Talk:fact

Gravity is BOTH a fact and a theory. What it is not, is a hypothesis. — This unsigned comment was added by Rskurat (talk • contribs).

In the formal sense of those words, yes, but this is a distinct, less formal sense. I agree that that example sentence is suboptimal; you are welcome to search for better uses of that sense in books so that we can replace it. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 23:35, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Something else is needed, alright. What we now have is a placeholder until a better version can be found.

It is a fact (true or correct to say) that

• Gravity is a force of nature (colloquial)
• Gravity is a Newtonian theoretical construct in classical physics (formal #1)
• Gravity is a pseudo-force in Einstein's relativistic physics (formal #2)

~~ Blue Mist 1 (talk) 18:00, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

"be" versus "become"

What is the difference between senses 6 and 7? In case the article gets edited:

6: Something which is real.

7: Something which has become real.

The example for #7 uses become in a way suggesting the sense is identical to 6.

Also, #5 either needs a clearer example to contrast it better with #6 or needs to be merged with #6 entirely. - Mocha2007 (talk) 16:41, 18 April 2019 (UTC)

I just deleted it. Sense 6 is logically implicit in sense 7—rewrite it as "something which has become something which is real"—and tense is specified by a verb, not by the word "fact". —Nizolan ^(talk) 01:54, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

RFV discussion: July 2019

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fact

"An honest observation." I think this is doubly wrong. Factuality is not about honesty. I can honestly believe that Bob is at work when, due to unforeseen sickness, he is not. Or I can have the honest opinion that broccoli is disgusting, but that doesn't make my opinion a general fact. Furthermore this sense overlaps to some extent with "something actual as opposed to invented" and "something which is real" and "something which has become real" and "an objective consensus on a fundamental reality that has been agreed upon by a substantial number of experts" and "information about a particular subject, especially actual conditions and/or circumstances". We have a ridiculous number of senses for this word. Equinox ◑ 15:03, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

I would suggest deleting this sense. Also, the last two senses are just special cases of the archaic "action", but the OED regards them as separate senses, so I suppose we should, too. Dbfirs 17:32, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

I agree this sense should be deleted. Honesty has nothing to do with it. An honest observation, made in good faith, may nevertheless be an honest mistake and therefore in disagreement with the facts. Also, no observation is needed for something to be a fact. One may need an observation to discover or ascertain a fact, such as that it is raining; but the fact already existed and was not created by the observation, and most certainly the observation (an act) is not the same as the fact (a proposition about the state of affairs that happens to be true). Apart from that, the degree of overlap in the several other senses is far too high; a fact is something that is true – that sense does not change depending on whether a contradicting position is a deliberate lie, or fiction, or the result of a mistake or other error. It is also so regardless of the number of experts (sense 6) agreeing on it. Spontaneous generation was not a fact until disproved by Pasteur, and gastric ulcers being caused by bacteria did not become factual by the reception in the scientific community of the 1984 paper reporting on Marshall’s self-experimentation.  --Lambiam 17:47, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

It's not often that we have more definitions of a word than does MWOnline (11 vs 9). So some pruning might be in order.

I don't think we want to base our definitions on philosophical analysis rather than on the definitions that other lexicographers have found satisfactory or on citations in context that we analyze and agree on.

If someone finds cites for this definition (which I find morally repugnant, BTW), it's in. DCDuring (talk) 20:56, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

There is the test of reverse replacement: take a sentence such as “I believe I am making an honest observation with which most would agree” and replace “honest observation” by “fact”: “I believe I am making a fact with which most would agree”. That doesn’t make much sense, does it?  --Lambiam 22:57, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

It is not a matter of much importance that the definition make sense in examples we make up. The governing question is whether there are citations in which it makes sense. DCDuring (talk) 23:17, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

While I'm on your side regarding the removal of the sense, I think you're being a bit too narrow there: one makes an observation, but states a fact. A sentence about "making a fact" will always sound silly, but that's because of the nature of the construction, not necessarily the precise sense of the noun. Equinox ◑ 00:24, 7 July 2019 (UTC)

Something believed to be true or real

a document laced with mistaken facts. --Backinstadiums (talk) 09:48, 9 August 2020 (UTC)