Yes, it should, and the only person cheeky enough to claim otherwise is Meta.

The thing about proving negative assertions is that, even if you could do it, there is zero obligation to do so. If you take that logic in stride and apply it to positive assertions as well, I can just apply Hitchen's razor and call it a day.

Quote from: Verbatim on August 31, 2016, 10:42:46 AM

and the only person cheeky enough to claim otherwise is Meta.

literally wat

you've argued many times that it's possible to prove a negative, which would technically nullify any burden of proof out there

Quote from: Meta Cognition on August 31, 2016, 11:18:56 AM

Quote from: Verbatim on August 31, 2016, 10:42:46 AM

and the only person cheeky enough to claim otherwise is Meta.

literally wat

you've argued many times that it's possible to prove a negative, which would technically nullify any burden of proof out there

"There is no unicorn in my shed".

Excuse me while I go prove this.

"There is no unicorn in my shed".

Excuse me while I go prove this.

edit: i misread this

the unicorn could be invisible and ethereal

"There is no visible, corporeal unicorn in my shed."

it could just be hiding when you look--you literally cannot prove that there's not

Quite a bit of science, especially in statistical analysis, is solely concerned with supporting negative statements (e.g. a statistician cannot affirm a hypothesis, but can merely reject the opposing hypothesis). Additionally, any positive statement can easily be restated as a negative.

What's your point?

It's absolutely, utterly, totally incorrect to think you can't prove a negative.

edited the post, i thought you were being rational for a second and being sarcastic

because you can't prove that there isn't a unicorn in your shed--i can just keep postulating explanations for why you aren't currently seeing one

Quote from: Verbatim on August 31, 2016, 11:28:22 AM

the unicorn could be invisible and ethereal

At which point I would fall back on epistemic noncognitivism, and claim that something defined entirely with non-empirical metaphysics is functionally meaningless, making the proposition void in the first instance.

this is what we call a "copout"

the functional meaninglessness of some entity does not demonstrate its nonexistence

Quote from: Meta Cognition on August 31, 2016, 11:31:19 AM

Quote from: Verbatim on August 31, 2016, 11:28:22 AM

the unicorn could be invisible and ethereal

At which point I would fall back on epistemic noncognitivism, and claim that something defined entirely with non-empirical metaphysics is functionally meaningless, making the proposition void in the first instance.

this is what we call a "copout"

the functional meaninglessness of some entity does not demonstrate its nonexistence

No, but if you have a totally non-empirical entity neither its existence nor non-existence is demonstrable. . .

The key here is that it's entirely possible to disprove propositions with well-defined empirical content.

If you say to me "there is a perfectly normal black bear with no supernatural abilities sitting in my living room eating from a jar of honey" I can quite easily disprove this. I mean, even if you change the proposition I have still proven the negative of the original proposition, since there would certainly be no "perfectly normal black bear" turning invisible.

The fact that you can't prove some negatives does not mean you can't prove a negative generally; it's exactly the same with positive propositions. Some propositions, positive or negative, due to their content, simply cannot be proved at all.

It should follow logically that if the universe is deterministic, there is no statement that can't be proven; we're solely limited by our ability to observe. This is also a reason why hypotheses should be rigorously formulated, and why science is a process of revision, rather than proof.

but i would just like to point out that that is not a negative assertion

There is no difference between a positive or negative assertion besides framing; a negative proposition is just the flip-side of a positive one. Just read the pdf I posted man, it's like two pages.

I'd also point out that, even if I had endeavoured to prove the negative that there is no black bear in your room, you are still the one making the original assertion. The onus is therefore originally on you to demonstrate that the bear is there. Hitchens Razor is still valid.

The nature of subjectivity eliminates the possibility of objectively proving anything.

It's pretty clear that, in this instance, "prove" means "demonstrate the probability of".

You can't absolutely prove any synthetic proposition.

What I'm arguing is that all negative assertions are non-empirical by nature. We can seek empirical data to help assure us that the assertion is true or false, but empiricism only goes so far. In reality, there are limitless explanations for any given phenomena that go beyond empiricism.

Then we don't really disagree at all.

My point is that you can do much the same with positive assertions. My argument is that, as far as it matters--that is, empirically--then negative and positive propositions can be treated much the same.

Of course it can break down when you start making ridiculous and unfalsifiable propositions, but that's not necessarily limited to negative propositions. Negative propositions probably have a more difficult time when it comes to keeping themselves empirically grounded, but that's why science works on the basis of rigour.

I think you're giving too much credit to the people making non-empirical revisions to propositions. There comes a point where their claim can neither be proved or disproved, but if you're rigorous enough in your consideration of the original proposition, it's of course possible to demonstrate its probably falsehood.

I'm not saying negative propositions are easily provable; merely that if they are held to the kind of standard we should hold them to, then they will be provable. My problem with "You can't prove a negative" is that you can quite clearly prove a well-defined enough negative. . . Which should be the only proposition we have to deal with when somebody makes an argument.

And hell, like I said, if you want you can just tell lazy proposition makers to fuck off. My ability to disprove something wouldn't necessarily remove your onus to demonstrate it in the first place; only when you have offered some kind of justification would I bear any kind of responsibility to respond properly.

EDIT: Underlined the most important part, cause I rambled a bit.

Quote from: Meta Cognition on August 31, 2016, 11:22:14 AM

"There is no unicorn in my shed".

Excuse me while I go prove this.

edit: i misread this

the unicorn could be invisible and ethereal

"There is no visible, corporeal unicorn in my shed."

it could just be hiding when you look--you literally cannot prove that there's not

In my opinion, this is when philosophy is making things difficult for the sake of making things difficult.

If anything, the presence of abundant misinformation only exacerbates the need for people to bear the burden of proof.