Evidence

Is Religious Experience Evidence of an External Reality?

People report visions, sensed presences, unity, revelation and answered prayer across many religions. The experiences may be sincere and transformative while their causes remain uncertain.

Can a Sacred Text Prove Its Own Authority?

Sacred texts often present themselves, their teachings or their messengers as authoritative. The question is whether internal claims can establish authority without independent support.

Are Miracles Evidence, Coincidence or Misinterpretation?

A miracle is often understood as an event caused by supernatural or divine intervention. Before accepting that explanation, the event itself and the available alternatives must be examined carefully.

What Would Count as Evidence for a God?

The question is not whether any event can be described as evidence for a god, but whether the evidence is sufficiently specific, reliable and difficult to explain without the proposed divine being.

Can Faith Be a Reliable Method of Finding Truth?

Faith can mean trust based upon evidence, confidence despite uncertainty or belief without sufficient evidence. Whether it reliably finds truth depends upon which meaning is intended and whether errors can be detected.

Does the Age of a Belief Make It More Credible?

Ancient beliefs often command respect because generations have preserved them. However, long survival can result from tradition, authority, repetition and social identity as well as from reliable evidence.

How to Change Your Mind Without Feeling Defeated

People often experience changing their mind as losing an argument, betraying a group or admitting weakness. A truth-seeking approach treats revision as evidence that learning has occurred.

Why Personal Experience Is Powerful but Unreliable

Personal experience often carries greater emotional force than statistics or distant testimony. It can reveal genuine events, but it is limited by the observer's perspective and vulnerability to error.

How Memory Creates Events That Never Happened

People can remember events that did not happen or remember real events with important details changed. False memories do not necessarily involve dishonesty; they can arise through ordinary processes of reconstruction.

Can Eyewitness Testimony Be Trusted?

Eyewitness testimony can provide valuable evidence, but confidence and honesty do not guarantee accuracy. What a person noticed, remembered and later reported can be altered at several stages.

Why Extraordinary Claims Need Stronger Evidence

An extraordinary claim is not merely unusual or unpopular. It is a claim that would require major revision of well-supported knowledge or depends upon causes outside reliably observed experience.

How Much Evidence Should a Claim Require?

Not every claim needs the same amount of evidence. Everyday low-risk claims may reasonably be accepted provisionally, while extraordinary, consequential or highly specific claims require stronger and more independent support.

Bertrand Russell

Philosopher · 1872–1970 · Logic, philosophy, scepticism, public ethics

Bertrand Russell is important to Truth By Reason because he joined logic, scepticism, anti-dogmatism and public moral concern.

David Hume

Philosopher · 1711–1776 · Philosophy, scepticism, empiricism

David Hume is important to Truth By Reason because he challenged weak claims about miracles, causation, religion and certainty through sceptical and empirical reasoning.

Can something be true but unproven?

Yes. A claim can be true even before humans prove it. But until there is enough evidence, we should not treat it as established knowledge.

Is evolution a threat to religion?

Evolution is a threat to some literal religious claims about creation, but not necessarily to every form of religious belief. It depends on what the religion claims.

What is reality?

Reality is what exists or is true whether or not we want it to be so. But humans also experience personal, social, symbolic and imagined realities that must be carefully distinguished.

What is the difference between evidence and proof?

Evidence supports or weakens a claim. Proof is a stronger standard where the evidence is sufficient to justify accepting the claim as established for a given purpose.

Why Truth By Reason Uses Probability Rather Than False Certainty

Truth By Reason uses confidence and probability because many important claims are not honestly handled by pretending everything is either absolutely certain or completely unknowable.