John Connolly Quotes

Simply because you do not have evidence that something exists does not mean that you have evidence that it doesn't exist.

There's another way to phrase that and that is that the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. It is basically saying the same thing in a different way. Simply because you do not have evidence that something does exist does not mean that you have evidence that it doesn't exist.

Absence of proof is not proof of absence.

There is no such thing as absolute proof. There is only evidence.

The truth is in nature, and I shall prove it.

I get mail; therefore I am.

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

There may be fairies at the bottom of the garden. There is no evidence for it, but you can't prove that there aren't any, so shouldn't we be agnostic with respect to fairies?

Scientists search for truth. Philosophers search for morality. A criminal trial searches for only one result: proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

We must never assume that which is incapable of proof.

A very great deal more truth can become known than can be proved.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Metaphysics is the science of proving what we don't understand.

How do you prove we exist? Maybe we don't.

You can never be absolutely certain that anything doesn't exist. But you can show that it's unlikely.

If my interlocutor desires to convince me that Jupiter has inhabitants, and that his description of them is accurate, it is for him to bring forward evidence in support of his contention. The burden of proof evidently lies on him; it is not for me to prove that no such beings exist before my non-belief is justified, but for him to prove that they do exist before my belief can be fairly claimed. Similarly, it is for the affirmer of God's existence to bring evidence in support of his affirmation; the burden of proof lies on him.

Metaphysics is almost always an attempt to prove the incredible by an appeal to the unintelligible.

But as with Maxwell's Demon, so now. Either she could not communicate, or he did not exist.

And no one has the right to say that no water-babies exist, till they have seen no water-babies existing; which is quite a different thing, mind, from not seeing water-babies; and a thing which nobody ever did, or perhaps will ever do. But surely ... they would have put it into spirits, or into the Illustrated News, or perhaps cut it into two halves, poor dear little thing, and sent one to Professor Owen, and one to Professor Huxley, to see what they would each say about it.

One can study what exists and how consciousness functions; but one cannot analyze (or “prove”) existence as such, or consciousness as such. These are irreducible primaries. (An attempt to “prove” them is self-contradict ory: it is an attempt to “prove” existence by means of nonexistence, and consciousness by means of unconsciousness .)

Why do you keep maintaining your ideas are right if you can't prove them?

i cannot be called upon to know a negative or to prove a negative. if there is a god and you prove it, that's fine. but you don't tell me you can't know that there isn't. i would say yes i know there isn't because i have been given no evidence.

I am a great believer rather than the popular scientific way of dealing with things that 'Nothing exists unless you can prove it'. I am pretty much the other way that pretty much anything can exist unless you can disprove it.

Truth is that which cannot be proved false.

Nothing is demonstrable, unless the contrary implies a contradiction. Nothing, that is distinctly conceivable, implies a contradiction. Whatever we conceive as existent, we can also conceive as non-existent. There is no being, therefore, whose non-existence implies a contradiction. Consequently there is no being, whose existence is demonstrable.