Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Yitzhak Sapir" <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>]

On 10/24/07, Kevin Riley wrote:

> The claim is that the Hebrew X represents two sounds, not that two letters
> merged in Hebrew.  It is believed by most Semiticists, so I am surprised you
> don't consider it worth considering.  But, that is your choice - you are
> free to believe whatever you want to.  I am curious, however, as to what you
> would replace observation with as a tool - surely you would not support
> theoretical speculation without any observed evidence?

Observations are one method of theories for falsification.  This is not to say
that the only use for observations are falsification, but clearly a major use
is to falsify other theories.  A theory suggests various predictions, and 
those
predictions can then be tested by observations.  Should the observations
fail to observe what is predicted, the theory has been falsified.  If you do
away with observations, you do away with the ability to test predictions.
If you can't test predictions, you may have no reason to offer predictions
in the first place.  Perhaps Mr. Fried would like to offer a theory that 
cannot
be falsified and this is the reason for his diminished value of observations.
But then, if Mr. Fried's theory cannot be falsified, it is not scientific.

Yitzhak Sapir