Am I an Elf? Is Being an Elf the Most Significant Cause of Being an Elf? A Critique of Crime Science and Laycock’s Mistake
Transcript of a mini-lecture lecture by Professor JoeKing
To provide an example of what makes good and bad explanations for observed phenomena, let’s consider my own pointy ears.
It is not a good explanation for my having pointy ears for me to say: “It is because I am a non-human creature called an elf; and that I’m an elf because elves have pointy ears, I have pointy ears. And that you can’t prove, therefore, that it’s not true that I’m an elf.”
If I want to make a convincing case that I am an elf, rather than a human, then it is for me as the person (or elf) making such a claim who has the obligation to establish, on the basis of testable evidence, that having pointy ears makes me distinguishable from humans.
If I can argue successfully that some kind of otherwise explainable and significant difference between myself and humans makes me non-human then I’ve established a sound hypothesis that I am of a different species from humans. Next, I could set about fitting myself into some kind of existing or new classification framework – based on observation to claim what it is then that I am.
For example, I might refer to some prior posited elf theory that states that elves have magic powers, are only 6 inches tall and live under toadstools. If this is as good as any other description for my own species then it would not be irrational to try to fit myself into it. The alternative is to invent a new one or move on and choose another from what we already know from past observations of non human humanoids – perhaps I’m a Neanderthal or some other extinct humanoid found, previously, only in the fossil record?
Let’s stick with the elf question for now. The observable fact I am not 6 inches tall and don’t have magic powers, and that I actually live in a house and not under a toadstool means that my claim to be an elf, under the Blighton fairy story framework would be refuted and I’d probably be referred to a psychiatrist. In which case, to avoid being deemed delusional, I would next need to find some other refutable explanation if I wanted to continue to seek to establish that I am an elf and not human. If that was also refuted, then I’d need another one….and so on.
Bearing in mind that Laycock’s Mistake teaches us that evidence for what is and is not so does not end with observations and measurement. Let’s pause for a moment and consider how we might explain me and my pointed ears if things were different and I was in fact only 6 inches tall, had these pointy ears and actually had demonstrable magical powers.
Well, to avoid Laycock’s Mistake we’d need a theory that explained why I existed. This is because my weird existence cannot explain itself anymore than fossils can explain themselves or the existence of an opportunity for a crime explains why crime happens, or why an opportunity for an elf to occur explains what makes an elf exist. For example, we need
To date, you (we?) humans have been unsuccessful in disproving evolution, since the fossil record supports the theory. All of which suggests it’s a very good explanation for the origin of species. Fossils exist as a truism throughout the fossil record just as opportunity exists as a truism in all crimes. After all without an opportunity how could any crime have taken place. Unless we want to invoke magic of the supernatural as a plausible explanation then fossils are pretty much irrefutable, as is opportunity in crime. Hence, they are excellent observations of what exists but do nothing to explain why they exist. In short, neither are causes.
To explain the reason (cause) for my being 6 inches tall, having pointy ears and magical powers scientists might construct elf theories. One elf theory might incorporate Darwinism. And an alternative rival theory might hypothesize that elves are in fact aliens from another planet. Either way, to be potentially good explanations both theories would have to compete with one another and any other rivals by being (1) supported by evidence and (2) capable of being completely refuted; for example, by any future discovery of elves in the fossil record, or that elves have DNA significantly unlike anything else found on Earth or perhaps no DNA at all.
This is the sort of explanation that is required and is used to separate science from religious belief and other superstitions - such as unfounded beliefs in elves and fairies at the bottom of your garden – or that opportunity is a cause of crime.
So much for good explanations then. Lets’s briefly recap.
1. Good explanations are hard to vary, which means that you cannot conveniently alter them after experiments or observations simply to make them fit your data.
2. Good explanations are capable of being refuted.
3. The Crime Science explanation that opportunity is the most significant cause of crime is easy to vary and impossible to refute. Contrary to what Crime Scientists weirdly believe this makes it a bad explanation for crime - and a bad explanation for my being an elf.
4. The data cannot explain itself as a cause of itself in the form of a truism.
4. The data cannot explain itself as a cause of itself in the form of a truism.
5. I’m pretty sure that I’m probably not an elf, whatever you or I choose to believe, or what Crime Science would claim about my ears as a cause of me being one.
My next lecture will be on Cultural Criminology and fairies at the bottom of my garden.
Thanking you all for reading the transcript of my lecture.
Professor JoeKing
References
The Original Launching Crime Science – the weirdly deleted article – can be obtained free by emailing: crimescience@hotmail.com
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