Often a fact will be claimed in argument under the implied authority of a specific pedagogy, such as scientific facts or historical facts. Dispute may arise in defining the standard upon which the authority of the fact rests. Rhetorical use of the term often does not disclose from where the authority originates.

The common usage of, “something that has really occurred or is the case”, dates from the middle of the sixteenth century.[4] Fact is also synonymous with truth or reality, as distinguishable from conclusions or opinions. This use is found for instance in the phrase Matter of fact,[5] and in “… not history, nor fact, but imagination.”

Fact also indicates a matter under discussion deemed to be true or correct, such as to emphasize a point or prove a disputed issue; (e.g., “… the fact of the matter is …”).[6][7]

Alternatively, “fact” may also indicate an allegation or stipulation of something that may or may not be a “true fact”,[8] (e.g., “the author’s facts are not trustworthy”). This alternate usage, although contested by some, has a long history in standard English.[9]

Fact may also indicate findings derived through a process of evaluation, including review of testimony, direct observation, or otherwise; as distinguishable from matters of inference or speculation.[10] This use is reflected in the terms “fact-find” and “fact-finder” (e.g., “set up a fact-finding commission”).[11]

Fact in philosophy

In philosophy, the concept fact is considered in epistemology and ontology. Questions of objectivity and truth are closely associated with questions of fact. A “fact” can be defined as something which is the case, that is, the state of affairs reported by a true proposition.[12][13]

Facts may be understood as that which makes a true sentence true. For example, the statement “Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system” is made true by the fact that Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system. Facts may also be understood as those things to which a true sentence refers. The statement “Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system” is about the fact that Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system.[14]

[edit] Correspondence and the slingshot argument

Some versions of the correspondence theory of truth hold that what makes a sentence true is that it corresponds to a fact.[15] This theory presupposes the existence of an objective world.

The Slingshot argument claims to show that all true statements stand for the same thing – the truth value true. If this argument holds, and facts are taken to be what true statements stand for, then we reach the counter-intuitive conclusion that there is only one fact – “the truth”.[16]

[edit] Compound facts

Any non-trivial true statement about reality is necessarily an abstraction composed of a complex of objects and properties or relations.[17] For example, the fact described by the true statement “Paris is the capital city of France” implies that there is such a place as Paris, that there is such a place as France, that there are such things as capital cities, as well as that France has a government, that the government of France has the power to define its capital city, and that the French government has chosen Paris to be the capital, that there is such a thing as a “place” or a “government”, etc.. The verifiable accuracy of all of these assertions, if facts themselves, may coincide to create the fact that Paris is the capital of France.

Difficulties arise, however, in attempting to identify the constituent parts of negative, modal, disjunctive, or moral facts.[18]

[edit] The fact-value distinction

Main article: fact-value distinction

Moral philosophers since David Hume have debated whether values are objective, and thus factual. In A Treatise of Human Nature Hume pointed out that there is no obvious way for a series of statements about what ought to be the case to be derived from a series of statements of what is the case. Those who insist that there is a logical gulf between facts and values, such that it is fallacious to attempt to derive values from facts, include G. E. Moore, who called attempting to do so the Naturalistic fallacy.

[edit] The factual-counterfactual distinction

Main article: counterfactual conditional

Factuality — what has occurred — can also be contrasted with counterfactuality — what might have occurred, but did not. A counterfactual conditional or subjunctive conditional is a conditional (or “if-then”) statement indicating what would be the case if events had been other than they actually are. For example, “If Alexander had lived, his empire would have been greater than Rome”. This is to be contrasted with an indicative conditional, which indicates what is (in fact) the case if its antecedent is (in fact) true — for example, “if you drink this, it will make you well”.

Such sentences are important to Modal logic, especially since the development of Possible world semantics.

[edit] Fact in science

Further information: scientific method and philosophy of science

Just as in philosophy, the scientific concept of fact is central to fundamental questions regarding the nature, methods, scope and validity of scientific reasoning.

In the most basic sense, a scientific fact is an objective and verifiable observation; in contrast with a hypothesis or theory, which is intended to explain or interpret facts.[19]

Various scholars have offered significant refinements to this basic formulation, some of which are detailed below. Also, rigorous scientific use of the term “fact” is careful to distinguish: 1) states of affairs in the external world; from 2) assertions of fact that may be considered relevant in scientific analysis. The term is used in both senses in the philosophy of science.[20]

[edit] Scholarly inquiry regarding scientific fact

Scholars and clinical researchers in both the social and natural sciences have forwarded numerous questions and theories in clarifying the fundamental nature of scientific fact.[21] Some pertinent issues raised by this inquiry include:

the process by which “established fact” becomes recognized and accepted as such;[22]

whether and to what extent “fact” and “theoretic explanation” can be considered truly independent and separable from one another;[23][24]

to what extent are “facts” influenced by the mere act of observation;[25] and

to what extent are factual conclusions influenced by history and consensus, rather than a strictly systematic methodology.[26]

Consistent with the theory of confirmation holism, some scholars assert “fact” to be necessarily “theory-laden” to some degree. Thomas Kuhn and others pointed out that knowing what facts to measure, and how to measure them, requires the use of some other theory (e.g., age of fossils is based on radiocarbon dating which is justified by reasoning that radioactive decay follows a Poisson process rather than a Bernoulli process). Similarly, Percy Williams Bridgman is credited with the methodological position known as operationalism, which asserts that all observations are not only influenced, but necessarily defined by the means and assumptions used to measure them.

[edit] Fact and the scientific method

Apart from the fundamental inquiry in to the nature of scientific fact, there remain the practical and social considerations of how fact is investigated, established, and substantiated through the proper application of the scientific method.[27] Scientific facts are generally believed to be independent from the observer in that no matter which scientist observes a phenomenon, all will reach the same necessary conclusion.[28] In addition to these considerations, there are the social and institutional measures, such as peer review and accreditation, that are intended to promote factual accuracy (among other interests) in scientific study.[29]

Fact does not always mean the same thing as truth. Fact is a generally agreed-upon and seemingly obvious observation. It is a fact that things stick to the earth, without regard to why that happens. It was once a fact that the planets changed direction from time to time, and that the sun, planets and stars circled the earth once daily. This seemed obvious, and was generally agreed to be the case.

In time, the fact was changed, and it was then said that the earth circles the sun, and the planets only appear to change direction as they are passed by the earth in their orbits, or vice versa.

Misunderstanding of this difference sometimes leads to fallacy in rhetoric, in which persons will say that they have fact, while others have only theory. Such statements indicate confusion as to the meanings of both words, suggesting they believe that fact means “truth,” and theory means “speculation.”

[edit] Fact in History

Further information: Historiography

A common rhetorical Cliche states, “History is written by the winners.” This phrase suggests but does not examine the use of facts in the writing of history.

E. H. Carr in his 1961 volume, What is History?, argues that the inherent biases from the gathering of facts makes the objective truth of any historical perspective idealistic and impossible. Facts are, “like fish in the Ocean,” that we may only happen to catch a few, only an indication of what is below the surface. Even a dragnet cannot tell us for certain what it would be like to live below the Ocean’s surface. Even if we do not discard any facts (or fish) presented, we will always miss the majority; the site of our fishing, the methods undertaken, the weather and even luck play a vital role in what we will catch. Additionally, the composition of history is inevitably made up by the compilation of many different bias of fact finding – all compounded over time. He concludes that for a historian to attempt a more objective method, one must accept that history can only aspire to a conversation of the present with the past – and, that one’s methods of fact gathering should be openly examined. As with science, historical truth and facts will therefore change over time and reflect only the present consensus (if that).

Others have argued[citation needed] that an approach to facts such as Carr’s is relativism and they lament the loss of a transcendent or fixed moral framework. However, his views together with the popular rise of historiographical narratives and meta-narratives may comprise a consensual view[citation needed].

[edit] Fact in law

Further information: Evidence (law) and Trier of fact

In most common law jurisdictions,[30] the general concept and analysis of fact reflects fundamental principles of Jurisprudence, and is supported by several well-established standards.[31][32] Matters of fact have various formal definitions under common law jurisdictions.

These include:

an element required in legal pleadings to demonstrate a cause of action;[33][34]

the determinations of the finder of fact after evaluating admissible evidence produced in a trial or hearing;[35]

a potential ground of reversible error forwarded on appeal in an appellate court;[36] and

any of various matters subject to investigation by official authority to establish whether a crime has been perpetrated, and to establish culpability.[37]

[edit] Legal pleadings

A party to a civil suit generally must clearly state all relevant allegations of fact upon which a claim is based. The requisite level of precision and particularity of these allegations varies depending on the rules of civil procedure as well as the jurisdiction. Parties who face uncertainties regarding the facts and circumstances attendant to their side in a dispute may sometimes invoke alternative pleading.[38] In this situation, a party may plead separate facts that (when considered together) may be contradictory or mutually exclusive. This (seemingly) logically-inconsistent presentation of facts may be necessary as a safeguard against contingencies (such as res judicata) that would otherwise preclude presenting a claim or defense that depends on a particular interpretation of the underlying facts.[39]

[edit] See also

De facto

Reality

State of affairs

Truth

Counterfactual history

Belief

[edit] General applications

The term “objectivity” designates both a feature of scientific investigators and a feature of scientific inquiry itself.

To be objective is to adhere strictly to truth- conducive methods in one’s thinking, particularly, to take into account all available information, and to avoid any form of prejudice, bias, or wishful thinking. The forms of observation and experimentation, and the canons of deductive reasoning and inductive reasoning employed by scientists practising the verification guide scientists to be objective.

As stated earlier, the term “objective” can be applied to methods used in this process or results produced by it. For example, if a study to determine the effectiveness of a pharmaceutical drug is double-blind, randomized, and placebo controlled, the study can be called “objective” because it adheres to methods that are known to improve the reliability of its results.

Law, medicine, and almost every academic field have developed rules of evidence and guidelines for objectivity particular to their subject matter. In history, for example, objectivity is achieved through the use of the historical method and peer review of journal articles in which authors’ proposed explanations and analyses of historical events are evaluated by other experts, prior to publication.

It is a matter of dispute among experts to what degree aesthetic and ethical judgements, as well as judgements involving the interpretation of the law, can be objective. Some hold that the beauty or merit of artworks and literary works cannot be objectively decided. Others deny this. Some claim that ethical judgements are relative to an individual’s values or to the norms, mores, and folk-ways of society. Others deny this. There are impressive arguments on both sides.

[edit] Objectivity and subjectivity

In philosophy, an objective fact means a truth that remains true everywhere, independently of human thought or feelings. For instance, it is true always and everywhere that ’2 and 2 make 4′. A subjective fact is a truth that is only true in certain times, places or people. For instance, ‘That painting is good’ may be true for someone who likes it, but it is not necessarily true that it is a good painting pure and simple, and remains so always no matter what people think of it. If the painting could claim this, someone who thought the painting was bad would be completely wrong, in the same way someone who says the sun goes around the earth is wrong. So the reliability of mathematics is an objective truth, whereas the beauty of paintings is probably a subjective one.

[edit] The Scientific Virtues

Among the truth-conducive tools of thought used by objective thinkers are the scientific virtues. When formulating an hypothesis to explain a particular fact, make sure that: your hypothesis is the simplest one on offer (Principle of Parsimony, that it is adequate to all known evidence, that it can predict as diverse an array of phenomena as possible, and that it is fruitful (“risky,” according to Popperians, but more generally, that it can be verified by new or as yet unperformed experiments or observations).

The scientific virtue known as simplicity or parsimony has also come to be known as “Ockham’s Razor” because of its frequent use by the fourteenth century philosopher William of Ockham, whose primary statement of the principle in his nominalist epistemology is that in accounting for the facts nothing should be assumed as necessary unless it is established through evidentiary experience or reasoning, or is required by the articles of faith.

[edit] Objectivism

“Objectivism” is a term that describes a branch of philosophy that finds its origins in the early nineteenth century. Gottlob Frege first implemented it in describing an epistemological and metaphysical theory to the negative response of the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. Kant’s rationalism attempted to reconcile the failures he perceived in realism, empiricism, and idealism, and establish a critical method of approach in the distinction between epistemology and metaphysics. The application of the term “objectivism” to philosophies prior to Frege may then be tentative.

Objectivism, or metaphysical objectivism, is the view that there is a reality or realm of objects and facts existing wholly independent of the mind. Stronger versions of this claim might hold that there is only one correct description of this reality; they may or may not hold that we have any knowledge of it. If it is true that reality is independent of the mind, the reality of objectivism is thus inclusive of objects which one may not know about and are not the intended objects of mental acts. Objectivity in referring requires a definition of what is true, and is distinct from the objects themselves which cannot be said to be true or false. An object may truthfully be said to have this or that attribute, such as the statement “This object exists”, whereas the statement “This object is true” or “false” is meaningless. Thus, only references, or the statements one makes about objects without assigning truth value to the object itself, are true or false. Essentially, the terms “objectivity” and “objectivism” are not synonymous, with objectivism being an ontological theory to which a method of objectivity would apply.

Plato’s realism was a form of metaphysical objectivism, holding that the Ideas exist objectively and independently. Berkeley‘s empiricist idealism, on the other hand, could be called a subjectivism: he held that things only exist to the extent that they are perceived. Both theories claim methods of objectivity. Plato’s definition of objectivity can be found in his epistemology, which takes as a model mathematics, and his metaphysics, where knowledge of the ontological status of objects and ideas is resistant to change. Plato considered knowledge of geometry as a condition of philosophical knowledge, both being concerned with universal truths. Plato’s opposition between objective knowledge and doxa (opinions) would become the basis for later philosophies intent on resolving the problem of reality, knowledge and human existence. Personal opinions belong to the changing sphere of the sensible, opposed to a fixed and eternal incorporeal realm which is mutually intelligible. Where Plato distinguishes between what and how we know things (epistemology) and their ontological status as things (metaphysics), subjectivism such as Berkeley’s and a mind dependence of knowledge and reality fails to make the distinction between what one knows and what is to be known, or in the least explains the distinction superficially. In Platonic terms, a criticism of subjectivism is that it is difficult to distinguish between knowledge, doxa, and subjective knowledge (true belief), distinctions which Plato makes.

The importance of perception in evaluating and understanding objective reality is debated. Realism sides that perception is key in directly observing objective reality, while instrumentalism holds that perception is not necessarily useful in directly observing objective reality, but is useful in interpreting and predicting reality. The concepts that encompasses these ideas are important in the philosophy of science.

[edit] Objectivity in ethics

[edit] Ethical subjectivism

(See also, David Hume, non-cognitivism, ethical subjectivism).

The term, “ethical subjectivism,” covers two distinct theories in ethics. According to cognitive versions of ethical subjectivism, the truth of moral statements depends upon people’s values, attitudes, feelings, or beliefs. Some forms of cognitivist ethical subjectivism can be counted as forms of realism, others are forms of anti-realism. David Hume is a foundational figure for cognitive ethical subjectivism. On a standard interpretation of his theory, a trait of character counts as a moral virtue when it evokes a sentiment of approbation in a sympathetic, informed, and rational human observer. Similarly, Roderick Firth’s ideal-observer theory held that right acts are those that an impartial, rational observer would approve of. William James, another ethical subjectivist, held that an end is good (to or for a person) just in case it is desired by that person. According to non-cognitive versions of ethical subjectivism, such as emotivism, prescriptivism, and expressivism, ethical statements cannot be true or false, at all: rather, they are expressions of personal feelings or commands. For example, on A. J. Ayer’s emotivism, the statement, “Murder is wrong” is equivalent in meaning to the emotive ejaculation, “Murder, Boo!”

[edit] Ethical objectivism

(See also, ethical objectivism)

According to the ethical objectivist, the truth or falsity of typical moral judgments does not depend upon the beliefs or feelings of any person or group of persons. This view holds that moral propositions are analogous to propositions about chemistry, biology, or history: they describe (or fail to describe) a mind-independent reality. When they describe it accurately, they are true — no matter what anyone believes, hopes, wishes, or feels. When they fail to describe this mind-independent moral reality, they are false — no matter what anyone believes, hopes, wishes, or feels. There are many versions of ethical objectivism, including various religious views of morality, Platonistic intuitionism, Kantianism, and certain forms of contractualism and ethical egoism. Note that Platonists define ethical objectivism in an even more narrow way, so that it requires the existence of intrinsic value. Consequently, they reject the idea that contractualists or egoists could be ethical objectivists.

[edit] See also

• Epistemology
• Phenomenology
• Truth
• Historical method
• Moral objectivism
• Scientific method
• Scholarly method
• Subject-object problem
• Michel Foucault’s analysis of historical and political discourse
• Gilbert Ryle
• Gilles Deleuze’s definition of Philosophy as singular creation of concepts, opposed to the contemplation of universal objects
• Habermas‘ conception of dialogue
• Jaakko Hintikka
• Alexius Meinong
• George Edward Moore
• Paul Ricœur‘s conception of history
• Bertrand Russell
• Franz Brentano
• Willard Van Orman Quine (specifically Word and Object )
• Objectivity (journalism)
• Objectivity (science)
• Journalism ethics and standards
• Historical method

What’s the story with stats?

Who are the hippest social scientists?

Greensboro College is seeking a full-time instructor of English for the 2008-2009 academic year. This is a one-year, non-renewable appointment to begin August 2008. The instructor will teach in the first-year English program—three courses in the fall, three in the spring—and serve on departmental committees. An M.A. and appropriate experience are required, Ph.D. preferred. 

Review of applications begins immediately and will continue until the position is filled. Please submit a letter of interest and a current curriculum vitae, along with names of references, to Dr. George Cheatham, Assistant Dean of the Faculty, Greensboro College, 815 West Market St., Greensboro, NC 27401. Send e-applications as Word attachments to cheathamg@gborocollege.edu.

Dear colleagues,

My chair has asked me to help identify potential candidates for two limited-term instructor positions to teach our first-year writing course (briefly described below). If you have any recent graduates (MA or higher in English) with a strong record of teaching writing who might be interested in this position at Elon, please encourage them to contact me for more information. Thank you for your assistance!

Thanks,

Jessie

College Writing/English 110 at Elon University is a requirement for all students, and it is one of the four courses that comprise the First-Year Core.  Since it is a cornerstone and prerequisite for most courses at Elon, students take it either in the fall or spring semesters of their first year.

The course helps students develop as writers through extensive practice in prewriting, drafting, and revising and prepares them for writing across the disciplines and beyond the academy. It is also designed to help students develop and hone argumentative skills, as the majority of the writing is argumentative and/or persuasive.  Therefore, College Writing is taught with writing as content, not as a writing-intensive literature course or as a course that uses writing simply to learn some other content. 

All sections of College Writing aim to develop the following:

• A more sophisticated writing process—including invention, peer responding, revising and editing—that results in a clear, effective, well edited public piece.
• A more sophisticated understanding of the relationship of purpose, audience, and voice, and an awareness that writing expectations and conventions vary within the academy and in professional and public discourse.
• An appreciation for the capacity of writing to change oneself and the world.

Sections of the 4-credit-hour course are capped at 20 students. Faculty meet monthly during the school year for faculty development lunches to discuss program updates and to exchange ideas for teaching in support of the course objectives.

————————————

Jessie L. Moore

Assistant Professor of English

College Writing/English 110 Coordinator

Professional Writing & Rhetoric Co-Coordinator

Elon University

What is Conceptual Art?

What is Installation Art?