the difference between facts and opinions

Let’s make a distinction between facts and opinions. That man is causing global warming, or is not, is an opinion. It is the result of weighing facts in Ye Olde crucible, and figuring out what seems more logical. That CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing exponentially is a fact, as is that throughout history the temp of the earth has varied considerably. You can argue with me that global warming is not being caused by man, but not about the rate of CO2 in the atmosphere, and I can argue against your saying it is not, but I can’t deny that the earth has gone through many temp variations.

Actually I am having a similar email argument right now with one of our classmates. So far we are just talking about CO2 and temps, but at some point I know that we are going to get to the 9 out of 10 scientists believe global warming is caused by man factor, and then we are going to get to this thing where this person says this and the other person says that.

This is what I said in a letter to him:

This is an argument I often have with Beagles, where he says some people believe this and some people believe that, and he thinks that makes the two sides equal and he is justified in choosing one side or the other as he chooses. I think you need to examine both arguments and see which is most logical, and also examine the credentials of the people making the arguments and I generally rate the more educated higher, but this can lead into some fuzzy territory. Science has gotten so much bigger than it was in the days when an English gentleman scientist could discover things in his basement, that you can’t examine this issues for yourself, and at some point you believe something because somebody you respect says so, and at that point you are taking something on faith, which is never good.

So basically I am saying that if two people have two different opinions, and isn’t that always the case, then you weigh the facts and the reasoning of both and one will probably outweigh the other. If that fails, or maybe as sort of a shorthand, you can judge the credentials of both and again one will outweigh the others.

As far as having to judge our objective realities by our subjective senses, well that is a whole other story. I think if we are going to have discussions with other people we have to accept objective reality, on faith as you say, but it almost never devolves that somebody says there is a telephone pole in the middle of your house and you don’t see one.

In the case of states, or maybe municipalities that have tightened their gun control, if you knew the names of the states or municipalities, or where you had read this, we could look it up, and there it would be a hard little fact that we would both have to agree on.

I assume you know that the fact that somebody says something on the internet means absolutely nothing. Look, here I am on the internet, and I say there is a giant telephone pole for space aliens in the middle of Beaglesonia. Now what if I say here is a satellite image of the pole in the middle of Beaglesonia, and Beagles has said on his blog that little green guys are taking his truck for joy rides?

Well here are a couple things we can check, we can go to Google Earth and see if that pole is really there, and we can go to Beagle’s blog and see if he actually said that. Of course the fact that it was on Beagle’s blog doesn’t do much to verify the fact, but if we learn that he is a prof at the university that will give more credence to the existence of the pole than if we learn he is an inmate in the nut house.

I think it wouldn’t be too much trouble to look up whether the murder rate in Michigan has gone up or down since concealed carry, but if you are not going to look it up neither am I. But I am going to concede you the point. I was one of the antis when it first started going through the states who thought that murder rates would soar, and I have indeed been proven wrong.

I’m equally sure it has not gone down. Okay just to practice what I preach I did go to the Google on this, mostly I got pro gun sites and mostly wherever the murder rate has gone down they claimed it was because of concealed carry, and where it has gone up, well they ignored those cases. Everybody has concealed carry now, and the murder rate has not gone up or down by much.