A man sees two elephants in the wild.
He takes a picture with his camera
The picture is now on a negative in his camera
He develops the image.
You can see his elephants.
Question: At what point would you believe that this man saw the elephants?
Why?
This may appear as a harmless and simple question, but the answers and ramifications are not so simple, and reveal more about us than we may imagine.
The Lions Den 
Hmmmm…..the product of what he saw…I say that would be evidence. Combine that with faith in the truth told by the photographer. ..no prob here believing he saw the elephant.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Tkx W.
Interesting so far.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes…been reading…quite interesting.
LikeLike
Is this a trick question? I say the photographer saw the elephant first which inspired him to take the picture.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Nope, no trick question, its the answers that are tricky 😉
LikeLike
Reblogged this on Talmidimblogging.
LikeLike
“…its the answers that are tricky” – and, I would strongly suspect – cheesy —
LikeLike
It wouldn’t hurt to actually think of the possibilities; may be helpful as a matter of fact.
LikeLiked by 1 person
With YOU doing the writing? Slim to none.
LikeLike
Seriously, arch… what are you, five years old?
LikeLike
I’m not convinced the whole photo analogy here really works to develop whatever idea you’re trying to develop here. It’s a fairly easy metaphor to dismantle, in that, all you could say for sure is that someone saw the elephants. How do you know someone else didn’t snap the pic using his camera? Guess I just don’t see the epistemological wow factor buried in there….
LikeLike
In all fairness truth, how could you be convinced if you don’t know what I am getting at?
But your observations about a ‘wow’ factor may be premature.
Its actually simple. You get extra points for ‘buried,’ though.
LikeLike
ok I admit, “wow factor” was a tad on the snarky side. But yes, it’s clearly designed to be some sort of how-do-we-know-what-we-know thought exercise. A head scratcher as to the reliability of personal testimony? A reflection upon the definition of “evidence”… All good questions of course.
But still, is the metaphor really complete? Does a photograph of something tell me anything except the fact that the shutter closed at some point and captured an image? (Could it have been on a timer? Could someone have borrowed the camera?)
What about if we were talking about a journal entry or something, as opposed to a photo. After all, these days photos can be faked anyhow, so do they really “prove” anything anymore…? 😉 (forgive my devil-advocacy on this one, trying to push a different angle I suppose…)
LikeLiked by 1 person
Its cool, I didn’t see snarkiness by the way; but I can tell you, that all responses so far are perfectly aligned with ‘revealing more about ourselves than we may imagine’)
LikeLike
Yes, that is usually the case, isn’t it…. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Your criticism is making little Milo cry –:(
LikeLike
Go ahead, arch and answer. Three comments, and you are playing dodge ball.
It’s not hard.
LikeLiked by 1 person
(Really, I thought that was what you were trying to do…?)
LikeLike
For me, it depends on who’s telling.
I’d believe that my dad saw the elephants sooner than I’d believe my jokester friend did.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Excellent Louis.
Tkx
LikeLiked by 2 people
I feel that yes, he saw the elephants originally, but only quickly and not REALLY SEEING the elephants as he was in a hurry to “capture” the moment. . .it was only later once the picture was developed that he too saw the elephants, but only second hand like his viewers. . .as he truly missed the first encounter. . .
LikeLiked by 1 person
I am never surprised at the high level of insight by the WP believers.
Great observations, cookie.
LikeLike
seeing a picture would be enough for me to believe he took a picture – but describing to me what they look like to him would make me believe that he really saw them.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ok PP fair enough.
Will try to add some additional thoughts once this runs dry.
LikeLike
That is actually a good observation. What we see with a picture may be worth a thousand words, but sometimes words convey what pictures cannot.
LikeLiked by 2 people
indeed!
LikeLike
Come on, tell us the answer you’re looking for. Seems pretty straight forward to me, but then I’m pretty unintellectual.
LikeLike
LOL..Kathy..I’m with you. Remedial blogging for us slower folks.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Hey W
Confucius say-
He who chew cud digest thinking much better
Slow is good 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m with you Timetoshare- 😉
It’s not a matter of intellect, but there are some fine answers, and yours is right there.
Need some more angles though. Hang in there-
LikeLiked by 1 person
“It’s not a matter of intellect” – If it were, this blog would REALLY be in trouble —
LikeLike
You know as an attorney I’ve been thinking of all of these conversations lately. In the criminal justice system in the United States, most of my cases have been based on circumstantial rather than direct evidence. If the law required us to utilize direct evidence in every case, we’d have a completely broken system. Even in my forfeiture cases that I handle, they are all mostly proven circumstantially i.e. large sums of money, money in rubberbands, dog sniff, defendant has no job, has drug priors etc. The more I think of this issue of “evidence” the more I realize how insane the whole thing is. Sorry, I had to ramble a little bit but my lawyer brain went into hyper-overdrive lol. I guess during my next trial I’ll just say, “Ladies and gentleman of the jury I just give up.”
PS heads up I did not come to argue with any atheists, just state my opinion which I get paid for daily. This one is on the house 🙂
LikeLiked by 5 people
Ha, way to go M.-
Good stuff, and no arguing here that I can see, thats a good thing.
For some reason, some people are staying away; there may be a few good reasons.
You picked up on something I never mentioned, ‘evidence,’ nice.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Melissa
Wow. The implications of what you just said finally hit me. Every day we take concrete action based on sometimes very NOT concrete evidences. Send a man to prison, or let him go…we believe things without really thinking about it even with a complete lack of concrete proof. We have faith in the pilot flying the airplane we are in, or the guy in the car in the lane next to us. We just act on faith…yet for some things, the demand for ironclad proof never ends.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I could go on and on. Maybe people should spend a day with me in the system.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Wait, is this a trick cuz there’s 3 elephants in the picture? Totally over my head lol
LikeLiked by 2 people
That’s a good point Kim!
LikeLiked by 1 person
See, I solved it! Haha just kidding. But I think I get it now after reading the other comments. Unless it was someone completely unreliable, I’d believe someone if they said they saw 2 elephants. Even though they’re lying because they obviously saw 3 😉
LikeLiked by 2 people
Hey wait. I don’t see that the photographer said anything. He just took the picture. It was ColorStorm who said two elephants. Hmm…I think..I think…I think.
LikeLike
This is blowing my MIND! Lol
LikeLiked by 2 people
W, you are causin’ trouble 😉
I’ll tell you what would have been brutal, if I meant ‘This man’ meaning myself.
I may have got tarred and feathered for that. No, no tricks. I’ll probably get boos now as a backup.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Pot stirrer is my middle name LOL. I am a professional! This thread is about the most fun blogging I have had in a while. Interesting and contemplative..and so far, no strife.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Once more the adage: the darn comments are better than the post.
I’ll try to piece it together the next few days. Agree, though, all smiles here, but do ya notice, the naysayers conveniently avoid this.
There is a good reason.
LikeLiked by 1 person
“the darn comments are better than the post.” – Newspaper obituaries are better than THIS post!
LikeLike
Ha
Nice. There is no trickery, but some good lessons I think.
This creative answer entitles you to a book of comment coupons, redeemable any time 😉 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Here is the dream I had last night:
I am in front of a house with another person. I see a man run out of the house and he is on fire. I see his assailant chasing after him.The man collapses and dies right in front of me and the assailant runs into a nearby vacant house to hide. I get on the phone to call my dispatch center (we have our own in house dispatch/911 which is a critical part to this dream) and I say, “I just witnessed a homicide, send a car out immediately. This is Melissa Presser.”
“Melissa,” the dispatcher says, ” I am not sending anyone out. How do you know what you saw is real. I am not there and don’t see it so I am not sending anyone out.”
“John!” I yell, “I am looking at the man’s dead body. The assailant is right here over in this next house, get someone over here NOW.”
“I’m not going to do that,” said John.
“Then get a supervisor on the phone, ” I say.
I wait, I wait, I wait.
Click
The man is dead before me. I see the assailant run away.
I wake up.
LikeLiked by 1 person
A dream yes, but the importance of an eyewitness account. Key word,
‘eyewitness,’
This was really on your mind to be so lucid.
tkx M.
LikeLike
Yes . Luke. Others. God is so real.
LikeLiked by 2 people
I seem to recall something about. ..many infallible proofs.
LikeLiked by 2 people
You may want to put an asterisk there. It’s included in the wrap up.
Paragraph one. Nice.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Marked for future reference!
LikeLike
I’m in court now and wow how the spiritual and earthly things all connect so fluidly when we put our spiritual glasses on. Wow
LikeLiked by 1 person
It might be hard to believe ColorStorm, but I am a complete skeptic. I wouldn’t believe that man saw any elephants at all. I’d need to see the photo and than I’d probably question the film, too, and suspect a double exposure. Or suspect a lying man who needs to have his eyes checked. I probably should have been a defense attorney.
The only way to get rid of my skepticism would be to drop me on my head in the mud with a pile of elephants. That usually tends to do the trick. That has actually happened to me a few times, metaphorically of course 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
You have been hanging around truthis stranger-fiction too much
😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
There were two elephants one large and one medium, which is what the photographer saw, but in the delay of taking the photo of the three . . . The large elephant rescued the small elephant from the water. In the photo you see the large elephant giving the small elephant a quick clean up. Slow, but good photographer. : )
LikeLike
Yep, you may be right, but my guy was on the other side of the hill, and truly only saw two! 😉
LikeLike
: )
LikeLike