The Critical Flaws of Testimony and Evidence.
Deciphering signals to decrypt the Truth.
"The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence."
- Carl Sagan
When discerning truth to achieve justice, there are 2 signals: testimony and evidence.
Testimony is the sharing of experience.
It can be spoken or written.
In a court of law, testimony is a form of evidence, as a first-hand account of fact by a witness.
Yet testimony is subject to the credibility of the witness, and to the judgment of an audience.
The witness could lie.
Or they could leave out relevant details and important context.
The audience (or jury) could reject the true testimony of a non-credible person.
Or the judge could be biased against the accused and make the proceedings more difficult.
How can a justice system be guilty of convicting so many innocent people?1
The critical flaw of testimony is human intent.
Evidence is information the senses perceive in observable reality.
It is concrete. It is tangible.
Some examples of evidence are:
- A photograph.
- Documentation of a financial transaction.
- An audio recording of a phone call.
- Data from sensors.
Yet the way evidence is presented affects its perception and interpretation.
This is framing.
Skillful lawyers can present evidence in a frame to align with innocence or guilt.
Journalists can weave a narrative to affect how you believe an event happened.
Advertisers can create messages to influence the general perception of a person or brand.
Artificial Intelligence has enabled the creation of “Deep Fakes.”2
It will soon be hard to know what is real and what is “f.e.a.r.” - false evidence appearing real.
The human mind makes sense of information by creating a pattern.3
As an example, here are pieces of evidence:
1. A photograph of Susan and John together, smiling at a restaurant.
2. A receipt with two entrées, two beverages and one dessert.
3. A text from Susan to John "Pick me up at 6pm outside the office."
4. A text from Bob to Susan at 11pm saying "Where are you? The children are in bed."
What is the truth about the situation?
Our minds fill in the gaps to create a possible story.
What if you learned that Bob is Susan's brother?
He offered to babysit for his sister and her husband as a favor. It’s their anniversary and the scheduled babysitter was sick.
He has a late night conference with a team in Asia soon, and Susan said they’d be back at 10:30.
This new information widens our understanding.
Our perspective changes.
The critical flaw of evidence is human perception.
Discerning the truth means casting light across all crevices so that as many facts, motives, and probabilities are illuminated.
Only then can we reason what is true with a degree of certainty.
Evidence and testimony are merely signals.
3rd Eye 👁️ Mind 🧠
Solve puzzles, see hidden meaning, and understand esoteric knowledge.
(Solution at end of post)
Image Riddle:
This band started in the late 1960s with songs including one about a lonely number.
Higher ⛰️ Self 👤
Grow in health, wealth, relationships, and autonomy.
Awesome ❤️🔥 Makers 🙌
Learn from inspired creators in business, technology, science, and culture.
With all the fervor and speed of AI it can seem like magic.
Yet when something complex is explained clearly and simply, it can be understood.
Andrej Karpathy’s Intro to Large Language Models (LLMs) is an excellent primer.
Make Everything Awesome is for reasonable folks who aspire to raise the consciousness of humanity and build a world we want to live in.
Thank you for reading. Be blessed!
- Aaron Richmond
3rd Eye Mind (solution):
Three Dog Night.
A dog is framed in a triangle (3 sides) with the night sky in the background.