Using absolutes: always, never

[Chuck]

When to use absolutes?

"You NEVER run the vacuum!" This is hyperbole; I ran the vacuum two months ago.

And so, in research discussions one will rarely see "always", "never", or other absolutes. One cannot accurately say, for example, that a Goliath beetle has never been caught in USA, because one was. Is it safe to say that Goliath beetles do NOT occur in North America? Probably, from what we know, that capture probably came in a bunch of fruit. But a negative cannot be disproven.

I recently came across this in another field of research- an artifact was presented with what is obviously(?) in an incorrect characteristic. Or is it? It's possible that it is correct, and a lot of established views are going to be turned upside-down.

Is it fair then to simply avoid the absolute by rephrasing? "Papilio multicaudata is ONLY found west of the Mississippi" becomes "Papilio multicaudata is found west of the Mississippi"....yet the "ONLY" is implied.

Where there is any ambiguity, even the tiniest bit, then what? If we use "almost always" and "as known to date" and such, publications would be inundated with these caveat words.

So what to do?

[58chevy]

The use of absolutes bothers me because there are no absolute certainties in nature, although many things come close. When a meteorologist says that there is a 100% chance of rain, he knows it's never that certain but close enough that his forecast will most likely come true. It would be more accurate to say 99% or 1% rather than 100% or 0%. If you buy a lottery ticket and believe that you have a chance to win, you do. But that chance is so small that it might as well be zero. However, if the odds of winning were advertised as zero, nobody (correction: almost nobody) would buy tickets. If there is ambiguity in a claim (Papilio multicaudata is only found west of the Mississippi), maybe it should say "chances of finding Papilio multicaudata east of the Mississippi are .00001%." The word "only" is thus avoided.

[kevinkk]

Yes, there are exceptions to virtually everything. I think people use "figures of speech" and that's where "absolutes" pop up. For instance,
the old saying is the only certainties in life are death and taxes, I would argue that taxes are not a certainty, and we can only count on expiration.
An interesting observation, and an issue fixed with proper language and grammar, in their correct context.

[vabrou]

I can safely proclaim that 'virtually everyone' is guilty of using 'absolutes'. People write in the same mannerisms they do when speaking. I am certainly guilty of doing these things, though I am aware of the prevalence of this affliction and when writing make an attempt to eliminate doing this. I can say with 'absolute certainty' that I often fail.

One idiotic thing that even the most learned persons do is to say something is 1000% true. Once one has reached 100%, there is no more of anything beyond 100%. This is entirely different than saying something is 10 times as many e.g. 10 times 100 = 1000 (a quantity) which does not infer or result in 1000 (percent). I can proclaim with 'absolute certainty' that there are a few persons reading this do not comprehend this concept.

I can say with certainty and agree there are 'probably' exceptions to any proposed rules. Chuck, I watched a video where someone was 'running' from an out of control vacuum. An exception obviously.

I will end with that statement I often repeat: The only persons that don't make mistakes are those that do not do anything. Now this is a 100% certainty, then maybe not.

I note that novice collectors often go out light trapping 2-3 days in a year and afterward make foolish BS statements publicly based upon their meaningless experiences. Even though I have operated all of insect traps for nearly 50 million trap hours, I cannot with certainty make some proclamations as an absolute. Such statement have to have some limiting criteria. Another example is in our N.A. scientific literature for the past near two centuries is the repeatedly plagiarized statements concerning how many broods of lepidoptera species exists. Nearly all of these statements do not have have any limiting criteria. e.g. someone reporting a species in Canada only has one annual brood and makes such a proclamation without clarifying that occurred in Canada (this is how our scientific literature reads). But that same species here in Louisiana may have 11 or more annual broods. Here in Louisiana are several agricultural noctuid pest species which have 13 annual broods, How can that be? 13 broods X 28 days each = 364 days.

[Chuck]

Thanks thus far for the input.

I'm rather caught in the middle- I like to keep things short, which at times requires the reader's understanding that there are exceptions.

If I have to write something like "chances of finding Papilio multicaudata east of the Mississippi are .00001%" for every instance when a "fact" is presented then a paper would double in size without adding any real value.

Even something so simple as "flight period June-August" infers that there are no adults on the wing in September, while in fact one might see one per year the first few days of September. Must such a thing be accounted for? We as scientists KNOW there are outliers in virtually every case; the end of the bell curve is miniscule.

[eurytides]

I find the word “typical” helpful in these situations. Typical, X is found at location Y.

[kevinkk]

I will end with that statement I often repeat: The only persons that don't make mistakes are those that do not do anything. Now this is a 100% certainty, then maybe not.

Exactly what I said once to my employer at the roofing company when one of my coworkers claimed he never made mistakes, after I, as foreman
made a judgement call. "You never make mistakes because you never make decisions." That ended the conversation.

[Chuck]

OK, so how does one say "they don't have this blue on the FW" without acknowledging this one friggin' specimen? "rarely" seems to be imply perhaps it's more common.

[adamcotton]

You could state 'very rarely' to indicate less often than 'rarely', or if you have only seen a single specimen with these blue scales you could state 'blue scales were present on the forewing of a single individual among xxx specimens examined'.

Adam.