{
  "id": "a_dlknoszo",
  "oid": 164902,
  "revision": 1,
  "revision_oid": 164903,
  "work": "orthodoxy",
  "edition": "pg16769-r1",
  "title": "An objection can fail without the claim becoming true",
  "anchors": [
    {
      "unit": "CH02.P008",
      "oid": 26,
      "role": null,
      "edition": "pg16769-r1",
      "paragraph": "CH02.P008",
      "exact": "the insane explanation, if not conclusive, is at least unanswerable",
      "start": 135,
      "end": 202,
      "prefix": "ry. Or, to speak more strictly, ",
      "suffix": "; this may be observed specially",
      "url": "/orthodoxy/pg16769-r1/CH02.P008#char=135,202"
    }
  ],
  "body_markdown": "The qualification distinguishes proving a claim from defeating one attempted refutation. A conspirator might deny a conspiracy; consequently denial alone cannot conclusively disprove one. But this does not establish that a conspiracy exists, or that its explanation and an innocent explanation deserve equal confidence. Chesterton's examples expose the weakness of an appeal to general rejection; they do not exhaust the evidence that could distinguish the alternatives. His assertion that one 'cannot dispute it except' through denials therefore overstates what the examples establish.\n\nA useful earlier comparison is Locke's *Essay concerning Human Understanding*, II.xi.13. Locke separates the capacity to reason from the truth of its starting points: someone imagining himself a king may draw appropriate conclusions about the obedience he should receive. The inspected witness is the 1690 title-dated edition, printed p. 71. Its imagined king closely resembles Chesterton's example, but resemblance does not establish borrowing. Locke locates the error in wrongly joined ideas; Chesterton emphasizes how an explanation can absorb the objections offered against it. Neither formal consistency nor the failure of one objection supplies missing evidence. [Locke, II.xi.13](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:An_Essay_Concerning_Humane_Understanding_-_Locke_(1690).djvu/87).",
  "sources": [
    {
      "url": "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:An_Essay_Concerning_Humane_Understanding_-_Locke_(1690).djvu/87",
      "title": "John Locke, An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, 1690 title-dated edition",
      "locator": "Book II, chapter XI, §13; printed p. 71, scan image 87",
      "exact": null
    }
  ],
  "citations": [],
  "external_references": [
    {
      "url": "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:An_Essay_Concerning_Humane_Understanding_-_Locke_(1690",
      "title": "Locke, II.xi.13"
    }
  ],
  "limits": [
    "No evidence of direct influence from Locke was established.",
    "This assesses the structure of the examples, not a clinical claim about all people experiencing delusions."
  ],
  "metadata": {
    "run": "chapter-02-restart-2026-11-07",
    "paragraph_investigator": "P008",
    "task": [
      {
        "approach": "Philosophical contextualization: then and since",
        "question": "What distinguishes an explanation's immunity to a particular objection from its truth, and how does Locke's account of reasoning from false premises illuminate Chesterton's examples?"
      },
      {
        "approach": "Biblical references",
        "question": "Which Gospel passages illuminate the rejected claimant to divinity, and does the Gospel itself distinguish rejection from evidence?"
      }
    ],
    "model": "gpt-6.1-sol"
  },
  "content_sha256": "sha256:44a6aeb15d27be9b8528beece18b6050979209d99ade3b19453be61d794aad2a",
  "created_at": "2026-11-07T16:10:56Z",
  "is_current": true,
  "url": "/a/a_dlknoszo",
  "revision_path": "/a/a_dlknoszo/r/1",
  "cited_by": []
}