Black swans and blue tarantulas: 'Without' and 'despite' are not the same<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"To believe that which has been disproved is always wrong. To believe that which cannot be proved could be wrong, but it also could be right. The distinction is not subtle, and it's rather important.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2012\/12\/10\/black-swans-and-blue-tarantulas-without-and-despite-are-not-the-same\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Black swans and blue tarantulas: 'Without' and 'despite' are not the same\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"To believe that which has been disproved is always wrong. To believe that which cannot be proved could be wrong, but it also could be right. The distinction is not subtle, and it's rather important.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2012\/12\/10\/black-swans-and-blue-tarantulas-without-and-despite-are-not-the-same\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"slacktivist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-12-10T20:10:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/files\/2012\/12\/Sazima.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2012\/12\/10\/black-swans-and-blue-tarantulas-without-and-despite-are-not-the-same\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2012\/12\/10\/black-swans-and-blue-tarantulas-without-and-despite-are-not-the-same\/\",\"name\":\"Black swans and blue tarantulas: 'Without' and 'despite' are not the same\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2012-12-10T20:10:12+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2012-12-10T20:10:12+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\"},\"description\":\"To believe that which has been disproved is always wrong. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/\"}]}<\/script>\n","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Black swans and blue tarantulas: 'Without' and 'despite' are not the same","description":"To believe that which has been disproved is always wrong. To believe that which cannot be proved could be wrong, but it also could be right. 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Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. 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{"id":12078,"date":"2012-12-10T15:10:12","date_gmt":"2012-12-10T20:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=12078"},"modified":"2012-12-10T15:10:12","modified_gmt":"2012-12-10T20:10:12","slug":"black-swans-and-blue-tarantulas-without-and-despite-are-not-the-same","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2012\/12\/10\/black-swans-and-blue-tarantulas-without-and-despite-are-not-the-same\/","title":{"rendered":"Black swans and blue tarantulas: ‘Without’ and ‘despite’ are not the same"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Recently came across this quote from Aldous Huxley<\/a>: \u201cThe deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Baloney<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Believing in things contrary to evidence<\/em> is obviously far worse than believing in things despite a lack of evidence.<\/p>\n

$\"\"$ <\/a>To believe that which has been disproved is always wrong. To believe that which cannot be proved could be<\/em> wrong, but it also could be right<\/em>. The distinction is not subtle, and it\u2019s rather important.<\/p>\n

Before leaping to another round of theist\/atheist flame-wars over the distinction, keep in mind that this relates to many, many things other than God or religion. It is, for example, why the Fermi paradox<\/a> is not called \u201cFermi\u2019s Proof That We Are Alone in the Universe.\u201d Or why one cannot say there\u2019s no such thing as a black swan or a blue tarantula<\/a> based only on never having seen one.<\/p>\n

To believe that which has been disproved leads us to deny<\/em> evidence, and that\u2019s a Bad Thing. To believe in that which has not yet been proved or disproved leads us to seek evidence, and to follow wherever it leads. And that\u2019s a Good Thing.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m also not sure that \u201cbelieve\u201d means what Huxley thinks it means. It doesn\u2019t make sense to speak of believing<\/em> things with<\/em> evidence. If we have evidence for the belief, then there\u2019s little point in merely calling it belief. The evidence is what makes it knowledge.<\/em><\/p>\n

I believe<\/em> in God. But I do not\u00a0believe<\/em> that the Earth is 4.5 billion or so years old \u2014 I know<\/em> that.<\/p>\n

As RJS recently wrote<\/a> in response to Pat Robertson\u2019s surprisingly sensible comments on the age of the Earth: \u201cArguing for a young earth is as ineffective as arguing that F\u2260ma, that energy is not conserved, or that a ball thrown into the air will not fall along an easily calculated path.\u201d<\/p>\n

We could try to blur that distinction between belief and knowledge with some kind of sliding scale between, at one end, an utter leap of faith, and, at the other end, rock-solid certainty. But few of us really think absolute certainty is ever a feasible claim about anything. And in any case, there would still be some sort of threshold of sufficient<\/em> evidence below which one would still be committing Huxley\u2019s supposed sin against the human mind. We can\u2019t repair Huxley\u2019s maxim by changing \u201cto believe things without evidence\u201d to \u201cwithout enough<\/em> evidence.\u201d That\u2019s just kicking the can down the road.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo believe things without evidence,\u201d isn\u2019t necessarily wrong. Sometimes it\u2019s necessarily necessary.<\/p>\n

But to believe things contrary<\/em> to overwhelming evidence? Yes, that\u2019s a deep sin against the human mind.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"