What’s the difference between epistemology and ontology? epistemological claims are statements about belief, about your map, about what we can say about reality and ontological claims are statements about reality, about the territory, about how things are

Related: Epistemic status

Sagan scale 🎨

A tool for gauging whether somebody is too skeptical or too open to ideas. As Carl Sagan thinks the balance is best “It seems to me what is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most skeptical scrutiny of all hypotheses that are served up to us and at the same time a great openness to new ideas. Obviously those two modes of thought are in some tension. But if you are able to exercise only one of these modes, which ever one it is, you’re in deep trouble. If you are only skeptical, then no new ideas make it through to you. You never learn anything new. You become a crotchety old person convinced that nonsense is ruling the world ... On the other hand, if you are open to the point of gullibility and have not an ounce of skeptical sense in you, then you cannot distinguish the useful ideas from the worthless ones. If all ideas have equal validity then you are lost, because then, it seems to me, no ideas have any validity at all." from The Burden of Skepticism

Round theories and loose evidence

Many mechanisms in the world are very specific. If explanations are too "round" or too generic this might mean it's not real.

Bad explanation: Easy to vary. Good explanation: Hard to vary (that is every detail plays a functional role). via David Deautsch Ted Talk

How do I understand this?

• Easy-to-vary: There is a woman in the state of Washington with a large following who claims to make contact with someone from 35,000 years ago. Why exactly 35,000 and not 34,365 years ago? (source The Burden of Skepticism). Another example is the mythical explanation of the seasons by Demeter, which is easy to vary and lacks the functional role of every detail. One can swap any detail of the story and the whole explanation would remain intact.
• Hard-to-vary: In contrast, imagine different connected, cross-influencing nodes that lock the answer in a more rigid (hard-to-vary) position. If one detail is changed in a scientific theory, all others would need to change or be tweaked accordingly. In the current scientific explanation of seasons, every detail plays a functional role, with the 23-degree tilt of the Earth and its orbit around the sun being crucial factors. This tilt is essential to the Earth's exposure to the sun's heat, and any change in this angle would impact temperatures or the position or time of sunsets.
• More thoughts

Cognitive biases

People who exhibits Cognitive Biases

• Personal evidence

Law of the Instrument

People who are really good at a specific area of knowledge may sometimes think that their expertise transcends disciplinary boundaries and can explain a surprisingly high volume of subjects. (Read more on Law of the Instrument here)

Forceful Interpretation

Source

When explanations seem forceful or overly complicated, this may indicate that the quality of the explanation is not the highest.

This image shows the paths of the planets in the solar system before and after the realization of heliocentrism.