The Peikovian Doctrine of the Arbitrary Assertion

[Ellen Stuttle]

Leonid,

I'm not seeing indications that you're tracking. You quote -- post next above -- a sentence from my #119 and then ask, "Why arbitrary?"

I've stated several times what I mean in calling an assertion or hypothesis "arbitrary." I stated my meaning in a continuation of the very sentence you quote.

Your subsequent comments don't address the meaning of "arbitrary" I'm using (which I'll repeat: "not adequately grounded in evidence to require checking out for truth or falsity").

So what if elephants exist, and my back yard exists, and once when you were on holidays at a nature resort, you saw elephants next to your lodge every day?

How would the truth of all of those statements provide supporting evidence for a claim made that there's an elephant in my back yard? Or even provide supporting evidence for a claim that it's possible for there to be an elephant in my back yard?

By my definition of "arbitrary" you need to provide something plausible before even putting possible on the table. There could be an elephant in my actual Bloomfield, Connecticut, back yard? How?

(Btw, I'm assuming that what you meant by this sentence -- "The low probability of an event doesn't make it arbitrary" -- was something like, "The low probability of an event doesn't make asserting its truth arbitrary.")

---

Tony,

I was really surprised by your responses on "possible"/"probable." I'll get back to you when I can.

At this time heavy snow is falling upon my actual Bloomfield, Connecticut, back yard -- and everywhere I can see around and, so I hear from weather reports, over a large part of the North East. I need to do some things in case of the electricity being out for awhile.

Question: Does the snow falling here mean, according to Leonid's reasoning, that snow might fall today in Johannesburg?

Ellen

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Question: Does the snow falling here mean, according to Leonid's reasoning, that snow might fall today in Johannesburg?

Ellen,

Maybe elephants will fall like the snow tomorrow in your backyard?

Consider it: elephants do exist; they can be hauled up with aircraft; and they can be dropped.

Call it what you want, but using this weird Peikovian-based meaning, that ain't an arbitrary notion.

btw - Here is a quote from Six Blind Elephants by Steve Andreas. It seems somehow germane to this discussion, but I haven't placed my finger on why.

Six blind elephants were discussing what wise men were like (never having seen one).

Failing to agree, they decided to find one and determine what it was like by direct experience.

The first blind elephant felt the wise man, and declared, "Wise men are flat."

After feeling the wise man, the other blind elephants agreed.

Michael

EDIT: It later occurred to me that some people might not be familiar with the parable of the elephant and the blind men, so here is a Wikipedia article on it: Blind men and an elephant. From the article:

In various versions of the tale, a group of blind men (or men in the dark) touch an elephant to learn what it is like. Each one feels a different part, but only one part, such as the side or the tusk. They then compare notes and learn that they are in complete disagreement.

The stories differ primarily in how the elephant's body parts are described, how violent the conflict becomes and how (or if) the conflict among the men and their perspectives is resolved.

In some versions, they stop talking, start listening and collaborate to "see" the full elephant. When a sighted man walks by and sees the entire elephant all at once, they also learn they are blind. While one's subjective experience is true, it may not be the totality of truth. If the sighted man was deaf, he would not hear the elephant bellow. Denying something you cannot perceive ends up becoming an argument for your limitations.

[Leonid]

Leonid,

I'm not seeing indications that you're tracking. You quote -- post next above -- a sentence from my #119 and then ask, "Why arbitrary?"

I've stated several times what I mean in calling an assertion or hypothesis "arbitrary." I stated my meaning in a continuation of the very sentence you quote.

Your subsequent comments don't address the meaning of "arbitrary" I'm using (which I'll repeat: "not adequately grounded in evidence to require checking out for truth or falsity").

So what if elephants exist, and my back yard exists, and once when you were on holidays at a nature resort, you saw elephants next to your lodge every day?

How would the truth of all of those statements provide supporting evidence for a claim made that there's an elephant in my back yard? Or even provide supporting evidence for a claim that it's possible for there to be an elephant in my back yard?

By my definition of "arbitrary" you need to provide something plausible before even putting possible on the table. There could be an elephant in my actual Bloomfield, Connecticut, back yard? How?

(Btw, I'm assuming that what you meant by this sentence -- "The low probability of an event doesn't make it arbitrary" -- was something like, "The low probability of an event doesn't make asserting its truth arbitrary.")

---

Tony,

I was really surprised by your responses on "possible"/"probable." I'll get back to you when I can.

At this time heavy snow is falling upon my actual Bloomfield, Connecticut, back yard -- and everywhere I can see around and, so I hear from weather reports, over a large part of the North East. I need to do some things in case of the electricity being out for awhile.

Question: Does the snow falling here mean, according to Leonid's reasoning, that snow might fall today in Johannesburg?

Ellen

Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts. I gave a definition of arbitrary. An arbitrary assertion is the one which violates axioms, law of causality, invalidates senses as a means of knowledge or evades the well established body of knowledge. It has nothing to do with probability. Snow in Johannesburg is a rare event, like elephants in Bloomfield, but it happened nevertheless. However if you say that snow in Johannesburg will fall BECAUSE it falls in Connecticut, that would be an arbitrary assertion-violation of causality.

[Brant Gaede]

So far all I've gotten is the doctrine of the arbitrary assertion is arbitrary. It seems to proclaim an inability or lack of interest in simple examination of logical or illogical, rational or irrational, etc. The lack of interest is one thing; using it as a foundation for high moral dudgeon--I'm above all that and it's important I'm above it and that you know why I'm above it and if you don't get up on the platform with me (actually up on the platform but stand behind me; this is my show) you're irrational, immoral and took the evil Brandens' side way back then when they done Rand wrong--quite another.

--Brant

cult talk

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts.

Leonid,

Let's look at this. In order to make this statement of fact as the fact you stated, you need to be a mind-reader or a ghost or some other supernatural entity. That's the only way you can know for sure if Ellen read your previous posts or not.

(It's entirely possible that she read them and ended up interpreting them differently than you did, but that is not covered in your statement, which is all-inclusive, i.e., a fact.)

We know that mind-readers and ghosts do not exist. So, essentially, according to the argument about the arbitrary you promote, there is no referent to do the heavy lifting in your statement. There is no entity. What you implicitly refer to--the entity that has the power to know what you stated--the mind reader or the ghost--has no correspondence in reality.

Therefore, your statement is arbitrary. It needs no further consideration as it has no cognitive content.

Nor, for that matter, does the rest of your post, since it is based on your arbitrary premise.

In other words, it is a waste of time to read your comment. Actually, it's worse than a waste of time. It's evil. To engage one's mind with the arbitrary is irrational, and we all know that irrational = immoral.

(Just funnin' with ya'... But look at the mess you get into when you treat arbitrary as a synonym for fantasy or imaginary, then try to apply it as a blanket rule of logic. )

Michael

[Leonid]

Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts.

Leonid,

Let's look at this. In order to make this statement of fact as the fact you stated, you need to be a mind-reader or a ghost or some other supernatural entity. That's the only way you can know for sure if Ellen read your previous posts or not.

(It's entirely possible that she read them and ended up interpreting them differently than you did, but that is not covered in your statement, which is all-inclusive, i.e., a fact.)

We know that mind-readers and ghosts do not exist. So, essentially, according to the argument about the arbitrary you promote, there is no referent to do the heavy lifting in your statement. There is no entity. What you implicitly refer to--the entity that has the power to know what you stated--the mind reader or the ghost--has no correspondence in reality.

Therefore, your statement is arbitrary. It needs no further consideration as it has no cognitive content.

Nor, for that matter, does the rest of your post, since it is based on your arbitrary premise.

In other words, it is a waste of time to read your comment. Actually, it's worse than a waste of time. It's evil. To engage one's mind with the arbitrary is irrational, and we all know that irrational = immoral.

(Just funnin' with ya'... But look at the mess you get into when you treat arbitrary as a synonym for fantasy or imaginary, then try to apply it as a blanket rule of logic. )

Michael

If you read my post you'd know that this is not a case. My statement doesn't deny any axiom, law of identity and causality, doesn't invalidate senses and doesn't evade the established body of knowledge. It also has nothing to do with mind reading, but represents a conclusion from the reading of Ellen's post, its cognitive assessment. This conclusion could be false or true, but definitely not arbitrary. And I do not treat fantasy or imaginary as arbitrary, providing that one doesn't take fantasy for real. Even 5 years olds don't take fairly tales for real and don't believe in Santa Klaus. Amazing that when they grow up, they believe in God.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

If you read my post you'd know that this is not a case. My statement doesn't deny any axiom, law of identity and causality, doesn't invalidate senses and doesn't evade the established body of knowledge. It also has nothing to do with mind reading, but represents a conclusion from the reading of Ellen's post, its cognitive assessment.

Leonid,

Bull.

An assessment would be "Ellen, it appears to me like you didn't read my previous posts."

Or maybe, "In my assessment, your comments lead me to believe you didn't read my previous posts."

But you didn't say that. You said: "Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts."

That's not an assessment. That's a fact.

One you have no way of knowing for sure without being in Ellen's head. And that denies more axioms, laws of identity and causality, and invalidates the senses in more ways than I can think of right now.

Deny it if you want, but this isn't rocket science.

It's simple English.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

I've been in Ellen's head. I was lucky to get out alive.

--Brant

don't go there

[Leonid]

If you read my post you'd know that this is not a case. My statement doesn't deny any axiom, law of identity and causality, doesn't invalidate senses and doesn't evade the established body of knowledge. It also has nothing to do with mind reading, but represents a conclusion from the reading of Ellen's post, its cognitive assessment.

Leonid,

Bull.

An assessment would be "Ellen, it appears to me like you didn't read my previous posts."

Or maybe, "In my assessment, your comments lead me to believe you didn't read my previous posts."

But you didn't say that. You said: "Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts."

That's not an assessment. That's a fact.

One you have no way of knowing for sure without being in Ellen's head. And that denies more axioms, laws of identity and causality, and invalidates the senses in more ways than I can think of right now.

Deny it if you want, but this isn't rocket science.

It's simple English.

Michael

It's not a fact but conclusion. In fact I should have write : Because Ellen said A, B, C, it's quite obvious that she didn't read my previous posts. But simple English allows to present final conclusion without lengthy elaborations. It's a figure of speech. I think you understand that as well as I do. Do you have any comments which pertain to the subject matter?

[Brant Gaede]

Not obvious at all. What you think, what you know and what you think you know are three different things and categories. We have an intellectual give and take etiquette for the same reason the teacher doesn't run her nails across the blackboard: it's grating. You might have better said, "Ellen, did you read my previous posts, because . . . ?" That hits the ball back to her court where it belongs, not out of the stadium requiring her to chase it down with time-wasting questions about how you knew that about that just to get rid of the bad taste and premise you foisted off on her. In other words, you are really not entitled to tell her what she did or didn't do; that's her entitlement.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

But simple English allows to present final conclusion without lengthy elaborations. It's a figure of speech. I think you understand that as well as I do. Do you have any comments which pertain to the subject matter?

Leonid,

Have it your way.

You didn't learn English.

That's a conclusion, not a fact. But it's actually a fact.

Michael

EDIT: I can't resist. This way of using English is just so darn arbitrary...

[Leonid]

"You didn't learn English."- you are darn right. However if I say " It's raining"-do you expect me to give a full account how I arrived to such a conclusion and if not, would you condemn such a statement as arbitrary? It seems that in this particular case it is you who tries to stretch boundaries. Do you want to discuss linguistics or we can go back to the subject matter?

[Leonid]

Not obvious at all. What you think, what you know and what you think you know are three different things and categories. We have an intellectual give and take etiquette for the same reason the teacher doesn't run her nails across the blackboard: it's grating. You might have better said, "Ellen, did you read my previous posts, because . . . ?" That hits the ball back to her court where it belongs, not out of the stadium requiring her to chase it down with time-wasting questions about how you knew that about that just to get rid of the bad taste and premise you foisted off on her. In other words, you are really not entitled to tell her what she did or didn't do; that's her entitlement.

--Brant

I don't argue against that. I already said that my statement could be false or true conclusion, but in any case not arbitrary.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

... if I say " It's raining"-do you expect me to give a full account how I arrived to such a conclusion and if not, would you condemn such a statement as arbitrary?

Leonid,

Timelines are marvelous things. And so is observation. You are talking about an observable event in the present. All I have to do is look. But we can change tense. If you said, "It was raining" and I did not observe it, I would implicitly assume you observed it, or relied on information of someone else who observed it.

When you claim, "Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts," you are not in the same category of statement. There is no way to observe whether she did or not.

As to your complaint about linguistics, how on earth are you going to claim some words/concepts are arbitrary and others not and totally ignore linguistics?

If you use words in an arbitrary or fuzzy manner, how do you expect conceptual clarity in something as thorny as an "arbitrary assertion" according to Peikoff's meaning?

Clarity is a good thing, not a bad one. Clarity of both words and concepts is "the subject matter" to me in this discussion.

Michael

[Jonathan]

Clarity is a good thing, not a bad one.

And yet you're having a discussion with Leonid!!!

J

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Jonathan,

LOL...

But you ought to see what is in my brain.

Leonid's a good dude with a good heart. English is not his first language, so he could have taken my quip in a bad way, but he laughed. He understood my intent, which was not hostile. In my book, that's an indication of a good person.

Leonid comes to his own conclusions from his own reasoning (including when using arguments he got from other people), sticks to his guns until convinced otherwise, and he's honest about it. Even in disagreement, I like this about him.

As far as the "conviincing otherwise" part goes, though...

Like they say about certain women, you better bring your lunch. You're going to be a while...

Michael

[Leonid]

... if I say " It's raining"-do you expect me to give a full account how I arrived to such a conclusion and if not, would you condemn such a statement as arbitrary?

Leonid,

Timelines are marvelous things. And so is observation. You are talking about an observable event in the present. All I have to do is look. But we can change tense. If you said, "It was raining" and I did not observe it, I would implicitly assume you observed it, or relied on information of someone else who observed it.

When you claim, "Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts," you are not in the same category of statement. There is no way to observe whether she did or not.

As to your complaint about linguistics, how on earth are you going to claim some words/concepts are arbitrary and others not and totally ignore linguistics?

If you use words in an arbitrary or fuzzy manner, how do you expect conceptual clarity in something as thorny as an "arbitrary assertion" according to Peikoff's meaning?

Clarity is a good thing, not a bad one. Clarity of both words and concepts is "the subject matter" to me in this discussion.

Michael

I don't ignore linguistic. I just asked whether or not you want to discuss it on this thread. It's quite a big issue which includes the ambiguity of language, use of metaphors, idioms, context, etc...If i have to define and explain every word in the statement " It's raining" and then to explain and define every word in the definitions and explanations ad infinitum no amount of computer power which exist at present and may exist in the future will be enough to complete the job in our life time. Most of the things we understand from the context even if we use poorly defined or incomplete sentences. So in the context of my conversation with Ellen the meaning of my statement is clear. It means " Ellen, I think you never read my posts". Why you want to multiply entities beyond necessity?

[Ellen Stuttle]

Ellen, you didn't read my previous posts.

Yes, I did -- and I think that someone who's not inside my head could pretty safely conclude that I did, considering the amount of detail from your posts I cited in responding to you.

I gave a definition of arbitrary. An arbitrary assertion is the one which violates axioms, law of causality, invalidates senses as a means of knowledge or evades the well established body of knowledge.

I know you gave a definition of arbitrary. However, I've said that I don't use "arbitrary" in the Peikovian way you use it. Thus I think that if you were tracking the sequence of posts, you wouldn't need to ask "Why arbitrary?" in regard to something I said using my -- not your -- definition.

All clear?

Ellen

PS: You have yet to provide any even slightly plausible basis for claiming that an elephant might be in my back yard.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

... Most of the things we understand from the context even if we use poorly defined or incomplete sentences. So in the context of my conversation with Ellen the meaning of my statement is clear. It means " Ellen, I think you never read my posts". Why you want to multiply entities beyond necessity?

Leonid,

The meaning is so clear I didn't understand it and neither did Brant. Maybe this is due to our inferior brains?

I'm sure we're not the only ones, either, so there are probably a lot more inferior brains wandering about in these parts...

There is one meaning I got from your statement that I didn't comment on, and it is not a good one. Rand called it connotation. And here's the meaning I found connoted: dismissive presumptuousness. A kind of snobbery--a way of proclaiming, without proclaiming, that you have superior mental equipment, or use of it, over Ellen's.

It's a competitive meaning. A put down.

Were you dueling with her or discussing an idea?

That's a premise to check.

But suddenly I find myself interested in your new presumption--this time about me.

Do I want to multiply entities?

Hmmmmm...

I don't know. You imply I do, but I honestly don't know.

I had to increase the kinds of entities to include a couple of imaginary ones in order to make some logical sense out of your "arbitrary assertion" about Ellen, but multiplication was the furthest thing from my mind at the time.

Anyway, Rand's razor cuts on both sides of the blade. You don't just avoid multiplying concepts beyond necessity. You're not supposed to integrate a concept in disregard of necessity, either. Granted, we are talking about propositions in the form of assertions, not concepts per se, but I'm cool with extending the rules to them.

So to claim that your words don't have to mean what they mean, that they can mean something contrary, that the context is more important than their meaning--nay, that it actually replaces their meaning and makes your intended one clear, is a total disregard of necessity.

If this were true, why use any specific words or statements at all to communicate your meaning? Just stick with the context and your message should be clear.

(Good luck with that, too.)

In my view, both context and word (or statement) should be clear, with one shedding light on the other, not one contradicting the other and thus somehow being replaced by it.

Are we dueling over ITOE?

Michael

[Leonid]

... Most of the things we understand from the context even if we use poorly defined or incomplete sentences. So in the context of my conversation with Ellen the meaning of my statement is clear. It means " Ellen, I think you never read my posts". Why you want to multiply entities beyond necessity?

Leonid,

The meaning is so clear I didn't understand it and neither did Brant. Maybe this is due to our inferior brains?

I'm sure we're not the only ones, either, so there are probably a lot more inferior brains wandering about in these parts...

There is one meaning I got from your statement that I didn't comment on, and it is not a good one. Rand called it connotation. And here's the meaning I found connoted: dismissive presumptuousness. A kind of snobbery--a way of proclaiming, without proclaiming, that you have superior mental equipment, or use of it, over Ellen's.

It's a competitive meaning. A put down.

Were you dueling with her or discussing an idea?

That's a premise to check.

But suddenly I find myself interested in your new presumption--this time about me.

Do I want to multiply entities?

Hmmmmm...

I don't know. You imply I do, but I honestly don't know.

I had to increase the kinds of entities to include a couple of imaginary ones in order to make some logical sense out of your "arbitrary assertion" about Ellen, but multiplication was the furthest thing from my mind at the time.

Anyway, Rand's razor cuts on both sides of the blade. You don't just avoid multiplying concepts beyond necessity. You're not supposed to integrate a concept in disregard of necessity, either. Granted, we are talking about propositions in the form of assertions, not concepts per se, but I'm cool with extending the rules to them.

So to claim that your words don't have to mean what they mean, that they can mean something contrary, that the context is more important than their meaning--nay, that it actually replaces their meaning and makes your intended one clear, is a total disregard of necessity.

If this were true, why use any specific words or statements at all to communicate your meaning? Just stick with the context and your message should be clear.

(Good luck with that, too.)

In my view, both context and word (or statement) should be clear, with one shedding light on the other, not one contradicting the other and thus somehow being replaced by it.

Are we dueling over ITOE?

Michael

I don't think I snob anyone, in any case it wasn't my intention. I'm sorry that you perceive it like that. I'd agree that one should state his ideas as clear as possible, but there is no way to avoid the ambiguity of language. If you were understanding everything literally and ignoring context, that would make a communication almost impossible. Why don't you protest for example against my use of expression " You are stretching the boundaries". Taking literally it also sounds like arbitrary statement. However one cannot "stick with the context " without using words. It would mean impossible meaning-words dichotomy.Yes, people are not omniscient and misunderstanding always could take place. In such a case one should clarify the meaning. In my case I think that by now I made the meaning of my response to Ellen crystal clear. She said that I didn't defined arbitrary in spite the fact that i did it many times over. On this ground I concluded that she never read my posts. What is arbitrary about that? If you object to the metaphorical form in which I expressed my conclusion, I'd try to avoid such a form in the future.

[Ellen Stuttle]

[Ellen] said that I didn't defined arbitrary [...].

No, I didn't say that, and I haven't a clue what I said that you interpreted as my saying that.

Ellen

[Leonid]

[Ellen] said that I didn't defined arbitrary [...].

No, I didn't say that, and I haven't a clue what I said that you interpreted as my saying that.

Ellen

Post #126 "Your subsequent comments don't address the meaning of "arbitrary" I'm using (which I'll repeat: "not adequately grounded in evidence to require checking out for truth or falsity").

I think that my definition pretty much matches yours. The difference, however, is that my definition allows quick diagnosis of arbitrary without any further investigation. After all, that was Dr. Campbell's problem. I've shown that arbitrary assertion in principle cannot be investigated by any rational means.

[Ellen Stuttle]

[ES] Post #126 "Your subsequent comments don't address the meaning of "arbitrary" I'm using (which I'll repeat: "not adequately grounded in evidence to require checking out for truth or falsity").

I think that my definition pretty much matches yours.

How so? For instance, in post #104 you wrote:

It is important to distinguish between false, invalid or arbitrary because in Objectivism arbitrary has no epistemological status whatsoever. One cannot argue or disprove the arbitrary assertion by rational means of cognition.

In post #116, you spoke of "the difference between false, true and arbitary."

And in post #128 you wrote:

An arbitrary assertion is the one which violates axioms, law of causality, invalidates senses as a means of knowledge or evades the well established body of knowledge.

You also indicate that something which has any possibility of occurring isn't "arbitrary" (post #128, for instance).

Thus, if I understand your meaning correctly, you, like Peikoff, consider "arbitrary" a third category to "true" or "false."

(Your "evad[ing] the well established body of knowledge" (#128) seems to muddy things, since, for example, one could be making a supposedly scientific claim and citing some evidence while evading other available evidence. Nonetheless, most of your descriptions indicate that you think of "arbitrary" as separate from true/false.)

I on the other hand do not use "arbitrary" to refer to a separate category outside the range of truth/falsity. An "arbitrary" assertion or hypothesis, as I'm using "arbitrary," is true or false or some combination of true parts and false parts. It just isn't offered with enough evidential basis for supposing it might be true to require the time expenditure of checking it out for truth/falsity. It's ungrounded as posited, but not therefore a separate category in terms of its relationship to reality.

Ellen

[Leonid]

Ellen wrote "I on the other hand do not use "arbitrary" to refer to a separate category outside the range of truth/falsity"

Why to use concept "arbitrary" then, if it doesn't designate any category outside of false and true? However you are clearly separate arbitrary from these two categories . You said " ""arbitrary" not adequately grounded in evidence to require checking out for truth or falsity"). Every arbitrary according to your definition would be also arbitrary in accordance to mine and vice versa. That why definitions match. However I showed why arbitrary is not and cannot be grounded in evidence in principle.

[Ellen Stuttle]

Leonid,

Sorry for the delay. I've been busy with some projects which had deadlines.

Why to use concept "arbitrary" then, if it doesn't designate any category outside of false and true?

See my posts #93 and #109.

Ironically, in your claims about the possible presence of an elephant in my back yard, you've given a good little demonstration of just what I mean by "arbitrary."

However you are clearly separate arbitrary from these two categories [true and false] . You said " ""arbitrary" not adequately grounded in evidence to require checking out for truth or falsity").

I think that I'm "clearly" -- in my understanding of English -- NOT separating "arbitrary" from truth/falsity.

I wonder, are you perchance interpreting my description of an arbitrary assertion or hypothesis as one not requiring checking out for truth or falsity as meaning an assertion or hypothesis which can't be tested for truth or falsity? It doesn't mean that, but instead implies something the truth value of which can be tested.

Every arbitrary according to your definition would be also arbitrary in accordance to mine and vice versa.

No. I do not mean an assertion which (quoting you) "violates axioms, law of causality, invalidates senses as a means of knowledge [...]." As I said in post #148, your fourth criterion -- "evades the well established body of knowledge"-- muddies things, since that description could apply to an assertion which can be tested for truth/falsity.

For an example on the "vice versa" side, you don't classify your claims about an elephant in my back yard as arbitrary, and I do.

However I showed why arbitrary is not and cannot be grounded in evidence in principle.

I'd use different terms -- self-refuting, internally contradictory, unfalsifiable -- for the first three categories you cite.

Ellen