Evidence Analysis Issues

In today's blog post at http://www.legalgenealogist.com/2016/12/21/the-dog-that-did-bark/, Judy Russell corrected her response to a question posed at the end of her BCG webinar on negative evidence last night. As she writes, "The question was whether DNA results could be negative evidence, and, in my answer, the example I used of a case that could be negative evidence… isn’t," and she goes on to explain why.

Okay, here's a nice "nuance-y" question.  

It is generally accepted that a birth certificate contains primary information given by the parents at the time of the birth, and a marriage certificate contains primary information given by the bride and groom, so both documents are considered reliable.

But what if the information on the documents is actually a little fuzzier than that?  

Example (and let's assume for simplicity that both of these documents definitely refer to the correct people):

I'm looking for any advice on referencing clusters (or groups) of people when assembling units of evidence into a write-up. I need a convenient and meaningful reference system because of the large number of group references in this case.

I'm working on a huge problem to prove the identity of a single lady, but it has required me to use a cluster approach to piece together different families, and their generational relationships, from the groups described by the different sources.

Are gaps like 5-7 years in known children negative evidence or indirect evidence that there could be a missing child? Please explain. I think it fits the definition of negative evidence, but an associate of mine suggested it is indirect evidence.

Dear Editor,

Hello,

I am not sure this is the correct place to ask this but here goes.

When you are writing a case study or report and you come across a spelling variation for a  place name should you try and find a reference that lists the specific variation and then cite that source? 

I am assuming some variations are obvious and don't need a citation while others may not be so obvious and may require a reference. I am just not sure about when something is obvious. Just because it is obvious to me doesn't mean it is obvious to someone else!

Hi, I don't know much of anything about microfilm. I'm guessing the answer to the question in the subject is no but wanted to find out more about it. I am not speaking of originals that have been modified and then microfilmed (that has been ruled out in this case) but rather the modification of the finished microfilm itself. This would also include not obvious ways of inserting a new, modified picture onto an existing roll of microfilm that is derived from the unmodified microfilm picture that was removed from the reel (if any of those sort of ways even exist).

Can enlistment dates on a CMSR and in a pension application file be considered independent pieces of evidence?

I am working to differentiate two people of the name Jacob Sommer who lived in Philadelphia county during the Revolution.  The differentiator between the two individuals is mostly place - one lived in Germantown and the other lived in Moreland.