How confident are you about various so called facts? (page 15)

slimboyfat

Although I don't know for sure, I doubt a decapitated person has ever survived. But should we rule out even the possibility of it happening? Why?

LoveUniHateExams

I doubt a decapitated person has ever survived - this is correct, there are no instances of a decapitated person surviving the event.

So, would you answer "0%" to my question?

LoveUniHateExams

Sorry, 100% in answer to my question!

But should we rule out even the possibility of it happening? Why?

I'm not ruling out the slim chance of it happening but until it does I say that I'm 100% certain that decapitation of humans results in death to the victim.

slimboyfat

100% tends to rule something out, clearly.

LoveUniHateExams

But the onus isn't on me to rule out/not rule out the possibility that heads can be cryogenically frozen and subsequently revived.

The onus is on scientists to develop this technology! Until that happens my 100% seems reasonable, don't you think? Besides, I could revise it at a later date, if the technology is forthcoming.

So, what % would you give in answer to my question?

Xanthippe

19. Decapitation always results in death to the victim.
I'm 100% certain of this fact. I've seen decapitation footage and they all end up dead. come across no evidence that someone has survived being decapitated.
Slimboyfat and everyone else, please respond.

The other day I actually came across the source of the phrase running around like a headless chicken. Now I would have said that was bollocks a while back.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_the_Headless_Chicken

Simon

100% tends to rule something out, clearly.

No, it just means that is someone's current level of confidence given the current evidence. Whether someone will change their view if new evidence is discovered is a completely different thing - that is dogmatism. You keep confusing the two things.

It's rare for a rational person to be so confident of something there isn't a lot of compelling evidence for (that is also meaningful or of consequence). Religious belief is an example where people are 100% confident of something for which they have zero evidence. Of course it's not really confidence in this case, it's delusion.

I am 100% confident that Amelia Earhart ditched into the sea. But does it matter? Probably not - that's why I don't mind having confidence in something that there isn't much evidence for. It's just most likely by far. But if someone found her plane on an island somewhere then I'd be completely willing to change my opinion.

For things that do matter like cigarettes and cancer or fossil fuels and climate change or the exact spherical-ness of the earth ... a 100% confidence level is unlikely to be misplaced or reversed because most of the new discoveries don't contradict the existing knowledge, they just refine and augment it.

So different confidence levels for different reasons and high confidence doesn't rule anything out.

clearly.

Simon

BTW: The headless chicken wasn't a brainless chicken - it was a freak accident that left the chicken's motor-control intact and didn't kill it (due to a blood clot). This is an example of misleading evidence - calling it "headless" makes you assume it had no head and therefore no brain but 'faceless chicken' probably wouldn't have brought in the crowds.

I'm still 100% confident with the idea that decapitation causes death even if a freak incident makes it appear otherwise.

Xanthippe

I know Simon I read the article before I posted it.

This is an example of misleading evidence

Crikey, sorry Sir, I got my essay in on time at least. Slim is having fun and I was posting in the same spirit.

Simon

Sorry, I wasn't saying you were using it to be misleading, just that is what it would be in the context of that question.

How confident are you about various so called facts?

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