Proof, schmoof!
Though I concede an overlap, I reject the notion that philosophy and science are the same. We expect philosophical propositions to be supported by reasonable argument. We expect scientific propositions to at least in theory be supportable by empirical evidence. So as a life long student of philosophy, I am always a bit pained when I see a reasonably argued philosophical proposition met with the simple demand "proof."
Generally, when a philosophical proposition becomes empirically provable it ceases to be philosophy and starts to become science. But without philosophy, there is no avenue for entertaining those ideas which we know are not yet empirically provable. In that context, the appropriate response to a reasonably argued philosophical proposition with which you disagree is to make a reasonable counter argument, not to demand "proof."
I think Einstein is an excellent example of overlap. Though he was educated as a physicist, he was a philosopher. His theories did not derive from empirical evidence obtained from a laboratory. He worked in a patent office. Instead, his theories were derived in large part from his obsessive nature, his interest in physics, and his almost child-like imagination. And when he published those theories, they were met with very strong opinions of agreement or disagreement. But they were not met with demands for "proof." Instead, most of the ensuing empirical "proof" regarding his theories was provided by scientists who developed clever experiments for that very purpose.
I get it that people who have grown up into or adopted a scientific disposition may be a bit uncomfortable with propositions that are not amenable to empirical confirmation. But by and large, those are the propositions that philosophy deals with. If you disagree with a reasonably argued philosophical proposition, then make a reasonable counter argument. But do not demand "proof."
I am done now.
Generally, when a philosophical proposition becomes empirically provable it ceases to be philosophy and starts to become science. But without philosophy, there is no avenue for entertaining those ideas which we know are not yet empirically provable. In that context, the appropriate response to a reasonably argued philosophical proposition with which you disagree is to make a reasonable counter argument, not to demand "proof."
I think Einstein is an excellent example of overlap. Though he was educated as a physicist, he was a philosopher. His theories did not derive from empirical evidence obtained from a laboratory. He worked in a patent office. Instead, his theories were derived in large part from his obsessive nature, his interest in physics, and his almost child-like imagination. And when he published those theories, they were met with very strong opinions of agreement or disagreement. But they were not met with demands for "proof." Instead, most of the ensuing empirical "proof" regarding his theories was provided by scientists who developed clever experiments for that very purpose.
I get it that people who have grown up into or adopted a scientific disposition may be a bit uncomfortable with propositions that are not amenable to empirical confirmation. But by and large, those are the propositions that philosophy deals with. If you disagree with a reasonably argued philosophical proposition, then make a reasonable counter argument. But do not demand "proof."
I am done now.
Comments (69)
As for metaphysics, of course it can't be proven that one metaphysics is true, and the others are false, because, for one thing, most are designed to unfalsifiably predict the same world and observations.
But some principles that apply to science also apply to metaphysics:
Definitions should be explicit, and consistently used.
A need for assumptions and one or more brute-facts discredits a metaphysics.
...as do unverifiability and unfalsifiability.
It doesn't prove it false, but it discredits it.
For example, Materialism doesn't hold up well by those standards.
My uncontroversial metaphysics does.
Michael Ossipoff
.
How are you defining empirical evidence? Isn't the rational method of philosophy just like the rational method of science in that one puts forward some reasonable general concept and then suggest that these kinds of particular consequences will serve as the truth-makers?
Science defines itself more by narrowing its domain to the physical or natural - speculative generalisations that might actually get cashed out in terms of perceptible particular consequences.
Or indeed, being more rigorous, science prizes mathematically framed conceptions in which the particulars are now numbers read off dials. Philosophy is happy with actual perceptions - what you might think you see, hear, touch and feel. Even a sense of "hey that is correct" - a psychological registering of a jolt of certainty - counts as the empirical validation for the reasonableness of some proposition.
But science is different in reducing the scope of the empirical to acts of measurement - numbers read off dials.
Sure we still need our eyes to do that. But epistemically, which of these activities are more withdrawn from concrete claims about the world, more reliant on modelled conceptions of what is the case?
The good old rational vs empirical divide soon breaks down on closer examination. Science is different largely due to the degree it reduces the empirical to an almost entirely idealist or conceptualised basis. Philosophy is either a case of anything goes - a form of cultural self-expression like poetry. Or where it gets rigorous itself, a more general polishing up of the habits of logical and critical thinking.
The ability to make well-formed propositions - that can be tested even in everyday life without instruments and experiments - is still a generally useful educated skill.
I suspect mostly the same as you. Amenable to some form of measurement resulting from replicable procedures. And as empirically minded as the Greeks may have been, nobody ever expected Plato to provide empirical evidence of his ontological theories.
I want to start an argument obviously. That is going to be hard if you won't disagree. :)
Yes. The rational method of philosophy and science share the same procedures for establishing propositions. However, the scientific approach rejects as non-scientific any and every proposition which is not at least in theory amenable to scientific proof. Philosophy does not do the same.
And unlike philosophy and with the possible exception of QM, the rational method of philosophy is not the only method of philosophy. Please see Thus Spake Zarathustra by F.W. Nietzsche.
In some ways, the rationale method of philosophy is continually over thrown yet always makes a comeback. it is the Freddie Kreuger of philosophical methods.
Fair enough. I'm reacting mostly from the point of view that sees a common method to what we mean by "rational thought".
CS Peirce in particular pinned it down as the three steps of abductive hypothesis, deductive reasoning and inductive confirmation. So creative leaps, formal logical expression, then a checking against reality ... whatever that then means. (Pragmatism being clear what it means, and science being distinctive in following that on the whole.)
Quoting Arne
Seems like we are too much on the same page. Sigh.
(It won't last.)
While I agree with the gist of this - there is a conspicuous philosophical backbone in Einstein's theories - Einstein was not a metaphysician working in some rarefied abstract sphere. He was very well aware of contemporary developments in science, and his first major works were motivated by specific problems in physics, both experimental (the Brownian motion, the photoelectric effect) and theoretical (Maxwell's electrodynamics and its apparent inconsistency with the relativity of speed, the ultraviolet catastrophe). Arguably, his General Relativity was motivated more by philosophical considerations than any specific problems known at that time.
I conceded the overlap in my first sentence. My experience tells me that those interested in philosophy are more likely to be aware of developments in science than the average person and that those interested in science are more likely to be aware of the history of philosophy than the average person.
Most philosophy is not data drive while some is. Most science is data driven while some is not. And that matters when discussing science and that matters when discussing philosophy.
And besides, we all know the person demanding "proof" rarely makes such demands regarding ideas they agree with. In that sense, it is a form a fallacious reasoning that relieves the person making the demand of their philosophical duty to make a counter argument and to actually give some thought to ideas they do not like.
It is fallacious in the sense the it's motivation is to suggest that the argument being made is to be dismissed for reasons that have nothing to do with the soundness of the argument. And that is anti-philosophical.
I disagree.
You couldn't be more WRONG!!
Starting an argument with me is as easy as riding a bicycle.
And when I knock you off of that bicycle, you need to just back on keep going until I knock you off again.
I agree.
I am a research scientist though by education I am a lawyer. I work for a company who has acontract with the EPA. We assess and code scientific papers. Very of few of the papers meet our criteria for coding. There are very few papers rejected for lack of empirical proof. There are many papers rejected because there method is unsound. And most of those rejected as unsound contain sufficient empirical proof.
For me, I always considered the greatest common ground is the focus upon the nature of reality (philosophy?) and/or the reality of nature (science?).
By asking about the place of proof in philosophy, you have sort of answered your own question. But I would rephrase as what is philosophy's place in relation to scientific proof. And first and foremost, it is not philosophy's place to provide it. And for the most part, science adequately self polices itself regarding its own standards of proof.
And consistent with my OP, I assert it is philosophy's place to discuss when and where a demand for "proof" is reasonable, unreasonable, helpful, harmful, necessary, unnecessary, made in good faith, intended to obstruct, and so on. . .
Perhaps the thread will go in some of those directions.
I guess we will see.
I'm not a proponent of Scientism, but I am a passionate defender of it's right to be considered just as valid a philosophical position as any other, so I will try to make a defence of it here.
The problem comes down to philosophical statements about philosophy - meta-philosophy, my area of interest. What you're saying is that demanding proof of a philosophical statement is meaningless because it deals only with that realm which cannot be proven. This sounds perfectly sensible on the surface, but the problem arises in two main areas.
Firstly, the cry of "proof!" may well be levied in a philosophical argument, but what it often means is that the propositions has strayed into the territory of science. Consider as simple example of ordinary language philosophy. A counter-argument might run... "...but that's just not how we use the word 'x'". Here the ordinary language philosopher might either have cause to adapt their theory, but equally they might quite rightly cry "proof!". After all, language use is a thing in the real world, it can be measured. Dictionaries spend millions on research to work out that exact question, 'what does a word mean to the language users?', so a demand of proof to the counter-argument that the word is simply not used some particular way is not entirely unreasonable.
You can see how this extends in phenomenology, free-will, determinism, conciousness - in all these areas philosophers are very prone to making statements which rely on some empirical data which may or may not actually be the case, but is treated as if it is for the sake of the argument.
Second, there's the meta-position itself. Again, I think you might be misreading what the cry of "proof!" actually implies. In this second instance it's being used in the positivist sense that "if you cannot provide proof, then your statement is meaningless". Again, I wouldn't adopt this position myself, but I would defend it's right to be considered a valid position by the very token you're trying to use. On what grounds could you categorically dismiss the proposition that "all statements (except this one) about 'the way things are' without empirical proof of things actually being that way, are meaningless". You certainly couldn't dismiss it on the grounds of empirical evidence - you can't measure meaning. You could dismiss it as self-referential, but on what grounds can you categorically dismiss self-referential statements. The liar paradox, for example, can be solved for particular modalities (see Tarski) and that's a self-referential statement so they're not intrinsically impossible to analyse.
Basically, I think you mis-characterise Scientism. It's just saying that statements in public discourse about 'the way things are' should be empirically falsifiable. You may not agree, I certainly don't, but what you can't do is dismiss the position and yet still claim that those who hold it are unable to similarly dismiss other philosophical propositions as meaningless.
There’s no meaningful distinction between ‘propounding’ and ‘defending’.
Quoting Pseudonym
That’s what it must mean, for your argument to have any cogency. It’s the only argument you have.
Quoting Pseudonym
More double-talk. ‘I would say X, but X’.
Are you suggesting that you hold no positions to be valid yet not persuasive to you personally? That every position you hear must be categorised in those which you either wholeheartedly support and those which you deny outright? That really is a more dogmatic stance than I thought even you capable of.
Your third sentence says "What you're saying is that demanding proof of a philosophical statement is meaningless because it deals only with that realm which cannot be proven." Emphasis added.
1. At no point did I say it was meaningless. Instead, the more reasonable interpretation of my argument is that a demand for empirical "proof" is less likely (perhaps significantly so) to be valid within the realm of philosophy than in the realm of science. Consequently, there is reason to suspect the demand may be less meaningful in one realm than in another. So your claim that I said a demand for proof is meaningless is at best an unreasonable interpretation of my position.
2. And staying within just your third sentence. At no point did I say that philosophy deals "only" with propositions that cannot be proven. What I did say is "by and large" those are the types of statements with which philosophy deals.
I also went on to say to the effect that most of philosophy is not data driven though some is while most of science is data driven though some is not.. So even if you mistakenly interpreted me as meaning "only" when I clearly did not say only, such an interpretation is clearly unreasonable in light of what I actually said.
So we are only into your third sentence and you have offered two extreme terms to characterize my non-extreme position and you have offered two unreasonable interpretations of what I actually did say. As a result and with all due respect, would it be unreasonable for me to suspect that you may be trying to make my position appear more extreme than it is? I sure hope you are not doing that.
I'm not sure what my countering with the majority parts of your statements as opposed to the entirety has to do with the argument.
As I understand it, you are taking issue with people demanding proof of philosophical propositions, yes? So, I'm saying, of those situations you are taking issue with, many fall into one of two camps, both of which can actually be defended.
I haven't, to my knowledge, made any comment whatsoever about your view of the division between philosophy and science nor on the totality or otherwise of your definitions thereof.
So, if I understand this correctly, you're saying that some calls for proof may be less valid in philosophy than they would be in science. I think that's a fairly uncontroversial proposition, but I'm struggling to see then why you would be "always a bit pained when I see a reasonably argued philosophical proposition met with the simple demand "proof."", and entreat us "If you disagree with a reasonably argued philosophical proposition, then make a reasonable counter argument. But do not demand "proof."". These sound very unlike the conclusions one would draw simply from a realisation that some philosophical propositions do not lend themselves to proof. Surely the excersice here should be to take issue with each request for proof on its merits then, rather than damn the entire practice to purgatory.
You have said that you are always pained when you see a philosophical position met with a demand for proof. You have entreated us to "not demand proof", and when Wayfarer described you view as opposing the position "that philosophical views require scientific evidence" you responded affirmatively. Given this, and that the idea that "some philosophical propositions do not require empirical proof" is pretty much globally accepted already, I don't think is was entirely uncharitable of me to interpret your position as I did.
A demand for "proof" is not a counter argument to a reasonably argued philosophical proposition. Instead, it is a red herring and you know it.
Whereas arguing that "... it is a red herring and you know it" is a much more reasonable example of a counter argument?
No. It is a simplification of my thesis.
Going forward, there is no need for you to continue telling me what I am saying. I know what I am saying.
If you want to argue with what I say rather than what you say I am saying, feel free to do so.
But if you want to argue with what you say I am saying rather that with what I am saying, you will be arguing with yourself.
Have a good weekend.
I'm having great trouble understanding what it is you're saying. As far as I can gather from your recent post, your argument is that some philosophical proposition are not amenable to the demand for proof, yet some are. You also seem to be accusing those who make demands for proof of disingenuity. This is where I'm getting lost. If you agree with the proposition that some philosophical propositions are amenable to demands for proof (the second half of your first proposition), then you are in complete agreement so far with those you seem "pained" by. They too evidently believe that some philosophical propositions are amenable to demands for proof, namely the ones about which you are debating.
I can't help but wince a little every time I read something about proof in science in this thread. It's like the Scientific Method never happened.
I think you can safely assume that all parties are using the term 'proof' in the wider sense in which it is used in discourse rather than the narrower sense in philosophy of science. That's certainly how I've understood it in any case. I take it to mean simply that one should provide some measure of correspondence with repeatable inter-subjective sense data, not that one must provide the final and incontrovertible data that demonstrates something is the case.
You are free to read it as many times as you wish.
So you're claiming that those who respond to your argument by demanding proof are being disingenuous, but your own technique appears to be to simply write something and then refuse to explain it when pushed. I'm not sure I see the improvement.
No, that is not what I am saying.
It is the nature of the proposition that determines whether a demand for empirical "proof" is appropriate.
And a philosophical proposition is different than a scientific proposition.
As a result, applying criteria developed for evaluating scientific propositions to philosophical propositions is not a good idea.
No one would suggest we apply the criteria developed for evaluating music to evaluating pizza.
Has it occurred to you that I chose the word "demand" (as opposed to request) for a reason?
I am rarely bothered by a reasonable counter argument that raises the issue of empirical "proof" in regard to a reasonably argued philosophical proposition.
But yes, I am always pained when a reasonably argued philosophical proposition is met with a "demand" for empirical "proof."
Aren't you?
You can demand empirical proof as much as you like, you are never going to get it.
Quoting Arne
Because the methods of criticism available are different.
Have you got any examples of that?
I would say because the criteria of validity are different.
There are no criteria of validity in science.
And it is the example that motivated the OP.
There was a discussion this morning regarding what happens after we die.
I do not believe I participated in the discussion. If I did, it was tertiary.
One comment was to the effect:
that the soul is not a material thing so it could certainly live on after our material death.
that statement was met with the one word demand "proof!"
It just struck me as extremely rude to demand "proof!" when the person making the demand knew there was no such proof to be had and to thereby perfunctorily dismiss such a personal and intimate statement.
Can't philosophical propositions be supported by empirical evidence? Can't certain philosophical propositions be considered more reasonable--more likely to be correct--than others, based on empirical evidence? Can't certain philosophical positions reasonably be considered fatuous given empirical evidence?
Take solipsism, for example, or any philosophical position which maintains that what we encounter and interact with from moment to moment isn't "really real" or can't actually be determined, or that fabulous, ever-popular tree that falls without a sound. The evidence that other people and things exist beyond ourselves, the evidence that we constantly interact with use things for certain purposes, successfully construct buildings and roads, etc., hurt ourselves when we run into walls, would seem to make such philosophical propositions as "I am the only thing that exists" highly unlikely, and would seem to indicate that it's very probable that the things we constantly interact with have the characteristics we think they have.
Almost as if there is no such thing as the scientific method or controls or stuff like that.
I will let my boss know and we can all go home. Of course, we will to find new jobs. But whatever.
We code scientific research papers.
Most of them do meet our requirements.
One of the keywords for rejecting papers is CRITERIA.
And guess what that means?
That is why science split from philosophy in the first place. It was the place to go with those ideas amenable to empirical proof. Aristotle is not Plato and no one expected Plato to provide "proof." Plato was a philosopher. Aristotle was a philosopher very much interested in science. And the rest is history.
As for solipsism, there are few adherents and empirical evidence is not the reason.
my choosing the word "demand" was no accident.
very few fall into the camp of amenable to empirical "proof."
And none of mine do.
I leave to science the empirically provable.
That is their thing and they are good at.
I suppose a better term for what people are actually looking for (or should be looking for) is "evidence." Most of science and most of philosophy are just working with evidence which supports or weakens any given argument. Any good scientist or philosopher will admit that "proven" is just shorthand for "there is so much evidence for x that we can reasonably assume it is true."
However, both fields do sometimes work with "proof." Like math and logic actually often do prove their conclusions.
The OP was prompted by a discussion I was following about "what happens after you die." Someone commented to the effect "we do not know if the soul is a material thing. it could be that it lives on after the body dies."
The comment was met with the one word demand "proof!"
I was struck by the rudeness of the response in light of the personal and intimate nature of the comment.
Not only was the response rude, the person making the demand knew there would be no proof forthcoming.
It is anti-philosophical.
Why would anyone do that?
Science really can't work that way. Progress is made by finding problems with our theories and proposing solutions to these problems, not by certifying theories as true. Right now there is zero evidence that there is a problem with either quantum mechanics or general relativity. No one knows even how to perform an experiment to discover any problems with them, since both LHC and LIGO have failed to find one, but we know there IS a problem, and it has nothing to do with evidence.
What are these propositions? What is it that philosophy has "moved on" from that has been resolved by empirical evidence? I think the kind of epistemological/metaphysical issues I mentioned continue to be addressed to this day. There are those who still address the fascinating case of the pencil in the water glass, still maintain that we are "deceived" by our senses in such instances and therefore can't rely on them, and ponder whether we are in The Matrix or are brains in a vat.
And I understand that those who seriously consider solipsism don't do so because of empirical evidence, but the question I have whether the empirical evidence establishes solipsism is highly unlikely.
Note the recently created thread entitled "The Probability of Simulation."
Demanding proof of reliability of the senses one relies upon is a self revealing absurdity.
How do these people get to work in the morning?
So your proposition is now just that some people are quite rude?
How do you know that there is a problem? It makes no sense to say you know something without having a shred of evidence in favor thereof. You're simply failing to count the reasons we have to believe QM is flawed in someway as evidence.
Quoting Arne
Possibly because they had nothing else to say in favor of their own pet theory and people are pretty unwilling to admit defeat (especially around here) :wink:
Also, possibly, they were being rude about a legitimate concern that any such hypothesis should only be given credence when accompanied by at least a shred of evidence... but I also do not understand the need for rudeness if that is the case.
No. The issue is the criteria to be applied, if any, given the nature of the premise. I have little patience for people who demand their music taste like pizza.
How much time have you spent on Internet forums?
Quoting Ciceronianus the White
I often reflect on the broader implications of the meaning of 'empirical evidence'. What does it amount to, other than an argument be referenced by something that can be detected by the senses (or by scientific instruments, which amplify the senses)? Many times the demand for 'evidence' in regard to subjects such as the nature of personal identity, the nature of number, the nature of mind, and so on, amounts to an implicit requirement of this kind. Hence appeals to the science, to evolutionary psychology, neuro-science, and so on, as arbiters of any such claims. But already that is tending towards 'scientism'.
So, nowadays, the demand for something that is 'scientifically rational', really amounts to 'show me something material, tangible, measurable'. And that amounts to a kind of philosophical orientation, often implicit. What we talk of as 'real' has to be tangible, measurable, understable, at least in principle, by science - otherwise what are you talking about? (Which is basically what @Pseudonym is asking.)
Classical philosophy had very different criteria for what constitutes a 'rational proof'. Such arguments as the 'principle of sufficient reason', or Kant's transcendental arguments, cannot in principle be made subject to empirical validation. They're analyses of the nature of experience or of knowledge or of the implications of logic. But they also belong to a different cultural context than ours; ours is dominated by (often implicit) assumptions about what constitutes 'knowledge', the demand for empirical validation being one hallmark of that attitude.
It comes down to a 'way of being', and 'ways of being' are very hard things to talk about.
A couple of refs:
The Cultural Impact of Empiricism, Jacques Maritain
Science, Materialism and False Consciousness, Bas van Fraasen.
I have been on internet forums as long as there have been internet forums. And I have been in philosophy discussion groups since my days as a philosophy undergrad and that was before there were internet forums.
Here is the distinction I make:
If my proposition is not an empirical proposition, then do not demand empirical proof. Simply put, it makes no sense to demand proof that you know cannot be provided.
As for constitutes other kinds of proof, I do not care. And I do not care because they are gibberish and can all be boiled down to whether you have made a good argument.
If someone makes a good argument that I disagree with and I feel entitled to respond, I will make a counter argument and hopefully it will be good.
But demanding empirical proof in support of a non-empirical claim while you are heading out the door is the philosophical equivalent of flipping someone off because they do share your viewpoint. It is a red herring.
This ain't facebook.
Hey I’m totally in your camp. I was just surprised that you were surprised by the kinds of comments you were talking about.
Me too.
Though I think it angered me more than surprised me.
The extreme sensitivity of the subject matter, someone putting themselves out there with a personal and obviously non-empirical comment, and the one word response "proof!"
Maybe it was just a perfect storm.
Maybe I was hoping this was a better neighborhood.
And it probably is.
Then it's a matter of taste?
What are the reasons to believe QM is flawed?
And yes, there is no evidence that there is a problem with either QM or GR. The known problems are purely theoretical.
This is why I do not personally find Scientism compelling, but I do find it's diametric opposite offensive, hence my preference that it remain a valid world-view. What we "talk" of should, of course, remain unrestricted insofar as it does not risk harm to others, but in discussions about Scientism vs Philosophy, what's at stake is not circumscribing what can be "talked" about, it is is defining authority and authority (in a positive social environment) comes from agreement (think democracy).
We can only agree on that which can be measured. A measure is a scale in the shared world which we can go to to find agreement. It has absolutely nothing to do with materialism or physicalism, as primary world-views, those are just consequences.
Even if we took something as entirely material as the height of objects. If we had no external scale, no agreed on measurements of height, then it would not make sense to talk about height either, despite it being entirely material. There would be not point in me comparing the animal I've seen which I describe as "quite tall", to the one that my friend sees which he describes as "very tall". We can gain nothing useful from that exchange because neither of us has any idea how tall the other's animal actually is relative to our own internal experience.
So, that which is measured on some external, agreed upon scale, deriveds authority from the widespread agreement on that scale. A scientists who measures the speed of light in the widely agreed upon scale of kilometres per hour is inviting anyone else to measure the same thing on the same scale. He is not claiming personal authority to make pronouncements about the real world, we all agreed on the scale, it's publicly available (kilometres and hours, that is), so any proposition using it has a fair and just authority.
With Philosophical and theological propositions, this is not the case. A spiritual experience of one person cannot be measured on a publicly agreed on scale, so has no just authority. St Paul may well "talk" about his life experiences, but he cannot claim any more authority of spiritual matter than my Grandma because his experiences are not measurable by something which has widespread agreement. It is this sort of talk which offends me. "In Leviticus it says...", "the Buddha said...", Kant proves..., "Plato shows us that..." etc. None of these things have any just authority to be considered above any other simply because the standards by which they are shared are not widely agreed on. It's not that we can't "talk" about them, but that's not all we do is it? We "declare" things about them, we Pronounce things, we pay tax-payers money to further the study of them, we make laws about protecting those who believe in them. And that's just in the modern democratic countries. Elsewhere we make laws condemning people to death simply for opposing them, make laws which force people to follow what they say no matter how much unhappiness it brings them. It's a hell of a lot more than just "talking"
I think if you'd have started the OP with this, the discussion would have been very different.
Anyway, to analyse this particular exchange;
Firstly, the proposition was specifically about what we don't know and what "could" be the case, so any proof of such a claim would not be in the form of empirical evidence anyway. Proving that something "could" be the case is only a matter of demonstrating that there are no agreed on facts about the world which prevent it. So technically, this exchange has nothing to do with empirical evidence and I can see no reason to believe that the opponent meant empirical proof and not argumentative proof.
But let's say for the sake of discussion, that the claim was "a soul lives on after the body dies" (without the 'could be'. Then the person would be making a claim about the properties of an object (the soul) which they claim exists in the shared experience. In this case, a request (hopefully politely) for empirical proof would be entirely appropriate. The philosophical proposition here would have strayed into territory best covered by science. To use your analogy, it would the the proposer who was talking about pizza but measuring it by their musical judgement, the interlocutor is the one asking that pizza be measured by the taste of pizza.
I'm not speaking of validation or proof, but believe that all we think and do is grounded in the world as we're a part of it, and to the extent philosophical propositions are contrary to what we regularly encounter and interact with the fact we do so renders those propositions questionable.
Quoting Pseudonym
That is the only thing you ever say.
Well, there is actually research, from a psychiatrist by the name of Ian Stevenson, who held a privately-endowed chair at the University of Virginia, from 1967 until 2002. During this period, he conducted a research program on children who claimed to remember previous lives.
[quote=Wikipedia]He traveled extensively over a period of forty years, investigating three thousand cases of children around the world who claimed to remember past lives. His position was that certain phobias, philias, unusual abilities and illnesses could not be fully explained by heredity or the environment. He believed that reincarnation provided a third type of explanation.
Stevenson helped to found the Society for Scientific Exploration in 1982 and was the author of around three hundred papers and fourteen books on reincarnation, including Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation (1966) and European Cases of the Reincarnation Type (2003). His major work was the 2,268-page, two-volume Reincarnation and Biology: A Contribution to the Etiology of Birthmarks and Birth Defects (1997). This reported two hundred cases of birthmarks and birth defects that seemed to correspond in some way to a wound on the deceased person whose life the child recalled. He wrote a shorter version of the same research for the general reader, Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect (1997).[/quote]
In one such case
Now having discussed Stevenson on this and other forums previously, I expect that what you will say is that he must have been tendentious, or his methodology must have been flawed, or he was gullible in what he was prepared to believe. In any case, whatever the evidence, it can't be true. And if you read the Wikipedia entry on Stevenson, you will find ample support for this reaction to Stevenson. So you don't need to tell me that you will dismiss it out of hand - heard it all before.
Myself, I have, at least, an open mind. Recently there was a TV documentary on 'child prodigies' on ABC TV (Australia). One of them was a child pianist who had been admitted to the Julliard School of Music in New York (at 7, one of the youngest ever) . The piano teacher was interviewed, saying she recognised the precocity of this young girl. She said, 'every year when we audition, we have some kids who come in, who are 8-9 years old, they play at break-neck speed, they don't miss a single note. But they don't move you. ' [commentator] 'Simply memorising a skill is not good enough. For a child to be a prodigy, there has to be an additional quality'. [teacher] 'We know we can develop technique, but we can't develop a soul'.
Was this child the re-incarnation of a great pianist? I'm not claiming to know. Perhaps there is an 'archetypical realm' of piano genius which takes form (or incarnates) in such children. But whatever it is, I'm sure it nothing that can be explained in terms that evolutionary biology, or science, will ever understand; not their ability, not how they got it, and, especially, what it means.