Degrees of Certainty
See Inductive logic, Philosophy of probability, Philosophy of statistics.Physicist Lawrence M. Krauss suggests that identifying degrees of certainty is under-appreciated in various domains, including policy making and the understanding of science. This is because different goals require different degrees of certainty—and politicians are not always aware of (or do not make it clear) how much certainty we are working with.
Rudolf Carnap viewed certainty as a matter of degree (degrees of certainty) which could be objectively measured, with degree one being certainty. Bayesian analysis derives degrees of certainty which are interpreted as a measure of subjective psychological belief.
Alternatively, one might use the legal degrees of certainty. These standards of evidence ascend as follows: no credible evidence, some credible evidence, a preponderance of evidence, clear and convincing evidence, beyond reasonable doubt, and beyond any shadow of a doubt (i.e. undoubtable—recognized as an impossible standard to meet—which serves only to terminate the list).
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Famous quotes containing the words degrees of, degrees and/or certainty:
“When a thought of Plato becomes a thought to me,—when a truth that fired the soul of Pindar fires mine, time is no more. When I feel that we two meet in a perception, that our two souls are tinged with the same hue, and do as it were run into one, why should I measure degrees of latitude, why should I count Egyptian years?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Always the laws of light are the same, but the modes and degrees of seeing vary.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Psychologists have set about describing the true nature of women with a certainty and a sense of their own infallibility rarely found in the secular world.”
—Naomi Weisstein, U.S. psychologist, feminist, and author. Psychology Constructs the Female (1969)