A. What observations would you expect to make if this statement were true that you would not expect to make if this statement were false, or vice-versa?

1. Bismarck is the capital of North Dakota.

In the political structure of the United States of America, the capital city of a state is the city housing the state government. A good way of checking which city this might be is to find the state capitol building - the building where the legislative branch meets. Therefore, if the capital of North Dakota is in Bismarck, one should expect to find the state capitol there.

2. The universe does not exist; all existence is imaginary.

There appear to be no observations which would refute this statement. There is no logical reason why any given imaginary observation would be otherwise than it is, and stating that all existence is imaginary implies that there is no non-imaginary with which the universe can be compared to show a difference.

3. The earth is flat.

There are many obvious implications of this belief - facts which would be more likely not to hold if the earth were some other shape. A selection:

a. The earth would have edges. If you proceeded in a straight line for long enough, you would encounter the edge of the earth.

b. Where the horizon was not an elevated point (e.g. a mountain), the horizon would be the edge of the earth - as the entirety of any plane figure is visible from any point above that figure.

c. Gravity would be parallel at all points. If Alice through a telescope as Bob, many miles distant, dropped an object, she would see that object fall along a trajectory parallel to the trajectory through which an object dropped at her location would fall.

d. All celestial objects - the sun, the moon, the planets, the stars - would rise and set simultaneously at all locations on Earth.

4. The comic book Queen & Country is based on the British ITV series The Sandbaggers.

One identifies the inspiration one creative work takes from another by those features which are, first, common to those works but uncommon in the wider genre, and second, not likely to be created by independent development. Both Queen & Country and The Sandbaggers are spy fiction; therefore, the evidence that Queen & Country is based on The Sandbaggers would be found in those aspects of the former which are rare in spy fiction but exist in The Sandbaggers, such as the existence of a group of three special agents within British intelligence.

5. Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter is a good book.

What are the distinguishing features of a "good book"? Common usage suggests several factors which are common (although not universal) in good books:

a. A good book is readable. It should not be overly difficult to read, understand, and finish the book.

b. A good book is enjoyable. The reader should gain pleasure while reading it, and pleasure while remembering having read it.

c. A good book is informative. The reader ought to come away from the book with true knowledge they did not have before reading it.

d. A good book is well-organized. Related material should appear together, or, where it does not, references should be made to the related material.

e. A good book is original. It should provide new knowledge, new organization of knowledge, newly enjoyable presentation of knowledge, or newly clarified presentation of knowledge, or some combination of all of the above.

Criteria such as these are more likely to be met by good books than by poor books.

6. "A Visit from St. Nicholas" (a.k.a. "Twas the Night Before Christmas") was written by Clement Clarke Moore.

Determining authorship is a complicated matter, but there are several lines of evidence which could be compiled on the subject:

a. The existence of drafts. If, among an author's papers, are found numerous pre-publication versions of a work (as is the case with Lincoln's speech at Gettysburg), this renders strong evidence that the author was the proximate creator of the work.

b. If the work is written in a style which is distinctive to other works attributed to that author, this supports the conjecture that all these works were composed by the same hand. Inversely, if the work is written in a style discordant with the remainder of an author's body of work, this suggests that it was not likely to have been written by that author.

c. Attribution. Other factors being equal, if the original publications attribute the work to an author, that attribution may usually be believed.

d. Date. If a work was originally composed when the purported author was not writing (e.g. before their birth or after their death), this refutes the premise that the author created it.

e. Content. If the work contains information which the purported author did not know or did not believe, that suggests the author did not create it.

7. Herbert Hoover was left-handed.

Left-handedness manifests in several ways in the behavior of an individual - writing and drawing being the most obvious. If Herbert Hoover were left-handed, one would have a greater expectation of seeing photographs of him writing or drawing with his left hand and less with his right. One would also expect accounts (for example, in letters, diaries, etc.) wherein his handedness was mentioned to state that he was left, not right, handed.

B. In the song "Thou Shalt Always Kill", what does "The Beatles were just a band" mean?

This is a difficult one. Clearly the Beatles were a band, but to say that they were "just" a band seems to indicate an additional claim which is not well defined. While it is possible to ascribe meaning to the statement in some contexts, without evidence that it was composed with that meaning in mind, it holds no factual value. Indeed, if one considers the statement in its original context, one finds that it, like the one preceding it, serves as an reprimand against fandom rather than a statement of fact.

You could add the date of creation question to A-4. If Queen and Country came out before The Sandbaggers, that would refute the assertion that Sandbaggers influenced it. Other than that, this looks really good. I'm very pleased that this project is actually underway. Upvoted (and if I could upvote more than once, I would).

Basically agree with your (A) answers, though I'd also add that even if a person hadn't read GEB, they could also expect that a long-lasting following for a book is more likely for a good book.

As far as (B), it cashes out for me into a complex of descriptive and normative claims. Among the descriptive claims are that it is possible for someone to excel legendary band X in their own genre (it would be hard though not theoretically impossible to find a good judge of genre quality who wasn't biased by knowing the legendary band).

Very, very nice! One quick suggestion: could you change the order of exercise A slightly so that it's in ascending order of difficulty? Judging from the other comments on this page, #2 and #5 are the most vague (and thus more difficult) and #7 was very easy.

Minor quibbles aside, I highly approve of this endeavor--well done!