Ethical Realism

Eyewitness testimony is evidence, but is it reliable? I think it is usually reliable enough, but it ultimately has to be understood on a case by case basis, and expertise in relevant areas can greatly help us assess the evidence better. How evidence should function – what counts as good evidence – is an important issue that is not discussed or understood enough. It is greatly an issue of critical thinking and informal logic. In this case it is also highly related to natural science because eyewitness testimony is one of the ways we know about the natural world, and knowing about the natural world can also tell us a lot about how to properly assess the reliability of eyewitness testimony. Eyewitness testimony is an empirical (experience-based) type of evidence. (more…)