For the Wikipedia Template, see Template:Fact.

Generally, a fact is defined as something that is true, something that actually exists, or something that can be verified according to an established standard of evaluation. ^[1][2] There is a range of other uses, depending on the context. For example, fact may be argued under authority of a specific pedagogy, such as scientific facts or historical facts. In Logic, an argument is a Set of one or more Declarative sentences (or "propositions") known as the Premises along In Politics, authority ( Latin Auctoritas, used in Roman law as opposed to Potestas and Imperium In Metaphysics, particulars are one might say identified by what they are not they are not Abstractions not multiply-instantiated --i Pedagogy (ˈpɛdəgɒdʒi or paedagogy is the Art or Science of being a Teacher. Rhetorical assertion of fact is often forwarded without an implied or express basis of authority. Rhetoric has had many definitions no simple definition can do it justice

Contents 1 Etymology and usage 2 Fact in philosophy 2.1 Correspondence and the slingshot argument 2.2 Compound facts 2.3 The fact-value distinction 2.4 The factual-counterfactual distinction 3 Fact in science 3.1 Scholarly inquiry regarding scientific fact 3.2 Fact and the scientific method 4 Fact in History 5 Fact in law 5.1 Legal pleadings 6 See also 7 Notes and references 8 External links

Etymology and usage

The word fact derives from the Latin Factum, and was first used in English with the same meaning: "a thing done or performed", a use that is now obsolete. Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. ^[3]

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. Philosophy is the study of general problems concerning matters such as existence knowledge truth beauty justice validity mind and language Epistemology (from Greek επιστήμη - episteme, "knowledge" + λόγος, " Logos " or theory of knowledge In Philosophy, ontology (from the Greek, genitive: of being (part Questions of objectivity and truth are closely associated with questions of fact. Objectivity is both an important and very difficult concept to pin down in philosophy The meaning of the word truth extends from Honesty, Good faith, and Sincerity in general to agreement with Fact or Reality A "fact" can be defined as something which is the case, that is, the state of affairs reported by a true proposition. The state of affairs is that combination of circumstances applying within a society or group at a particular time The meaning of the word truth extends from Honesty, Good faith, and Sincerity in general to agreement with Fact or Reality In Logic and Philosophy, proposition refers to either (a the content or Meaning of a meaningful Declarative sentence ^[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]

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. The correspondence theory of truth states that the truth or falsity of a statement is determined only by how it relates to the world and whether it accurately describes (i ^[15] This theory presupposes the existence of an objective world. Objectivity is both an important and very difficult concept to pin down in philosophy

The Slingshot argument claims to show that all true statements stand for the same thing - the truth value true. In Logic, a slingshot argument is one of a group of arguments claiming to show that all True sentences stand for the same thing 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]

Compound facts

Any non-trivial true statement about reality is necessarily an abstraction composed of a complex of objects and properties or relations. --> Abstraction is the process or result of generalization by reducing the information For other uses of Object see Object. In Philosophy, an object is a thing an Entity, or a Being. In modern Philosophy, Mathematics, and Logic, a property is an Attribute of an object; thus a red object is said to have the property Charles Sanders Peirce (pronounced purse) (September 10 1839 &ndash April 19 1914 was an American Logician mathematician, philosopher ^[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. Paris (ˈpærɨs in English; in French) is the Capital of France and the country's largest city This article is about the country For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic France topics. . 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. In Logic and Mathematics, negation or not is an operation on Logical values for example the logical value of a Proposition A modal logic is any system of formal logic that attempts to deal with modalities. Morality (from the Latin la moralitas "manner character proper behavior" has three principal meanings ^[18]

The fact-value distinction

Main article: fact-value distinction

Moral philosophers since David Hume have debated whether values are objective, and thus factual. The fact-value distinction is a concept used to distinguish between arguments which can be claimed through Reason alone and those where rationality is limited to describing Ethics is a major branch of Philosophy, encompassing right conduct and good life David Hume (26 April 1711 25 August 1776 Scottish Philosopher, Economist, and Historian is an important figure in Western philosophy Moral objectivism (or moderate moral realism) is the meta-ethical view which claims that Ethical sentences express Propositions 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. A Treatise of Human Nature is a book by Scottish philosopher David Hume, first published in 1739 – 1740. 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. The fact-value distinction is a concept used to distinguish between arguments which can be claimed through Reason alone and those where rationality is limited to describing "GE Moore" redirects here For the cofounder of Intel see Gordon Moore. The naturalistic fallacy is often claimed to be a Formal fallacy.

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, Subjunctive conditional or remote conditional is a conditional (or "if-then" statement indicating what would be 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. A counterfactual conditional, Subjunctive conditional or remote conditional is a conditional (or "if-then" statement indicating what would be In Grammar, the subjunctive mood (sometimes referred to as the conjunctive mood) is a Verb mood that exists in many languages In Grammar, conditional sentences are sentences discussing factual implications or hypothetical situations and their consequences 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". In Natural languages an indicative conditional is the logical operation given by statements of the form "If A then B"

Such sentences are important to Modal logic, especially since the development of Possible world semantics. A modal logic is any system of formal logic that attempts to deal with modalities.

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. Scientific method refers to bodies of Techniques for investigating phenomena Philosophy of science is the study of assumptions foundations and implications of Science. Science (from the Latin scientia, meaning " Knowledge " or "knowing" is the effort to discover, and increase human understanding Philosophy of science is the study of assumptions foundations and implications of Science.

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. "n objective account is one which attempts to capture the nature of the object studied in a way that does not depend on any features of the particular subject who studies it In the context of hardware and software systems formal verification is the act of proving or disproving the Correctness of intended Algorithms underlying Observation is either an activity of a living being (such as a Human) which senses and assimilates the Knowledge of a Phenomenon, or the recording of data A hypothesis (from Greek) consists either of a suggested explanation for a phenomenon (an event that is observable or of a reasoned proposal suggesting a possible The word theory has many distinct meanings in different fields of Knowledge, depending on their methodologies and the context of discussion. ^[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]

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. The social sciences comprise academic disciplines concerned with the study of the social life of human groups and individuals including Anthropology, Communication studies In Science, the term natural science refers to a naturalistic approach to the study of the Universe, which is understood as obeying rules or law of ^[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. Path-dependence explains how the set of decisions one faces for any given circumstance is limited by the decisions one has made in the past even though past circumstances may no longer A consensus theory of truth is any Theory of truth that refers to a Concept of Consensus as a part of its concept of Truth. ^[26]

Consistent with the theory of confirmation holism, some scholars assert "fact" to be necessarily "theory-laden" to some degree. Confirmation holism, also called epistemological holism is the claim that a single Scientific theory cannot be tested in isolation a test of one theory always depends 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. Thomas Samuel Kuhn (surname ˈkuːn July 18, 1922  &ndash June 17, 1996) was an American intellectual who wrote extensively 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). FOSSIL is a standard protocol for allowing serial communication for Telecommunications programs under the DOS Operating system. Radiocarbon dating is a Radiometric dating method that uses the naturally occurring Radioisotope Carbon-14 (14C to determine the age of A Poisson process, named after the French mathematician Siméon-Denis Poisson (1781 &ndash 1840 is the Stochastic process in which events occur continuously and In Probability and Statistics, a Bernoulli process is a discrete-time Stochastic process consisting ofa sequence of independent 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. Percy Williams Bridgman ( April 21, 1882 &ndash August 20, 1961) was an American physicist who won the 1946 Nobel Prize in Physics Operationalization is the process of defining a Fuzzy concept so as to make the concept measurable in form of Variables consisting of specific Observations

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. Peer review (also known as refereeing) is the process of subjecting an author's scholarly work research or Ideas to the scrutiny of others who are Accreditation is a process in which is Certification of competency authority or credibility is presented ^[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. "

Fact in History

Further information: Historiography

A common rhetorical Cliche states, "History is written by the winners. A cliché (from French, klɪ'ʃe or cliche is a phrase expression or idea that has been overused to the point of losing its intended force " 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. In Western civilization, Idealism is the philosophy which maintains that the Ultimate nature of reality is ideal or based upon ideas values essences The so-called 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 that an approach to facts such as Carr's is relativism and they lament the loss of a transcendent or fixed moral framework. Compare Moral relativism, Aesthetic relativism, Social constructionism, Cultural relativism, and Cognitive relativism. However, his views together with the popular rise of historiographical narratives and meta-narratives may comprise a consensual view. Meta (from Greek: μετά = "after" "beyond" "with" "adjacent" is a prefix used in English in order to indicate a concept

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. The Law of evidence governs the use of Testimony (eg oral or written statements such as an Affidavit) and exhibits (e A trier of fact (or finder of fact) is a person who determines facts in a legal proceeding Common law refers to law and the corresponding legal system developed through decisions of courts and similar tribunals rather than through legislative statutes or executive Jurisprudence is the Theory and Philosophy of Law. Scholars of jurisprudence or legal philosophers hope to obtain a deeper understanding of the nature ^[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. In Law as practiced in countries that follow the English model a pleading is a formal written statement filed with a Court by parties in a Civil action In the law a cause of action (sometimes called a claim) is a set of facts sufficient to justify a right to sue In Law, a question of fact (also known as a point of fact) is a question which must be answered by reference to facts and evidence, and inferences A trier of fact (or finder of fact) is a person who determines facts in a legal proceeding In Law, a reversible error is an error by the trier of Law ( Judge) or the trier of fact (the jury or the judge if it is a Bench trial) or In Law, an appeal is a process for requesting a formal change to an official decision Court of Appeal, Court of Appeals, and Appellate Division redirect here for a list of specific courts using those titles see Court of Appeal Corpus delicti (plural corpora delicti ( Latin: " body of crime " is a term from Western Jurisprudence which refers to the In the sociological field, crime is the breach of a rule or Law for which some governing authority or force may ultimately prescribe a Punishment ^[37]

Legal pleadings

A party to a civil suit generally must clearly state all relevant allegations of fact upon which a claim is based. In law a lawsuit is a civil action brought before a Court in which the party commencing the action the Plaintiff, seeks a legal or equitable remedy The requisite level of precision and particularity of these allegations varies depending on the rules of civil procedure as well as the jurisdiction. Civil procedure is the body of law that sets out the process that Courts will follow when hearing cases of a civil nature (a " Civil action " as opposed to Parties who face uncertainties regarding the facts and circumstances attendant to their side in a dispute may sometimes invoke alternative pleading. Pleading and Actual innocence and therefore presumed to be under GFDL---> Alternative pleading permits a party in a court action to ^[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. Res judicata or res iudicata ( Latin for "a matter judged" is in both civil law and Common law legal systems ^[39]

See also

• De facto
• Reality
• State of affairs
• Truth
• Counterfactual history
• Belief

Notes and references

External links

• It's worse than that!
• Random facts website
• Facts determined by community voting

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