🧵 Untitled Thread

Anonymous at Mon, 8 Apr 2024 08:16:04 UTC No. 16118300

At least one of the following statements must be true, but they can also not both be true:

>1. "The plural of anecdote is data."
>2. "The plural of anecdote is not data."

Which is it, and why? If anecdotes are data, can anyone prove anything by just saying it? How does the existence of lies play into it if anecdotes are data? And if they are not data, how can we know anything about the human mind at all? Beliefs, attitudes, moods, feelings, mental events. Even neuroscience relies on anecdotes, people reporting about their mental states while they are observing associated brain states, and so forth. Indeed, if anecdotes are not data, we can not even know that people hallucinate when they take LSD, because their anecdotal report that they do is not data, it is not information about reality in any way, shape, or form if anecdotes are categorically not data.

So whatever is the case, it seems like a paradox. Have the scientists or the philosophers of science figured this out yet?