The Evidence Room
How this site grades evidence
Every graded claim in this wing carries one of four words. Here is what each word means and how it is set.
Summary
The Evidence Room grades a contested claim with one of four words: high, strong, moderate or debated. The word reports how the specialists who work on that material stand, not how sure the writer feels.
- High means the fact itself is not in dispute among those specialists.
- Strong means most of them hold the reading and the page prints the evidence.
- Moderate means a named minority holds it, or the evidence reads more than one way.
- Debated means the specialists divide and the page names the sides without a verdict.
- A confession carries no grade, because a conviction is not a measurement.
The four words
high
high confidenceThe physical or textual fact is not in dispute among the specialists who work on it.
strong
strong confidenceThe reading is held by most of those specialists and rests on named evidence the page prints.
moderate
moderate confidenceThe reading is held by a named minority, or the evidence carries more than one reading and the page prints both.
debated
debated confidenceThe specialists divide, and the page names the sides without reaching a verdict.
How a grade is set
The word answers one question: where do the people who work on this material stand, and what does the page print to show it? It is not a measure of how certain the writer feels, and it is not a percentage in disguise.
Two things move a grade down. The first is a reading the evidence will carry more than one way. The second is a specialist field that divides on it. Where a page gives up a grade it says so in the open, beside the claim.
No other strength word stands on these pages. Words like overwhelming, undeniable and astronomical tell a reader nothing he can weigh, and readers discount them anyway.
Two blocks every graded page carries
- What the evidence does not settle. The open points, each with the find, text or argument that would decide it.
- What would overturn this. One line naming what would have to turn up for the claim to fail.
A claim with its evidence and no such line is half an argument, and the missing half is the half a doubting reader came for.
What takes no grade
A confession carries no grade. That Jesus of Nazareth rose bodily is what this site believes and states at the door, and a conviction is not a measurement.
An entry marked speculative carries no grade either. It is on the site as a proposal somebody has made, and the page says so instead of lighting a meter for it.
Where a grade is missing from a page that should carry one, the meter reads not graded, and that is a gap to report rather than a verdict. Write to us and name the page.