9. THE ORIGINS OF CERTAINTY (1)

Now that we have examined the degrees of certitude, we will turn to the origins of certitude.  After all, it won’t do us any good to discuss doubts if we have no way of settling them. 

So, we last mentioned how ignorance gives way to doubt, doubt to suspicion and so forth.  What allows us to upgrade, say, doubt to suspicion?

Many years ago, I was passing through Dover, England, where, I was told by the tour guide, the only good places to eat at were two Chinese restaurants.  Let’s call them Chang’s Chow Fon and Eng’s Chow Fon.   Suppose I can put off eating for a bit, but not too long.  Short of eating in each restaurant in turn to decide where I should eat, how do I decide?

As a first approximation, I decide to judge them by appearances.  Suppose that I discover that Chang’s restaurant is obviously badly kept—the grass is knee-high, a window in front is broken, paint is peeling in giant flakes—and Eng’s has a neatly kept lawn, shining windows and an otherwise immaculate appearance.  For me, this decides where dinner will be. 

What’s happening in this story? 

I started off the evening in positive doubt, since the tour guide implicitly gave the two restaurants equally strong recommendations.  Figuratively speaking, the scales of judgment were level.  By finding out which one was more decently kept, I found something by which to tip the scales.  This something is evidence. 

Before we discuss the nature of evidence, we need to define the word claim:  a claim is any statement whose truth is in doubt.  If I say, “I should eat at the nicely kept Chinese restaurant,” that is a claim.  I can’t know which one offers better food until I have tried both, but the price of certainty—eating, say, the same dish at both restaurants—is too high a price for me to pay in terms of time, health and money. 

Many claims can be justified by experience and so become accepted as facts.  If I am ironing clothes, listening to music and using a fan, and suddenly everything goes dark, I claim that I tripped the circuit breaker.  When I go to the garage and find the relevant circuit breaker in the off position, my claim becomes a fact.

Other claims have a harder time becoming facts.  For instance, even if I ate at both restaurants, I might find that their dishes are equally good, so that I hesitate to regard either claim as fact.  Or I might find out that both restaurants have more than one cook, and the quality of your meal depends on which cook is on duty.  Or one chef is double-timing, and the quality of your meal depends only on the mood the chef is in and has nothing to do with the restaurant.  At any rate, the question When do I eat at both restaurants? becomes more useful than Which restaurant is better?

We may now turn back to evidence:  We define evidence as anything that confirms a claim.  If I make the claim to my poker pals that I cannot play poker anymore, I can corroborate that claim by showing them a bank statement which shows there is nothing in the vault.  I have verified that my claim is a fact.  This example shows how (as Rickaby says) evidence is the test of truth.¹   

We may now say that evidence is what we use to upgrade any level of certitude to a higher (or for that matter a lower) level.

The importance of the notion of evidence requires us to discuss it a little more next time.

ENDNOTES

1.  See John Rickaby, The First Principles of Knowledge, 4^th ed. (London:  Longmans, Green & Co., 1901), p. 222.