Gendover - Week 6: Evaluating the Evidence

‘Evidence’ by Bill Selak, available under a  

Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic licence.

Sickness, domestic and work commitments have led to me falling somewhat behind the main group. I was stressed about this until I took a step back and realised I didn't need to keep up with the pack. No one is marking my progress, this is a learning opportunity, a chance to develop a better working process and NOT a race to the finish line.

Evaluating the evidence is an important step that many of us miss or take for granted. Thomas uses the example of his birth date, and surely he must know that is correct. Right?

Keeping with the birth date theme, a close relation has the wrong date of birth on her birth certificate, and therefore on her passport and other legal documentation. When you speak to her she tells you her actual birthday, the one she has always celebrated, is a couple of days earlier. The reason for the problem; her father gave the wrong date when he registered her.

When fines were first introduced if you didn't register births on time, dates were 'massaged' so they avoided the fine and then you find a baptism before a birth. So what's true?  How are we supposed to work through conflicting information? By EVALUATION, that's how.

Evidence can be evaluated using four categories;

1. Source Type
2. Clarity
3. Information Contained
4. Evidence Type

For a full explanation of these terms, head over to Thomas's Week 6 Blog as he explains it perfectly.


The second phase of Week 6 is to review Online Education Options, and that will be addressed at a later date when I've had time to consolidate the options!