User talk:JREverest/sandbox/Approaches to Knowledge/2020-21/Seminar group 6/Evidence

To the writer of the paragraph on Confirmation Bias: I saw that you covered how confirmation bias can lead to a distortion/manipulation of evidence, may I add a paragraph that discusses how this bias can impact the design of the experiment before any tests are even run causing systematic errors? Blacklipstick (discuss • contribs) 22:34, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Yes! That is a great point and would look at confirmation bias from another perspective of bias before the experiment is even conducted which is extremely interesting in the context of evidence! Of course you can contribute! I will look at your referencing to read the articles and sources you use myself in order to full grasp the concept! Thank you for your input!

Forensic Evidence In Criminology:

Hey Forensic evidence in criminology writer, I read about your article and did some research about it. I was wondering if I could add some limits to forensic evidence in criminology. I think it is very interesting to look at its limits since a lot of people take scientific pieces of evidence as granted. For example, Mitt Romney intended to reintegrate the death penalty in Massachusetts, since he thought that forensic evidence is 100 per cent reliable, which I believe is not the point of Forensic evidence improvement. Furthermore, I could be very interesting to look at the conflict between the two disciplines (law and science) since they both have different constraints and vision of what evidence is.

Sounds really interesting. Go ahead and add! I think maybe the part about the conflict between law and science could be a seperate paragraph as well; my part on forensics is the more science-y part of the law, so maybe it would be best to see what the Evidence in Law person thinks. Also wouldn't it be more of a collaboration than a conflict, between science and law? I would like to see your opinion on this, and if they do differ, how so?

Here is my paragraph, tell me what you think:

Law and science are indeed two very different disciplines, with different approaches and constraints when talking about evidence. When forensic evidence is put forward, it's considered as the truth since it is scientific, however, a piece of scientific evidence does not necessarily mean the truth. Since it is possible that a DNA test is wrong. In 2005, Mitt Romney took approached forensic evidence without taking into account the different constraints in the disciplines. Indeed, he only looked at it in the legal system, as they are the truth without any doubt. Thus, he decided to reintroduce a bill on relegalize death penalty in Massachusetts, considering that scientific evidence will prevent every wrong convcitions and did not consider any margin of error

Looks good. I like the way you wrote it better on the actual user page which is good. Thanks for your contribution!

Law and Crime
@Uclqjh0 and @hudsonvalley12, looks like we all got similar topics! should we make a general entry for crime/law related paragraphs and have subunits within it? some of our ideas overlap, we could rewrite a more compact version of all 3 of our articles. here is my proposition: Hey! This is a good idea! However, I am thinking about moving my essay to the truth sandbox as I think that approaching this topic by talking about the truth would be more relevant. I have to think about how I can turn it so nothing sure yet. I will let you know asap. But thank you for bringing that up, if I don't move it, this would be an excellent idea!! Hey! Good idea, I was just telling myself that when I saw yours. Should we have a main Law category then?

Hey, I went ahead and created the main category! Let me know what you think.

Evidence In Law

Law is a discipline based on evidence and truth. However, often, when it comes to truth, everyone has a different perspective and we quickly come to the conclusion that truth is not a monopole: similarly, to Schrödinger’s cat in physics, truth in law can take different forms and there can be multiple truths. This is why evidence is so important in law to support an argument. In front of a court, evidence can take the form of a testimony, an exhibit, a documentary material or a demonstrative evidence. [28]

What can be used as evidence in a court:

'''Testimony: ''' According to USLegal, “A testimony is a statement made in a legal proceeding or legislative hearing by a witness while under oath”. [29]. Here, a testimony is considered as an acceptable evidence in law in a certain situation that is defined and has prerequisites: it is made by a witness and while under oath. However, “testimony in the form of opinions or conclusions cannot be received, except from experts” [30], showing that law requires certain criteria to qualify a fact as “evidence” in the court room.

Eyewitnesses in court: how memory can be altered and create inaccurate evidences?

One of the key kind of evidence in law is eyewitnessed evidence. However, it has been argued for over a century that this type of evidence is not always reliable in court.[53] Indeed, it is known that when a memory is revisited, emotions among other factors play a big part in its reconstruction, especially in its alteration. This can lead to inaccurate accusations during a trial. So should an uncertain process such as revisiting memory, influenced by many different factors, be able to choose someone's fate for the rest of its life?

In fact, due to wrong testimonies in the United States, about 375 prisoners spent on average 14 years in prison for an accusation that was proven wrong by a DNA test. [54] However, in the judiciary system, eyewitnesses are considered very reliable. Most neuroscientists agreed “that memory is encoded in the patterns of synaptic connectivity between neurons”. This synaptic connection can be altered and thus shape future testimonies. Furthermore, there is the LTD (Long-term depression), a phenomenon that reduces neural synapses efficiency. Such a phenomenon can damage memory. [55]. This occurs during a simulation of the synapsis whenever someone is working with their memory, and lead to an improvement of the connection, thus the memory, but also to a deterioration of the connection. [56] Moreover, in others scenario, when stress occurs, which is very common when individuals witness a crime, it can release hormones, such as epinephrine or cortisol during the arousal. And it has been shown that during a high arousal stage, “memory encoding may be enhanced or impaired depending on the person's individual stress response.” [57].

Additionally, there is among many others bias such as the cross-race bias, when it comes to identifying someone from a different race, humans tend to struggle more and make the testimony less reliable and for instance, it is easier for us to recognize a face from our race. [58] Another alteration of the memory is when someone is exposed to confusing information. This could alternate someone’s original memory, but at different degree depending on the person (being exposed to a picture of someone’s that was not the guilty one, police asking rhetoric questions…) [59] Even though it is not possible at the moment to get into someone memory, it is essential to acknowledge that human’s memory is not fully reliable and therefore it is key that judges balance the weight they put into eyewitnessed evidence when making their final decision.  Exhibit:

An exhibit is “a document or object (including a photograph) introduced as evidence during a trial (copy of a paper attached to a pleading, any legal paper filed in a lawsuit, declaration, affidavit, or other document, which is referred to and incorporated into the main document”. [31]. Again, there are strict criteria as to what counts as evidence and what does not. For example: secondary evidence as to the content or intent of writings cannot be received. [32]

Documentary material or Demonstrative evidence:

“The term documentary materials is defined by 44 USCS § 2201 as all books, correspondence, memorandums, documents, papers, pamphlets, works of art, models, pictures, photographs, plats, maps, films, and motion pictures, including, but not limited to, audio, audiovisual, or other electronic or mechanical recordation’s”. [33]

Forensic Evidence In Criminology:

Evidence can be quite delicate to define: what makes something good enough to prove a point? What is proof based on: facts, knowledge, observation, or a bit of everything? Either way, evidence has become crucial in supporting claims, advancing research, and problem solving. In the case of criminology, evidence can be under several forms: forensic evidence, expert evidence, circumstantial evidence, direct evidence, and primary and secondary evidence. Criminology is a discipline that englobes the scientific study of crime and criminal behavior: therefore, evidence is a pillar of this discipline. Specifically focusing on forensic evidence, obtained through scientific methods such as toxicology, ballistics, blood tests, fingerprints, anthropometry, maturation, and DNA tests, we can understand part of the role of evidence in this discipline.

Forensic evidence is critical: it helps determine the innocence or guiltiness of a person in a court case. Some evidence can be undisputable, and can allow the certainty of specific facts. Other pieces of evidence can be insufficient, and arguments can not be based solely on the information brought by the evidence. In the court of law, the analysis of forensic evidence is used to establish facts on the situation. However, there also exists evidence tampering or faulty results, so it is also up to the involved professionals to examine and determine if the evidence can be used as real proof or fact.

In the past 40 years, forensic evidence has greatly advanced with the development of technology and new techniques. Today, many new tools are still being developed, such as drones which allow 3D representations of crime scenes or accidents, leading up to a future with more and more accurate evidence.

Hence, by creating strict rules, it ensures that the term “evidence” in law is specific which promotes its importance and utility in front of a court. This is important as for example: hearsay evidence cannot be received as evidence under this title in front of a court. [34]. Hence, we see that depending on the discipline, evidence has a certain level of exclusivity and sets of rules that apply to reach the appellation of evidence.

Bascrzm (discuss • contribs)

To the author of "The Issue of Personal Diary Entries as Evidence in History",

My opinion is that underlining and putting text in bold is not adequate when trying to write formally and objectively even if the purpose is to emphasise a segment. I've also never seen this on Wikipedia articles. Perhaps I am wrong, what do you think? Icloneseashells (discuss • contribs) 15:35, 25 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi. Yes, thank you, a reasonable observation. I have seen on some articles that words have been put in bold, but, yes, you are true about underlining. Thank you! Hellllothere (discuss • contribs) 23:05, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

To the author of Evidence of History,

I have read your article and I enjoyed it a lot. Whilst reading it, I came up with a new idea about which I could write within your section. Could I add a small paragraph about examples, when, in the discipline of history, there has been a misunderstanding and thereby misinterpretation of evidence (and write about the outcomes of that)? Hellllothere (discuss • contribs) 23:10, 18 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi. I think it would be a great addition! Thank you! Icloneseashells (discuss • contribs) 10:45, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

To the author of "Evidence of History" (again): 

Hi, since our contributions in this sandbox are about similar topics, but your is about a evidence of history as whole (rather than mine - issue with one particular type of evidence), I switched your contribution to the top and put mine right after yours, since, in my opinion, it would make a more comfortable transition for the reader! Would that be okay for you? :) Hellllothere (discuss • contribs) 10:24, 09 November 2020 (UTC)

Evidence based practice in interdisciplinary healthcare suggestions
Dear writer of Evidence based practice in interdisciplinary healthcare, As the writer of Evidence in medicine using the example of homeopathy I have realised that we have very similar themes. I was therefore wondering If we could somehow merge them together? Maybe I could move my contribution to yours as a complement to conflicts in the used of EBM. Let me know what you think... 128.86.177.101 (discuss) 20:42, 8 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi, thanks for the suggestion! Yes, I think that it would be a great idea to include homeopathy as an example of conflict in interdisciplinary healthcare. Would you like to make the edits, or should I? Onchesilbeach (discuss • contribs) 16:33, 9 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Hello! I have added my section!Romarinlavende (discuss • contribs) 10:35, 10 November 2020 (UTC)


 * Hi, thank you for adding your section! I think it is a really good example of conflicts in evidence. I have made a few edits to avoid any repetition e.g. definition of EBM, and to tie it in with the rest of the section. I just noticed that a few of the citations are links to wikipedia pages, would it be possible to find other sources for this information? Onchesilbeach (discuss • contribs) 11:52, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Evidence in Medicine - possible addition to help illustrate argument
To the writer of Evidence in Medicine,

I have just read your contribution and found it very interesting to think about the evidence for homeopathy. I like the ending with the argument for qualitative evidence to be used in evidence-based medicine, but was thinking maybe you could add some of the reasons people have against using qualitative evidence? e.g. some of the issues/discrepancies in collecting this data. As you have put forward a very convincing argument for use of qualitative evidence, this might help to illustrate why is it not already the most commonplace form of evidence.

Hope this makes sense :)


 * Hi! Thank you for your comments on my contributions (they make perfect sense). I am working on incorporating your example it with the difficulties of data collections in homeopathy and other CAM. 128.86.177.101 (discuss) 20:36, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

To the author of The Limitations of Using Extrapolated Data as Evidence,

Great idea in using the example of extrapolation! Maybe you could add to the implications of using extrapolation as evidence in biology (the discipline you describe with your example) if (as you stated) evidence formed from extrapolation is not 100% reliable, what does this mean for the discipline? How does it impact final results? could it have ethical consequences as an erroneous prescription could affect a human life? I thought this would be a good addition as it gives a bit of a deeper insight. I also found it very interesting to look at extrapolation in the social sciences such as economics and how trends and extrapolation are used to make economic assumptions. Although his might not fit in your sandbox due to it not being within the discipline of biology, I thought it would be a good extra example and something interesting to think about (even if it is not included)!
 * I think that it's really interesting to consider the implications surrounding the discipline as a whole, although extrapolation is usually used in specific experiments where it is unavoidable i.e. not possible to gather data empirically. I think extrapolation in the social sciences would be a great topic to discuss, it could even end up as its own paragraph! Blacklipstick (discuss • contribs) 13:10, 27 October 2020 (UTC)

From 11er467va to the author of The Limitations of Using Extrapolated Data as Evidence

As is written above, extrapolation is such a fitting idea for this week's concept! I just noticed you wrote 'scientific proof' rather than 'scientific evidence', which you may want to change as 'proving' anything in science is generally seen as not possible and so 'proof' not appropriate terminology.
 * Thanks so much for pointing out that technicality, I'll fix that Blacklipstick (discuss • contribs) 22:18, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

To the writer of Eye Witnesses in court:

I think including research or theories that show the argued unreliableness of Eye Witness testimony might help support your arguments or even develop them. I was researching and came across the idea of reconstructive memory in Bartletts theory where he researched memory and how stories are recalled (Loftus E.F., Palmer J.C. (1996) Eyewitness Testimony. In: Introducing Psychological Research. Palgrave, London.(Loftus E, Palmer J. Eyewitness Testimony. Introducing Psychological Research. 1996;:305-309.), many link this to the idea of eye witness testimony and I therefore thought it might be useful for your research. (he also did experiments to prove test this as he was a psychologists, it might also be interesting to look into that in order to observe the moulding effects of memory when recalling it. I thought it might help support your argument or be interesting in relation to your research. I hope this is useful!

Thank you for that! I will have a look!! Also if you want to add something feel free! Hey, thank you for that! I will look it up

I added a small section, I didn’t fully explain the research as your text is already lengthy and therefore I felt like adding a full explanation of research would be too much. I explained the main finding of the research by stating how leading questions can alter memory and therefore influence eye witness testimony, i hope this makes sense and is understandable! If not please tell me and i can change it to however you feel will fit your text best.

To the writer of Evidence in medicine: example of homeopathy: I feel your sentence that includes " . . a placebo effect or an actual effective method . . " suggests that placebo treatments don't have an impact on a patient, but they actually can. Blacklipstick (discuss • contribs) 22:57, 2 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Another thought: Since there is scientific evidence that placebos can actually trigger genuine physical/psychological changes in the body, would that (to a certain extent) validate the use of CAM? Blacklipstick (discuss • contribs) 22:59, 2 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi ! I had not seen your contribution earlier as it wasn't very clearly stated... (1) I have edited out this sentence anyway but what I meant was people would either accuse homeopathy to have a mere placebo effect (in which case it would be nothing new brought to medicine) OR it could be more than this and be official recognised as a concrete medical branch. (2)Placebo affects are different from an actual medical branch whereas CAM are a type of medicine.(from my point of view anyway) Romarinlavende (discuss • contribs) 11:04, 10 November 2020 (UTC)


 * From 11er467va to the author of 'The Issue of Personal Diary Entries as Evidence in History'

I really like that you've used diary entries to illustrate the issue with evidence in history - I have always felt they could be problematic if considered entirely factual!The only thing I did notice were some issues relating to grammar, semantics and register which could perhaps be revised to made the contribution even better. You could change 'past' to 'historically' in the first paragraph to sound more professional, change 'personal diary entries' to 'journaling is considered common practice', add 'the' before 'context', change the 'and' at the beginning of the parentheses to 'with the main aim...', remove the 'the' before 'academia', making the content of the second set of parentheses within that sentence a bit more clear (could split into two sentences perhaps?), removing the comma before 'historians' at the end of the paragraph, and add an 'of' in 'history of academia'. I really hope I haven't offended with these revisions - they are just suggestions! The final part where you use a quote from Paperno is striking and the concluding sentence really concise and astute!
 * Hi, thank you very much for these suggestions!! They are very valuable and I will certainly look into enhancing my text and making it more academically appealing! Thank you once again! :) Hellllothere (discuss • contribs) 10:03, 09 November 2020 (UTC)

To the author of Experiments as Scientific and Social Evidence
Hey! I really enjoy your topic. I have added a little bit of structure to your paragraph, by adding subtitles to separate the part about scientific experiments from the one about social experiments! I have also changed the structure of a few sentences and grammar in the part about a social experiment, and expanded on the history of it - I have described one of the earliest known social experiments. What is more, I have added a few sentences about what methods are used to assure the validity of social experiments! I think it is worth elaborating on! Of course, It is just a suggestion.

I also think it could be worth to add some references next to the paragraph about the Industrial Revolution, Renaissance, and Muslim philosophers!

--Dearenemy (discuss • contribs) 17:33, 10 November 2020 (UTC)