Evidence is and includes everything that is used to reveal and determine the truth, and therefore is presumed to be true and related to a case. Giving or procuring evidence is the process of using those things that are either (a) presumed to be true, or (b) were in fact proven to be true by earlier evidence (truths) and demonstrates the broadening of the truth of a case. And the collection of evidence is in fact the act of determining; what is evidence. Whereas, the word evidence carries with it the presumption of it (the evidence) being seen as true, the where and how it fits; its relationship in and to the other evidence. In short, it goes from determining what is evidence, to evidence is determined; determining truth, to truth determined. Evidence is the currency by which one fulfills the burden of proof.
Many issues surround evidence, making it the subject of much discussion and disagreement. In addition to its subtlety, evidence plays an important role in many academic disciplines, including science and law, adding to the discourse surrounding it.
An important distinction in the field of evidence is that between circumstantial evidence and direct evidence, or evidence that suggests truth as opposed to evidence that directly proves truth. Many have seen this line to be less-than-clear and significant arguments have arisen over the difference.
Read more about Evidence: Burden of Proof, Evidence in Problems, Evidence in Science, Evidence in Law, Types of Evidence
Famous quotes containing the word evidence:
“Washington has seldom seen so numerous, so industrious or so insidious a lobby. There is every evidence that money without limit is being spent to sustain this lobby.... I know that in this I am speaking for the members of the two houses, who would rejoice as much as I would to be released from this unbearable situation.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“I don’t know what it is about fecundity that so appalls. I suppose it is the teeming evidence that birth and growth, which we value, are ubiquitous and blind, that life itself is so astonishingly cheap, that nature is as careless as it is bountiful, and that with extravagance goes a crushing waste that will one day include our own cheap lives.”
—Annie Dillard (b. 1945)
“Analysis is more likely to adjust evidence than to adjust itself.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)