ABSTRACT
While charming and magical this Grimms’ fairy tale also illustrates how shoemaking follows the same process and logic as fact-finding, e.g., by scientists. For both, the first step is gathering materials – leather for the cobbler, observations for scientists. Next comes assembling the parts correctly to make a pair of shoes and factual conclusions. This means not using imaginary or inferior materials for shoes, or for scientific evidence. One of the last steps is often overlooked – providing an implicit warranty so that if a shoe falls apart on the first day of use, or a factual conclusion is disproved, cobbler and scientist will try to figure out what went wrong and correct it.
Supernatural elves help the cobbler, and they provide a good metaphor for extraordinary experiences that scientists sometimes use. Although science relies principally upon sensory evidence and thinking, extraordinary experiences, such as dreams or psychedelic images, can count as evidence – if corroborated by other means. The central process of factual conclusions is integrating all available evidence into a coherent conclusion, without specifying the nature of that evidence. This greatly expands the domain of fact-finding and dissolves the usual division between quantitative and qualitative fact-finding – evidence is evidence, if corroborated.
