This ‘need’ argument is really weird. Show me this need based definition of corroborated.
Evidence that tends to support the statement exists therefore the statement is corroborated. The evidence didn’t even consider whether or not the statement needed it mostly because that’s not a thing evidence does and doesn’t make a lick of sense.
the horse you beat dead is now an outline with grass growing through it. As is Ford’s unfounded accusation.
Ha!
And I’m not even done.
Take that horse! And that grass better watch the fuck out.
I was thinking about this thread on my drive in to work today and a couple things occurred to me.
Number one… what is it with you guys and the word corroborated? Corroborated is a much weaker characterization of a statement than true, and pretty much everyone agrees that the statement is true. Yet you flip the fuck out when the word corroborated comes up and refuse to even discuss the definition of the word. Bonkers.
Number two… what’s up with the weird need to mischaracterize Dr. Ford’s claim? She didn’t say anything like, “Brett Kavanaugh is a male, born in 1965, who attended Georgetown Prep.” Reporters didn’t scramble to corroborate these facts because they were already known. However, it is more accurate to summarize her assertion as, “Brett Kavanaugh is a little bit older than me and went to high school near me.” There’s an important difference here. One might even say that this difference is the kind of thing that ‘needs’ corroboration. Why the insistence that all she did was recite basic facts? The first paraphrase would be true if spoken by anyone, the second paraphrase is only true when spoken by a much smaller group of people. The fact that Dr. Ford is part of this smaller group is precisely the part of her assertion that the press et. al. sought corroboration for. It seems a little shady to paraphrase her claim to leave that out.
Exactly, that’s why it’s pointless to talk about corroborating something that’s known to be true. The relevant question is whether her unproven claims are corroborated, and they are not.
But it’s not pointless to determine a mutually agreeable definition of corroborated so that we can then apply it to Dr. Ford’s assertions. Yet it appears to be impossible to get you folks to even discuss it. What is up with that?
We’ve already done that, and I at least agreed to the definition for the purposes of this thread.
Now that we agree on a definition, do we also agree that there has been no corroboration that Ford was ever attacked, or that Kavanaugh or Judge ever attacked her, or anyone else?
Good. Ford’s claims about being assaulted have not been corroborated. None of the details she gave to back up her accusation have been corroborated.
The only details that matter, the ones that must be corroborated, are the ones that back up her story. Since, as you say, her claim about Kavanaugh being a year or so older and attending prep school do not back up her story, they are not important.
Do you get it now? We are not disagreeing on what constitutes corroboration. We are agreeing on what it is, and pointing out that none of Ford’s accusation has been corroborated.
Regards,
Shodan
Great.
Now let’s take a baby step and see if we can apply that definition to a statement made by Dr. Ford.
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves and try to do too much at once. I promise you we’ll get to other statements once we clear this hurdle, but for now consider this statement and this statement only. Corroborated or uncorroborated?
Keep in mind that this is the definition of corroborated you agreed to: an assertion is corroborated when there is other evidence that tends to support it. We have an assertion. Do we have other evidence that tends to support this assertion?
No, we can’t apply it, because as you already said
So that has nothing to do with the case.
If you want to talk about irrelevancies, go ahead, as long as you keep in mind that they are irrelevant.
The title of the OP is **How is someone like Christine Ford supposed to prove her case? **The answer to that is that she can’t, if she is going to rely on things that don’t prove her case.
Regards,
Shodan
If you want to look at this statement alone, there isn’t sufficient content to even be considered an assertion. What is being asserted here? Both what? It’s question begging and it’s weak sauce.
Try to stay focused.
We have a definition:
And we have an assertion:
The question before us is, “Does other evidence exist that tends to support the assertion?”
Whether or not it has anything to do with ‘the case’ doesn’t figure into it. We don’t need to if it relevant or irrelevant to answer the question. Does other evidence exist that tends to support the assertion? That question has answer regardless of relevance or cases or what have you.
Does other evidence exist that tends to support the assertion? Can you answer that question?
Do you really not know who both refers to? Like really really?
I can infer, but your hyper parsed tactic stated to just consider the lone statement. The problem is that it requires an assumption to have it make sense at all. Try it, and I think it will illustrate to you why this tactic you are attempting to employ is so ineffective.
To corroborate something requires at least two separate things - A corroborates B. If you were to do diagram out what A and B are, I think you would see that the way you’ve executed this tactic has failed.
Go ahead and infer what both might mean and see if you can answer the question. Try your best. I believe in you.
Let me know who you filled in for both and whether or or not you could determine if the statement was corroborated.
Here’s some suggestions for both:
Lou Ferrigno and Stan Lee
Paul McCartney and Jimmy Fallon
Brett Kavanaugh and Mark Judge
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Watson and Crick
The important thing is to have fun.
Sure, let’s try it. Here is the question you posed: Does other evidence exist that tends to support the assertion?
Here is example 1:
Both [Kavanaugh and Judge] were one to two years older than me and students at a local private school.
Answer: Yes. This is a true statement. No corroboration necessary.
Here is example 2:
Both [people who attacked me] were one to two years older than me and students at a local private school.
Answer: No. There is no evidence of an attack. There is no evidence that if there were an attack, that there were two perpetrators, or if there were two perpetrators that they were students, or if they were students that they were from a local school, or if they were from a local school, that it was a private school.
That’s why your tactic is so poor. Because you are assuming facts not in evidence to deploy this ‘corroborated’ gambit. The problem is you’ve missed the point of what needs to be corroborated. So yes, to be even remotely effective, you would need to specify the assertion that is being made.
I say again:
Can you identify what A and B are in your construction?
This is precisely why I was so insistent on nailing down a definition of corroboration. How are you defining corroboration where necessity comes into it? With the definition I posted, evidence that tends to support the assertion exists or it does not. The ‘needs’ of the assertion, whatever those are, are not even in the picture.
Yearbooks from Holton-Arms and Georgetown Prep corroborate Dr. Ford’s assertion that Kavanaugh and Judge were one to two years older than her and students at a local private school.
I can’t tell if you think this semantic quibble is meaningful. It’s not. You may as well be saying, 1+1=2 is corroborated by math. Uhh, sure. But since it’s axiomatic fact, being corroborated is utterly irrelevant. Why focus on irrelevancies? You are myopically focused on something that does not matter in any way. This is my post is my cite level reasoning.
So was every other student in that age bracket that attended that school, and every other near by private school. A stunning revelation. This is not a point of contention - it is a meaningless triviality. Remember, your original assertion was that there was a metric fuck ton of indications that he blacked out (post #208) and that there was lots and lots of evidence of it. (post #220) and that* it has been corroborated in many ways by many different sources. (post #229)* and that many of the details she gave us have been corroborated. (post #273).
The only thing you put out there as this metric fuck ton is publicly verifiable information that is not in contention and where corroboration is not in question. Quite poor.
I’m not focusing on irrelevancies. I’m focused on determining a mutually agreeable definition of corroboration and seeing if we can apply that definition to statements made by Dr. Ford. This is highly relevant to showing that, “It has been corroborated in many ways by many different sources,” and that, “Many of the details she gave us have been corroborated.” I am focusing on the definition and the simplest non-trivial example because the discussion can’t proceed without that.
Posts 208 and 220 were debunking another baseless claim and not related to the discussion of corroboration.
Let’s start with the Cambridge Dictionary definition of the word “corroborated”.
*corroborate
verb [ T ] us /kəˈrɑb·əˌreɪt/
to add information in support of an idea, opinion, or statement:
Recent research seems to corroborate the theory. *
It’s Ford’s opinion, or claim, that the two boys who engaged in this alleged molestation were one to two years older than her. Taken on it’s own merit, her claim is that the boys were older than her. People listened to what she said. It’s also Ford’s opinion, or claim, that the two boys attended a local private school. Again, people listened to what she said.
Local boys who were one to two years older than her may number in the thousands. Boys who attended a local private school may number in the hundreds.
Were the boys she named actual students at a local private school? Yes, they were. That part of Ford’s claim has been corroborated by others. It has been established that the boys Ford chose to name were local private school students.
What Ford, her supporters, her lawyers, and law enforcement have failed to corroborate is that she was molested, or that she was at a party where this alleged molestation took place, or the location of this alleged party, or who were the attendees of this alleged party, let alone her claim that Kavanaugh molested her some 35 years ago.
Now we’re getting somewhere.