Normal

You misinterpret me. I'm not citing those examples as evidence, I'm citing those examples as side-effects to assuming the assertion "Human life is valuable" is true, which is what veridical worth is all about.

bd-from-kg

Sorry, a near-duplication of Clutch's post! (Except that we don't agree, apparently, about what "Human life is valuable" is usually taken to mean.)

Clutch, I'll answer your posts when I get back from the pool. (Swimming is good fun. Now there's a meaningful statement that's immune to disproof!)

Clutch

Hence I am right. Read the quote, for pete's sake. It does not say "not veridical". It says "veridically worthless" -- meaning, plausibly, lacking the utility that truth typically possesses. Viz, explanatory and predictive power.

Clutch

Well, gosh. I did just say this.

In the sense I defined, you could test the claim by surveying extant attitudes about human life.
Yes, that's what 'testable' means. Oh, you mean reasonable testability!

I see. As in, testable without doing any work, without looking into anything, without measuring or examining any data?

I realize now that "4 out of 5 dentists advise a flouride toothpaste" is immune to reasonable disproof as well. After all, you'd have to survey them to find out. How unreasonable!

Clutch

bd,Not raving but drowning? Well, if you mean, "All people find swimming to be good fun", then it's meaningful and testable. And false. If you mean, "I, bd, find swimming to be good fun", then again it's meaningful and testable. And, given the context, likely to be true.

If you mean, "Swimming is good fun, quite apart from how I or anyone else finds it or could find it", then its coherence is doubtful; we would be right to press you on your grasp of the concept FUN.

Normal

You're right as long as you don't let silly things like definitions of words get in the way.

Explanatory and predictive are not synonyms either, and if you're curious about the explanatory power of "I think therefore I am", read Decartes' meditations.

Normal

Your method of testability fails for a number of reasons. Most glaringly, asking dentists about the superiorty of a toothpaste is radically different then asking people if human life has value. 4 out of 5 dentists claiming Flouride is superior is evidence of Flouride's superiority, but 4 out of 5 people denying the value of human life does not mean human life lacks value. Dentists have an objective evaluation in mind, while the people you ask about the value of life with have a subjective basis, making the assertion "Human life has value" immune to disproof. If we allow subjective testimonies to have the kind of weight you are suggesting, then 4 out of 5 people saying God exists should satisfy you.

Clutch

Don't be foolish. The phrase "veridically worthless" (it's not a word, you see) does not have a dictionary definition, nor is it a commonly used expression. If you want to discuss it intelligently, you need to resolve its ambiguity by looking at how Sagan used it. (As I pointed out several posts back.) Indeed. I guess that's a good reason for appealing to both, in explicating the notion of veridical worth. Otherwise my explication would have been redundant for including both terms. I'm not "curious", having studied (and taught) the Meditations for years now. I've already explained something of your misunderstanding of the cogito; you might learn something here if you pay attention.

Normal

Of course "veridically worthless" is not a word, but you are attaching your own meanings to the word "veridically". Predictability falls no where under the umbrella of terms "veridically" implies. You assert that for something to have "veridical worth" it necessarily must have "predictability". This is either an unprovable assertion or false. (following Sagan's own logic, false)

There's no need to appeal to both on your terms. Sagan doesn't even mention predictability so I'm curious about where this extrapolation of meaning came from.

Having been subjected to the interpretations of your english words, I hardly want to see what you can do to the words of other languages.

Clutch

Oh, boy. What a dog's breakfast. This is going to end very soon if you won't bother reading before writing.

Statement: "4 out of 5 dentists advise a flouride toothpaste"

Test: Survey dentists to determine -- not whether flouride is better; where the heck did you get that from? -- whether 4 out of 5 dentists advise a flouride toothpaste.

Statement: "Human life is valuable"

Ambiguous, unclear. So we clarify and disambiguate it.

Disambiguation: "Human life is valued by at least some people."

Test: Survey or observe people to determine whether at least some value human life.

It's a simple parallel.