What does “Evidence” and “Trust” mean for Xin Rui?
Xin Rui is a human, plain and simple. He sometimes performs, sometimes philosophises, but always seeks to learn more about the world.
When we use language, we often mean different things because of different life experiences and life stories.
Darryl Lim 00:00
What does EVIDENCE mean for you?
Xin Rui 00:03
Evidence, in a way, I see, is... evidence is any observable and verifiable fact or phenomenon or, like, just something, yeah, something that is in line with a given hypothesis. So if I suppose that there is an elephant in my room, I look around if I see the ear of an elephant, that adds to it. But if I only see the ear alone, that's not enough to say there's an elephant in my room, right? Even if I see an elephant in my room, I reach out to touch it. If my hand goes through it, I have a hallucination. So that's unlikely that there's a real elephant in my room at that point. So yeah, that kind of thing. So evidence is something that I can either by myself, can reach out and in some physical or in some sense, be it physical or in some other way, ascertain that it's there, or its effects are there, or it's something that someone... and I would accept [if] someone I trust in this particular field has done some experiment, at least if they purported to have, and then they provided [that] to me. So if a scientist was well-versed in quantum mechanics, tells me something new about quarks and electrons. I would trust them more than I would trust a biologist, telling me something new about quarks and electrons. I would consider the quantum physicist's statement of their discovery as having a higher evidentiary value, as compared to the biologist.
Darryl Lim 01:42
How did you come to this definition of evidence?
Xin Rui 01:47
I mean, on one hand, I consume a lot of media. I think scientific training also helps, like minimal as though it might be in school, like the whole idea that if you do a titration with these exact amounts, and you do it the correct way, and you see it before... you see it with your classmates, and when you do it, and it's different, you know that there's something going on with yours because... and then when you do it again, and you get the result because you were more precise this time, or whatever, that shows that there is something that's reliable and reproducible. And the fact that you trust the science teacher, despite the fact that you may not have seen them do the experiment, although most of the time they do, they demonstrate SPA (Science Practical Assessment). But you trust them because they happen to be more studied in the field, and they know more about it than me. But of course, some science teachers simplify things, right? And as we go along, we find people who are more studied, who provide a differing account that seems to mesh more with reality, and then at that point, you ditch [the previous thing]. So it's like a whole thing about growing up, looking at how we learn, looking at the system we went through, looking at people with trust and the information we learn, and then seeing the information being torn down by either new experiments that you performed yourself, like and... maybe the way I thought that. I'mtrying to think of a specific example, but it's very hard to bring one to mind just off the top of my head.
Darryl Lim 03:12
The word TRUST comes up a lot. Like, what does it mean for you? TRUST.
Xin Rui 03:16
If someone has a demonstrated track record of providing accurate information, I think, it would be what I think of trust... Like, actually no. Sincere and true information. I think is what I would require for trust so someone who's provided me with like... who has consistently provided me with sincere and true information so sincere in the sense that they were not trying to make fun of me, they were not trying to lie to me. So for example, I think I mean, I had a bunch of friends growing up, and when I say consistent and and sincere and true, I don't just mean like about the world. I also think it's about themselves, like when I have a friend who is... I had a bunch of friends in secondary school, some of them, when they got into the "in group", I was instantly just... Bye, bye. [I left the group.] And some of them who had told me they were my friends, who had told me we would spend time together, we would do things together, they didn't, even when they had the chance. So that, in a sense, it's sincere and true information about them. But even then, I will proportion how much trust I put in them, into the claim that's been made. So any claim they make about themselves, if they have provided that sincere and true information about themselves in the past, I would trust them, but if they're only given sincere and true accounts or like information about themselves, and now they suddenly make a claim about the universe, then I would question.
Darryl Lim 04:48
So this whole idea of trust, you have brought in certain specific details, but it's still within the conceptual realm. Do you have like a concrete example of how TRUST works for you?
Xin Rui 05:01
I have a friend in secondary school. He's very good at math, so he and I would be the kind of people who would do homework in advance in class, and so like, when he tells me, 'You got this wrong,' but he doesn't tell me how he knows or why he knows. Generally speaking, given that A) he is a very sincere person who tries to give true information in both the context of himself and in math -- and I think he's actually very bad at lying as well, or he doesn't see the purpose in it -- in that sense, when he tells me I'm wrong, even though he has not provided an account, I have seen him demonstrate his skills in the past. I have not ever seen him try to tell me I'm wrong or I'm right when I am not, just to make fun of me or something. So at that moment, I believe when he tells me, 'Your answer is wrong,' I [will] look over the question again. So in that sense, I don't know if that's concrete enough, but that's the trust that I afford to him in math and as a person who's telling me that I'm wrong about something.
Darryl Lim 06:01
How did you come to define trust like this?
Xin Rui 06:08
I feel like, that's quite intuitive because, like if I turn it around, just to kind of broaden my understanding of where you're coming from. What is your idea of trust?
Darryl Lim 06:18
My idea of trust is: trust is given, not built.
Xin Rui 06:21
It's given freely?
Darryl Lim 06:22
You give. You cannot... You cannot earn trust. You cannot build trust. You have to give. And that's why, when people break your trust, it hurts, yeah.
Xin Rui 06:35
Okay. Then when do you start to give trust? Or do you just start from the moment that someone says hi?
Darryl Lim 06:42
When someone says hi, and then you decide, okay, I want to give, you are risking certain parts of yourself. That's my point of view. Then when you give and you risk certain parts of yourself. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't, because you never know. And then if, let's say, some trust is broken, you get hurt and you want to reconcile? Because once you say you have to earn... I don't know. What is "earn back trust again"? Because if you think about it, if that person has done something and then, in normal conventional terms, that person has to earn back the trust, how to earn? One time they show you? Two times? Three times? A few days? A few years? If you think about it, there's no specific kind of way in which you can earn or put a number to the earning. So ultimately, you have to say, 'Okay, I give it to you.'
Xin Rui 07:37
So from I see it's a matter of degree, right? Like when I first meet someone, I would trust them to a certain extent, in certain facts. For example, if I meet someone new on the street and they tell me they've had dengue before, sure I believe you. I have no reason not to, and believing you will not change anything significant about my life. Maybe I'll treat you a bit nicer, because I also had dengue before, so I really share that one experience, even though dengue symptoms vary from person to person, but in that sense... but if they told me, jump off this cliff and you will receive a million dollars, I will not believe them. I will not trust them on that count, right? Would you? If someone random off the street told you these two contrasting... these two different facts? If they tell you I've had dengue before, would you trust them?
Darryl Lim 08:28
Let's bring in even [more] nuanced examples, like, when I was overseas recently, and I met my driver for the first time, he offered to help me pull my luggage along. So I was like, Oh, sure, but then I needed to go to the toilet. At that moment, I had the choice whether I could trust him. It was a choice to say, Okay, never mind, I give it to you, and then I go to the toilet and back [and leave my luggage with him]. So I think, for me, it was a... it did cross my mind. Oh, what if he just takes it away and, like, disappears? And it's a very, very high [risk], like, there's a possibility of that. So in anywhere, because you never know who human beings are. So I feel like that's my idea of trust? Like, in your position, what would you do?
Xin Rui 09:25
Oh, I would absolutely bring my bag in with me. I think for me, the matter is, again, it's about the level of risk and the degree of familiarity, or the the amount of experience I've had with this person to understand who they are and what kind of person they are?
Darryl Lim 09:48
So my question is, what, what helped you arrive [at] this form of idea of... concepts of verification, evidence, trust... almost a corroborating process that you have with the whole idea of trust?
Xin Rui 10:05
I can answer theoretically where it likely comes from, but I don't remember any specific instance. Like everyone is born somewhat trusting, and then when that trust eventually gets broken, and then the way you react to that is how you approach trust in the future. I suspect a part of where it comes from is my trust having been broken before by someone, which leads me to give or proportion my trust much more carefully. But if you ask me when that happened, I can't really say, I don't remember anything specific.
Darryl Lim 10:47
How did you come to realize that you... it might be... not just one incident, but maybe a few that made you realize that, oh, you need to build trust?
Xin Rui 10:59
I'm not sure how much of it is real life experience and how much of it of its media consumption, like when you watch a show, like if you watch Tom and Jerry [a cartoon series] even, and there are times where Tom and Jerry pretend to be each other's friends, and then they get betrayed, and then you're like, why would they trust each other in this moment? Like, they've clearly been at odds for a longest time. There is the conspiracy theory that they're both friends and just pretending so both of them can stay in this house. But in the moment when you haven't heard of the conspiracy theory, like, why would he trust him? They've been fighting all this while. He clearly doesn't wish him well. So this act of trust was foolishly given and resulted in, let's say, when Jerry pretends to be helping Tom fight another cat who's been brought in to compete with him in the house, right? And then you know that Jerry is just trying to save himself. And every time you see him betray Tom, you're like, why would he extend that trust in that moment? But apart from that, I'm trying to think of a real life example in which my trust was betrayed, which would lead to my current stance on [trust]. Maybe it's not about a trust being broken or betrayed, but in a sense, the trust... just realizing that some people can be wrong, like sincerely wrong. And that's where the true element comes from, and realizing that some people will try to tell you things, as though they're true, to make fun of you. I guess the earliest example I can remember this was when my dad and my mom both told me that my dad gave birth to me. I was young, when I was very young, and I went on to the school bus in primary school and said, like, when people say your mom gave birth to you, I'm like, no, my dad gave birth to me. And then I was relentlessly mocked on the school bus. I was always very okay with being weird, so I don't think I reacted particularly negatively beyond the fact that, how could you tell me that my dad was wrong? My dad's always right, or my dad and mom are both always right. So why tell me I'm wrong? But in that sense, then eventually I learned, you know, only women can give birth. So yeah, then there's this whole idea that, oh, even though I still trust him, he is still my dad, he still has... but that experience created an impression that you know, when someone makes a claim, you need to have more information to decide whether to trust it or not. Information on the person and information on the claim.
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