Stop Asking People to 'Prove' things

Proof isn't required for knowledge.

You’ve probably had this experience before. You’re debating someone that disagrees with you, and is therefore wrong and stupid (and ugly). Then, after making some claim that supports your view, they lay down a gauntlet.

“Prove it.”

I’ve had this happen to me while making very plausible and reasonable claims. I once had someone ask me to prove that Covid is a real disease. Flat Earthers ask mentally healthy people to prove that the Earth is round. Recently, I saw Vegans Gains ask Matthew Adelstein to prove that suffering is bad.

Of course, what follows then is an admission that you can’t prove a claim to be 100% certain, and the conversation is over. It’s too late. There’s no proof, and therefore your belief is bunk.

This, obviously, is an insane epistemic standard for anyone to have.

A belief is not justified only if one can prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt. Were that the case, we’d probably not be justified in believing anything. After all, we can’t even prove with certainty that anything exists outside our own minds. There’s always some story that can be told that explains the data while rejecting your belief.

There are many things I’m justified in believing that I can’t prove. As of writing this sentence, Joe Biden is alive (decent chance he’ll be dead by the end of the article, but he’s alive right now). This is a very sensible and rational thing to believe - however, I can’t prove it. Even if I google “Is Joe Biden alive?” it’s possible that he died a mere 5 seconds ago and the story hasn’t broke yet. It’s possible that he died 10 years ago and was replaced with an ultra realistic android. It’s possible it’s the year 2215 and I’m in a dream right now. So, we can never quite prove he’s alive - however, we’re still totally justified in believing he is.

Why? Because we have good reasons for thinking he is. This is what the proof demanders fail to understand. We don’t walk around, only believing things if we can prove them. It’s not like we only trust our bank statements if they have “QED” scribbled at the bottom. We believe things because our reasons for believing them are good, and the reasons for doubting them are bad.

Is it possible Joe Biden died 5 seconds ago? Sure, but it’d also be very unlikely. It’d be an amazing coincidence. Ironically, when someone asks you to prove something, they can also never prove the opposite is true. Your belief requires certainty to justify, while theirs only requires possibility. The game was rigged from the start.