of the evidence and how it's interpreted. While the adage is "Extraordinary...
  40. A

    I Is there any evidence of a universe expansion jerk

    As stated in the question--is there any evidence of a non zero rate of change of the acceleration of the expansion of the universe. What is the evidence for it and is it negative or positive? Also if there is what would it take to determine if there was a jounce?
  41. R

    MHB Statistical Significance: Manufacturer's Claim Rejected?

    form a conclusion about statistical significance. Do not make any formal calculations. Either use the results provided or make subjective judgments about the results. a manufacturer of laptop computers claims that only 1% of their computers are defective. In a sample of 600 computers, it was...
  42. nomadreid

    Nutrition and Cancer: Finding Evidence of Direct Benefits

    Using the keywords "nutrition" and "cancer", the Internet spews out thousands of articles. Ignoring the supermarket-checkout-magazine type of article, the others tend to either (a) be debunking various myths or (b) advising to avoid carcinogenic substances or (c) recommending to have a healthy...
  43. Anne Ross

    A Status of large higher dimensions

    The second Randall-Sundrum model was based on a large as opposed to compactified dimension. Has the possible existence of large higher dimensions been eliminated and what evidence rules them out?
  44. N

    Experience as Evidence: Forum Debate

    Are there any on the forum that think that what you experience is no evidence of reality? Or is it evidence? For example can you tell from your experience that reality is not one in whichno part experiences? Is that a simple truth that those on the forum agree upon, or are there those on the...
  45. jim mcnamara

    I MiniBooNE results at 6.1 sigma: Potential evidence for sterile neutrinos

    Bee Hossenfelder's blog has a discussion: http://backreaction.blogspot.com/ Preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/1805.12028 New evidence in the search for the 'sterile' neutrino. Can someone comment on this please. @mfb
  46. J

    Evidence that the ship had its engine turned on

    Homework Statement Homework Equations a = v/t p=mv(?) The Attempt at a Solution If an engine is turned on, that means that the ships are accelerating since the engine pushes back on air with a force and air pushes back to propel the ships forward, so I thought (A) would be the answer, even...
  47. F

    Evidence for global magnetic grid or pseudo science?

    In conducting research into historical accounts of Earths magnetic field, I consistently come across proposals of stable planetary magnetic grid systems; many of these theories which have apparently been developed through much time and effort. While I am unaware of any theory that cannot be...
  48. E

    I Observational evidence against expanding universe in MNRAS

    << Mentor Note -- after a very long Mentor discussion, we acknowledge that this paper, while potentially controversial, has been published in a reputable peer-reviewed journal. We believe that a discussion of this paper can be useful and constructive. Thanks >> This paper of mine was...
  49. K

    I Observational Evidence for Metric Expansion of Space?

    Imagine that the CMB did not exist. What observational evidence exists to support the theory of the metric expansion of spacetime, as opposed to having a static spacetime and it's the matter distribution that is expanding - as it would in an explosion?
  50. Posty McPostface

    Are banned topics subject to revision?

    As the title states. There's been a flurry of research being done in Japan on a banned topic related to "LENR". I was wondering what is the burden of proof required to change minds on this topic? How or where may it be presented? Is the guiding principle that if it cannot be described by...
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