A fallacy where one insists that only claims supported by scientific evidence (as narrowly defined) can be considered real, true, or worthy of belief—dismissing all other forms of knowledge, experience, and
understanding as illusory or meaningless. The
Evidentialist Fallacy mistakes one mode of knowing for the only mode of knowing, treating empirical evidence as the sole legitimate path to truth while ignoring that evidence itself rests on
philosophical assumptions (like the reliability of perception, the uniformity of nature) that cannot be empirically proven. It's the fallacy behind "if you can't prove it in a lab, it doesn't exist"—a position that would dismiss love, justice, beauty, meaning, and most of what makes life worth living.
Example: "He claimed his friend's
depression wasn't 'real' because you couldn't measure it with a
blood test—pure
Evidentialist Fallacy, mistaking the absence of one kind of evidence for the absence of reality itself."
