Facts of Reality

[BaalChatzaf]

Whence comes this phrase "facts of reality". The facts ARE reality. Facts are what is. Why this redundant phrase. There are no other facts than reality.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Alfonso Jones]

Whence comes this phrase "facts of reality". The facts ARE reality. Facts are what is. Why this redundant phrase. There are no other facts than reality.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I would recommend reading the two-part article "The Metaphysical versus the Man-Made" from The Ayn Rand Letter, March 12, 1973 and March 26, 1973. The article is also available on page 31 and following of Philosophy: Who Needs It.

Bill P

[BaalChatzaf]

Whence comes this phrase "facts of reality". The facts ARE reality. Facts are what is. Why this redundant phrase. There are no other facts than reality.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I would recommend reading the two-part article "The Metaphysical versus the Man-Made" from The Ayn Rand Letter, March 12, 1973 and March 26, 1973. The article is also available on page 31 and following of Philosophy: Who Needs It.

Bill P

A state of the world brought about by an action of sentient beings is no less real than a state of the world brought about by a natural non sentient process. A fact is what is regardless of how it came to be.

Example: I blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. It is down. A meteor strikes the Brookly Bridge. It is down. In either case it is down. That would be a fact in either of the above scenarios..

The distinction between the man made and the natural is unessential. What is, is regardless of how it came to be.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Alfonso Jones]

Whence comes this phrase "facts of reality". The facts ARE reality. Facts are what is. Why this redundant phrase. There are no other facts than reality.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I would recommend reading the two-part article "The Metaphysical versus the Man-Made" from The Ayn Rand Letter, March 12, 1973 and March 26, 1973. The article is also available on page 31 and following of Philosophy: Who Needs It.

Bill P

A state of the world brought about by an action of sentient beings is no less real than a state of the world brought about by a natural non sentient process. A fact is what is regardless of how it came to be.

Example: I blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. It is down. A meteor strikes the Brookly Bridge. It is down. In either case it is down. That would be a fact in either of the above scenarios..

The distinction between the man made and the natural is unessential. What is, is regardless of how it came to be.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I recommend (re)reading the essay. As you know (but perhaps some other readers do not), the title of that essay is alliterative and catching, but does not exactly capture the distinction Rand is making in the essay.

Bill P

[tjohnson]

From the above mentioned essay;

All the countless forms, motions, combinations and dissolutions of elements within the universe—from a floating speck of dust to the formation of a galaxy to the emergence of life—are caused and determined by the identities of the elements involved. Nature is the metaphysically given—i.e., the nature of nature is outside the power of any volition.

It sounds like Rand would not have thought much of Quantum Mechanics where the effects of the observer on the observed are taken into consideration.

Edited February 23, 2009 by general semanticist

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Facts of the fantasy has no meaning?

Art has a lot of facts that are not reality. Backstory in fiction, just for starters...

Michael

[Alfonso Jones]

Whence comes this phrase "facts of reality". The facts ARE reality. Facts are what is. Why this redundant phrase. There are no other facts than reality.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I would recommend reading the two-part article "The Metaphysical versus the Man-Made" from The Ayn Rand Letter, March 12, 1973 and March 26, 1973. The article is also available on page 31 and following of Philosophy: Who Needs It.

Bill P

A state of the world brought about by an action of sentient beings is no less real than a state of the world brought about by a natural non sentient process. A fact is what is regardless of how it came to be.

Example: I blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. It is down. A meteor strikes the Brookly Bridge. It is down. In either case it is down. That would be a fact in either of the above scenarios..

The distinction between the man made and the natural is unessential. What is, is regardless of how it came to be.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I recommend (re)reading the essay. As you know (but perhaps some other readers do not), the title of that essay is alliterative and catching, but does not exactly capture the distinction Rand is making in the essay.

Bill P

Illustration of my point: The following is in the essay, and fully addresses Bob's comment:

But nothing is exempt from the law of identity. A man-made product did not have to exist, but, once made, it does exist. A man's actions did not have to be performed, but, once performed, they are facts of reality. The same is true of a man's character: he did not have to make the choices he made, but, once he has formed his character, it is a fact, and it is his personal identity. (Man's volition gives him great, but not unlimited, latitude to change his character; if he does, the change becomes a fact.)

Clear?

Recall: It is good to read something before criticizing it...

Bill P

[Chris Grieb]

Bill P; I agree the article is worth reading and rereading.

[BaalChatzaf]

Whence comes this phrase "facts of reality". The facts ARE reality. Facts are what is. Why this redundant phrase. There are no other facts than reality.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I would recommend reading the two-part article "The Metaphysical versus the Man-Made" from The Ayn Rand Letter, March 12, 1973 and March 26, 1973. The article is also available on page 31 and following of Philosophy: Who Needs It.

Bill P

A state of the world brought about by an action of sentient beings is no less real than a state of the world brought about by a natural non sentient process. A fact is what is regardless of how it came to be.

Example: I blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. It is down. A meteor strikes the Brookly Bridge. It is down. In either case it is down. That would be a fact in either of the above scenarios..

The distinction between the man made and the natural is unessential. What is, is regardless of how it came to be.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I recommend (re)reading the essay. As you know (but perhaps some other readers do not), the title of that essay is alliterative and catching, but does not exactly capture the distinction Rand is making in the essay.

Bill P

Illustration of my point: The following is in the essay, and fully addresses Bob's comment:

But nothing is exempt from the law of identity. A man-made product did not have to exist, but, once made, it does exist. A man's actions did not have to be performed, but, once performed, they are facts of reality. The same is true of a man's character: he did not have to make the choices he made, but, once he has formed his character, it is a fact, and it is his personal identity. (Man's volition gives him great, but not unlimited, latitude to change his character; if he does, the change becomes a fact.)

Clear?

Recall: It is good to read something before criticizing it...

Bill P

A natural thing did not have to exist either. We learn from quantum theory there are infinite sets of possible states, none of which are certain and no one of which had to exist but one of which did come to be. No natural facts are no less contingent than so called man-made facts. In fact, man-made facts are just as natural as "natural" facts since man is a material entity which emerged by purely natural process. Man-doings are just another kind of natuiral doings. Everything that man does is bound by the same physical laws as what came out of the Big Bang. In fact we are the congealed product of material spewed out of dying starts. We are star dust, just as natural as hydrogen and helium.

Our cosmos is just as contingent as any so called-man made thing. What man does is bound by physical law. And even the laws that bind this emergent cosmos are contingent. The cosmos in which "ordinary" matter slightly outweighed anti-matter need not have happened.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Alfonso Jones]

Whence comes this phrase "facts of reality". The facts ARE reality. Facts are what is. Why this redundant phrase. There are no other facts than reality.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I would recommend reading the two-part article "The Metaphysical versus the Man-Made" from The Ayn Rand Letter, March 12, 1973 and March 26, 1973. The article is also available on page 31 and following of Philosophy: Who Needs It.

Bill P

A state of the world brought about by an action of sentient beings is no less real than a state of the world brought about by a natural non sentient process. A fact is what is regardless of how it came to be.

Example: I blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. It is down. A meteor strikes the Brookly Bridge. It is down. In either case it is down. That would be a fact in either of the above scenarios..

The distinction between the man made and the natural is unessential. What is, is regardless of how it came to be.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I recommend (re)reading the essay. As you know (but perhaps some other readers do not), the title of that essay is alliterative and catching, but does not exactly capture the distinction Rand is making in the essay.

Bill P

Illustration of my point: The following is in the essay, and fully addresses Bob's comment:

But nothing is exempt from the law of identity. A man-made product did not have to exist, but, once made, it does exist. A man's actions did not have to be performed, but, once performed, they are facts of reality. The same is true of a man's character: he did not have to make the choices he made, but, once he has formed his character, it is a fact, and it is his personal identity. (Man's volition gives him great, but not unlimited, latitude to change his character; if he does, the change becomes a fact.)

Clear?

Recall: It is good to read something before criticizing it...

Bill P

A natural thing did not have to exist either. We learn from quantum theory there are infinite sets of possible states, none of which are certain and no one of which had to exist but one of which did come to be. No natural facts are no less contingent than so called man-made facts. In fact, man-made facts are just as natural as "natural" facts since man is a material entity which emerged by purely natural process. Man-doings are just another kind of natuiral doings. Everything that man does is bound by the same physical laws as what came out of the Big Bang. In fact we are the congealed product of material spewed out of dying starts. We are star dust, just as natural as hydrogen and helium.

Our cosmos is just as contingent as any so called-man made thing. What man does is bound by physical law. And even the laws that bind this emergent cosmos are contingent. The cosmos in which "ordinary" matter slightly outweighed anti-matter need not have happened.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Bob -

I urge you - - - first read what I quoted, and then the entire essay. You are verbally jousting with a straw man wholly of your own construction. Unless you find great joy in such Don Quixote exercises, I recommend reading the text you say you are disagreeing with - to find out what it says. Your comments (and the fact that you seem to believe you are coming up with arguments against that text) make it clear that either you have not read the text or, having read it, you failed to understand it.

Bill P

[Guyau]

Bob,

1. Don’t we need the idea of the facts of reality as an obverse for the truths of reality?

2. Aren’t there lesser constituents of the real than the facts? Aren’t items of reality less than facts of reality?

3. Don’t we need the idea of the facts of reality as a contrast to the counterfactuals of reality, where the latter have various degrees of constraint by the facts of reality?

Couple of good books related to those issues:

The Facts of Causation by D. H. Mellor

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0415197562...008#reader-link

Facing Facts by Stephen Neale

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0199247153...00I#reader-link

There are degrees of contingency, even for natural inanimate structures, and further degrees for living things. http://www.objectivity-archive.com/volume2_number4.html#183

Contrast with the view of Harry Binswanger. http://rebirthofreason.com/Forum/ArticleDi...1723_2.shtml#46

[merjet]

Thanks for the references, Stephen.

Abstracts, including one for each chapter, of Facing Facts can be seen here.

[BaalChatzaf]

Bob -

I urge you - - - first read what I quoted, and then the entire essay. You are verbally jousting with a straw man wholly of your own construction. Unless you find great joy in such Don Quixote exercises, I recommend reading the text you say you are disagreeing with - to find out what it says. Your comments (and the fact that you seem to believe you are coming up with arguments against that text) make it clear that either you have not read the text or, having read it, you failed to understand it.

Bill P

I have read it. I understand it. I disagree with the conclusion. The argument is less than overwhelming. The facts (of reality) happen to be what they are. It just so happens. Our arrangement of the facts into causal chains is something that we do because our brains happen to operate the way the do. It so happens. Logical necessity is a human invention. It just so happens. Facts are what they are, it just so happens.

Think of man as nature's way of making water go uphill, it just so happens.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited February 23, 2009 by BaalChatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

[A natural thing did not have to exist either. We learn from quantum theory there are infinite sets of possible states, none of which are certain and no one of which had to exist but one of which did come to be. No natural facts are no less contingent than so called man-made facts. In fact, man-made facts are just as natural as "natural" facts since man is a material entity which emerged by purely natural process. Man-doings are just another kind of natuiral doings. Everything that man does is bound by the same physical laws as what came out of the Big Bang. In fact we are the congealed product of material spewed out of dying starts. We are star dust, just as natural as hydrogen and helium.

Our cosmos is just as contingent as any so called-man made thing. What man does is bound by physical law. And even the laws that bind this emergent cosmos are contingent. The cosmos in which "ordinary" matter slightly outweighed anti-matter need not have happened.

Boy, you have turned your science into a philosophy and discovered many wondrous things without the necessity of actual investigations and concomitant data. I am not questioning Quantum Physics, just you using it as a soapbox to pontificate to the ignorant about everything when you know considerably less than that, as do we all.

--Brant

[BaalChatzaf]

[A natural thing did not have to exist either. We learn from quantum theory there are infinite sets of possible states, none of which are certain and no one of which had to exist but one of which did come to be. No natural facts are no less contingent than so called man-made facts. In fact, man-made facts are just as natural as "natural" facts since man is a material entity which emerged by purely natural process. Man-doings are just another kind of natuiral doings. Everything that man does is bound by the same physical laws as what came out of the Big Bang. In fact we are the congealed product of material spewed out of dying starts. We are star dust, just as natural as hydrogen and helium.

Our cosmos is just as contingent as any so called-man made thing. What man does is bound by physical law. And even the laws that bind this emergent cosmos are contingent. The cosmos in which "ordinary" matter slightly outweighed anti-matter need not have happened.

Boy, you have turned your science into a philosophy and discovered many wondrous things without the necessity of actual investigations and concomitant data. I am not questioning Quantum Physics, just you using it as a soapbox to pontificate to the ignorant about everything when you know considerably less than that, as do we all.

--Brant

I am pointing out that things exist in nature because it so happens they do exist in nature. It so happens. I see little necessity and lots of contigency in nature. Our species, for example, was not fore ordained in the Big Bang. It so happens that an asteroid fell on Earth 65 million years agon and through a series of accidents (probably mediated by cosmic rays) the genetic mutations that produced our species came about, it so happens.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

Bob, I like your last post. Especially about necessity and contingency in nature. But not agreeing or disagreeing. I'm ignorant on this.

--Brant

[Will]

Bob -

I urge you - - - first read what I quoted, and then the entire essay. You are verbally jousting with a straw man wholly of your own construction. Unless you find great joy in such Don Quixote exercises, I recommend reading the text you say you are disagreeing with - to find out what it says. Your comments (and the fact that you seem to believe you are coming up with arguments against that text) make it clear that either you have not read the text or, having read it, you failed to understand it.

Bill P

I have read it. I understand it.

Ba'al Chatzaf

The following prayer has often been used to explain the importance of this distinction between the metaphysical and the man-made:

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serenity_Prayer

The implications speak for themselves and contribute towards preventing you from being at war with the metaphysical facts of reality.

As for QP, I know little, but understand it has philosophical problems, re: Law of Causailty, but it (QP) is of zero interest to me.

Will

Edited February 25, 2009 by Will

[BaalChatzaf]

Bob -

I urge you - - - first read what I quoted, and then the entire essay. You are verbally jousting with a straw man wholly of your own construction. Unless you find great joy in such Don Quixote exercises, I recommend reading the text you say you are disagreeing with - to find out what it says. Your comments (and the fact that you seem to believe you are coming up with arguments against that text) make it clear that either you have not read the text or, having read it, you failed to understand it.

Bill P

I have read it. I understand it.

Ba'al Chatzaf

The following prayer has often been used to explain the importance of this distinction between the metaphysical and the man-made:

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serenity_Prayer

The implications speak for themselves and contribute towards preventing you from being at war with the metaphysical facts of reality.

As for QP, I know little, but understand it has philosophical problems, re: Law of Causailty, but it (QP) is of zero interest to me.

Will

Once a human as made a fact come to be it is no less a fact than one that came about by none human means. A fact is a fact is a fact. A fact is that which is.

A state or condition of the world comes about subject to the same physical laws whether man made or nature made. Man flies about in planes subject to the same aerodynamic laws as do birds, bats and bugs. Man is as natural as the rocks and the trees. Man is nature's way of making water go uphill. The distinction between the man made and the natural is artificial since both are subject to the same physical laws and constraints. We are natural beings doing what we do according to the nature of nature. We are made of the same stuff as rocks, trees and shit. It so happens.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited February 25, 2009 by BaalChatzaf

[tjohnson]

I think Baal's problem is with the 'reality' part of facts of reality. When we find structure that we agree upon we call it 'facts' and the 'reality' part is superfluous.

[BaalChatzaf]

I think Baal's problem is with the 'reality' part of facts of reality. When we find structure that we agree upon we call it 'facts' and the 'reality' part is superfluous.

reality = facts. reality is all the facts that are (straight out of Wittgenstein).

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Alfonso Jones]

Bob -

I urge you - - - first read what I quoted, and then the entire essay. You are verbally jousting with a straw man wholly of your own construction. Unless you find great joy in such Don Quixote exercises, I recommend reading the text you say you are disagreeing with - to find out what it says. Your comments (and the fact that you seem to believe you are coming up with arguments against that text) make it clear that either you have not read the text or, having read it, you failed to understand it.

Bill P

I have read it. I understand it.

Ba'al Chatzaf

The following prayer has often been used to explain the importance of this distinction between the metaphysical and the man-made:

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serenity_Prayer

The implications speak for themselves and contribute towards preventing you from being at war with the metaphysical facts of reality.

As for QP, I know little, but understand it has philosophical problems, re: Law of Causailty, but it (QP) is of zero interest to me.

Will

Once a human as made a fact come to be it is no less a fact than one that came about by none human means. A fact is a fact is a fact. A fact is that which is.

A state or condition of the world comes about subject to the same physical laws whether man made or nature made. Man flies about in planes subject to the same aerodynamic laws as do birds, bats and bugs. Man is as natural as the rocks and the trees. Man is nature's way of making water go uphill. The distinction between the man made and the natural is artificial since both are subject to the same physical laws and constraints. We are natural beings doing what we do according to the nature of nature. We are made of the same stuff as rocks, trees and shit. It so happens.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Bob -

As best as I can determine, you arguing with a fantasy in your own mind. Don't impute a viewpoint to Rand, in contradiction to her own explicit statement, and then pretend to debunk it!

Again, she said (as quoted above):

But nothing is exempt from the law of identity. A man-made product did not have to exist, but, once made, it does exist. A man's actions did not have to be performed, but, once performed, they are facts of reality. The same is true of a man's character: he did not have to make the choices he made, but, once he has formed his character, it is a fact, and it is his personal identity. (Man's volition gives him great, but not unlimited, latitude to change his character; if he does, the change becomes a fact.)

Read that very carefully. What is it, specifically, on this subject where you are claiming Rand is wrong? When you have written that down, please read the paragraph again very carefully. I think you will find that what you have written is close to a paraphrase of the first three sentences I have quoted above.

Bill P

[thomtg]

Thanks for the references, Stephen.

Abstracts, including one for each chapter, of Facing Facts can be seen here.

Hi Merlin, is it possible for you to post the abstracts here for all to see?

[thomtg]

...

Contrast with the view of Harry Binswanger. http://rebirthofreason.com/Forum/ArticleDi...1723_2.shtml#46

Hi Stephen,

Keeping pace with you as you jump across time and (hyper)space is worthy of the effort, but I will localize my comments and questions here. And there are two: one metaphysical, one epistemological.

1. Your hyperlink from the above to "Physical Contingency" has an excerpt of another article in whose appendix you cite your definitions of necessity and contingency:

Necessity is: if A, then B, even if C.
Contingency is: if A, then B, unless C.

It seems to me that on this view contingency can be expressed as

If A, then B, unless C.
if A, then B, if not-C.
if (A & not-C), then B.

Then, it becomes a matter of substitution of the parenthetical part as A', to yield, "If A', then B". And in which case, "contingency" is the same as "necessity." It becomes a matter of knowledge of what this new A' is, as a condition for B. If, as you stated, that "necessity" and "contingency" are metaphysical concept, then what you have defined involves a commingling of an epistemological relation into the concept of "contingency."

2. Concerning the fascinating blog entry (comments and all) involving Harry Binswanger, I have two questions about the epistemological status of facts. Given the definition of "truth" as an identification of a fact, and given the definition of "identification" as a mental grasping (aka, an awareness) of the nature of something (Peikoff Introduction to Logic Lec1 20min.), I would like to know from you, first, what you think are the referents of "fact"?

Secondly, here below is my conception of fact. a) Would you say that this is standard Objectivist epistemology; b ) if so, do you agree; c) if not, why?

A person, being aware of reality for the purpose of living, chooses to identify some aspect of it. And let us say that this psychological action is an instance of the concept of consciousness "thought." As a process of consciousness, there is always a content with each action. (ITOE 29) In the case of a thought, the content is a fact (if the fallible action is successful). So too, as a process of consciousness, there is always a resulting product (however well or mis-integrated it is). (ITOE 35) In the case of a thought, the product is a proposition, which is expressed linguistically in the form of a declarative sentence. So, "thought," being a species of "identification," is an action to apprehend an aspect of reality, which, when successful, yields a true proposition, whose content is a fact (and when unsuccessful, yields a false proposition, whose content is an error).

For Objectivists, here represented by Binswanger, "Truth qua truth is one relationship between a proposition (as used by a mind) and reality: the relationship of identification"--with "identification" described as not "a kind of physicalistic correspondence." Thus, a fact qua fact comes into being for oneself at the same time as one asserts a truth via a proposition.

Since things exist independently of anyone's awareness of them, so facts are the things existing, as grasped by someone's awareness. As existents are perceptually perceived in some forms, so existents are propositionally identified in some facts. Said another way, as the content of a concept is any unit of a category of existents, so the content of a proposition is a fact of reality. Without human awareness, there would be no unit qua unit, or fact qua fact.

That propositions are products of consciousness, is a metaphysically given fact; that facts come into being, is a man-made fact. That which a fact designates, just is.

Update: As a contrast, how would you compare your view of fact with that of REB's?

Edited March 12, 2009 by Thom T G

[Guyau]

Thom,

In the formulas (from Ted Honderich) for necessity and contingency, A and B are to be held constant in the pair of formulas, but C is required to be entirely different between the pair. I should have used the label C in one and D in the other.

My examples make clear C and D must not overlap, and that they are conditions that are the case independently of anyone’s cognizance that they are the case:

“We can exhibit the complementarity of necessity and contingency by the moon’s orbit about the earth. The moon will continue to orbit the earth (if last-year orbiting moon, then next-year orbiting moon), even if the magnetic poles of the earth reverse, even if humans tread on the moon, or even if young men in Verona swear their love by the moon. Relative to those conditions, the continued orbit of the moon is a necessity. On the contingency side, the moon will continue to orbit the earth, unless shattered by a behemoth meteor, unless the sun-earth-moon system enters a chaotic regime, and so forth. Relative to these conditions, the continued orbit of the moon is contingent.”

My original text is here (scroll down one page):

http://www.objectivity-archive.com/volume2_number4.html#183

You asked what I think is designated by the term fact. I do agree pretty much with what you find Rand saying in her discussion with Peikoff and Gotthelf in the Appendix of ITOE. Also, I tend to side with Russell contra Wittgenstein concerning whether the relation between true propositions and facts can be not only shown, but said. See here, my review of Eric Wefald’s book (scroll down to page 227):

http://www.objectivity-archive.com/volume2_number4.html#205

I’m unsure on the idea of Logical Atomism, of atomic facts and their supposed compositions into other facts. I doubt Rand would go there.

Facts are what is the case. They do not require anyone to comprehend the case they are to be the case. Comprehending a fact will introduce a new fact, the fact of that comprehension. Occasions of consciousness are facts.

You proposed that facts are a form of propositional identifications analogous to forms of perceptual identifications. I think it is incorrect to say that facts are a form of consciousness, specifically, the form in which we identify things propositionally.

I like Rand’s idea that thinking about existents as facts is motivated by recognition of the possibility of error. I wonder, though, if that is the only motivation for talking of what-is in terms of facts. Be that as it may, facts are presented to consciousness, and that presentation of existence is not a presentation composed by consciousness.

Roger’s view for which you provided the link(s) echoes Rand’s oral remarks in her epistemology seminar. These are in some tension with Rand’s position, stated in her essay, that every concept stands for a number of implicit propositions. See further:

http://www.solopassion.com/node/5506#comment-68030

Peikoff’s summation of Rand’s view of truth is:

“The concept of ‘truth’ identifies a type of relationship between a proposition and the facts of reality. ‘Truth’, in Ayn Rand’s definition, is ‘the recognition of reality’. In essence, this is the traditional correspondence theory of truth: there is a reality independent of man, and there are certain conceptual products, propositions, formulated by human consciousness. When one of these products corresponds to reality, when it constitutes a recognition of fact, then it is true. Conversely, when the mental content does not thus correspond, when it constitutes not a recognition of reality but a contradiction of it, then it is false.” (OPAR 165)

Edited March 12, 2009 by Stephen Boydstun

[thomtg]

...

My original text is here (scroll down one page):

http://www.objectivity-archive.com/volume2_number4.html#183

You asked what I think is designated by the term fact. I do agree pretty much with what you find Rand saying in her discussion with Peikoff and Gotthelf in the Appendix of ITOE. Also, I tend to side with Russell contra Wittgenstein concerning whether the relation between true propositions and facts can be not only shown, but said. See here, my review of Eric Wefald's book (scroll down to page 227):

http://www.objectivity-archive.com/volume2_number4.html#205

I'm unsure on the idea of Logical Atomism, of atomic facts and their supposed compositions into other facts. I doubt Rand would go there.

Facts are what is the case. They do not require anyone to comprehend the case they are to be the case. Comprehending a fact will introduce a new fact, the fact of that comprehension. Occasions of consciousness are facts.

You proposed that facts are a form of propositional identifications analogous to forms of perceptual identifications. I think it is incorrect to say that facts are a form of consciousness, specifically, the form in which we identify things propositionally.

I like Rand's idea that thinking about existents as facts is motivated by recognition of the possibility of error. I wonder, though, if that is the only motivation for talking of what-is in terms of facts. Be that as it may, facts are presented to consciousness, and that presentation of existence is not a presentation composed by consciousness.

...

Stephen, thanks for responding.

From my reading of your "Volitional Synapses, VI",I do not see the implausibility of a tumbling milliliter of water at a waterfall being predetermined by conditions from a year or even a million years ago--without human interference. As one regresses in time, one expands the scale of the starting condition. One year makes one orbit around the sun; that makes the starting condition for the milliliter of water to encompass everything within 2 A.U., at a minimum. It is a matter of scale, which seems to be omitted entirely in the hypothesis of metaphysical (physical) contingency.

While I accept the idea of the "full trace of the fact" being delimited, I do not see it as a limitation to the law of causality, which is what you are implying in saying that the future action of an entity is not "in every way specifiable out of the present" conditions. (186)

Furthermore, I find troublesome the idea of "conditional facts" (184), which, if I interpret you correctly, takes any hypothetical statement as identifying such facts. Some hypotheticals are simply false, if not arbitrary.

So, by first artificially limiting the scale from which you specify conditions of necessity, you add in these other outside conditions, and relative to which you then claim some metaphysically given fact to be contingent. I disagree.

Here is a reformulation: if (A & not-C & not-D & not-scale & ... & not-volitional) then B.

From this, I maintain that there is no basis for metaphysically given facts to be contingent. The concepts of "necessity" and "contingency," as I take them literally, are characteristics of the contents of awareness in any process of thought to help us identify "things outside our control from things in our control." (ITOE 242d) The moon's orbit is thoroughly what it is, including its potential for collision with a behemoth meteor or for going into a chaotic régime. Both of these conditions are also outside of our control (for now).

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Your rephrasing of the analogy of facts to a "form of consciousness" is not what I meant. Let me clarify. I am proposing that facts are the "bit by bit" portions of reality as grasped by our consciousness in instances of a process of thought. (ITOE 243) These bit portions are the "content of consciousness" in the context of some "action of consciousness." (ITOE 31) Only when linked and attributive of a proper, methodical process of thought, do they become facts.

Taking as a starting point Ayn Rand's theory of values, with the controlling insight that values are objective (CTUI "What is Capitalism?" 22), I claim that values are a kind of facts; that evaluation is a kind of cognition; and that, intermediately therefore, values and facts are on par ontologically. Hence, facts and values are on par as contents of consciousness--as contents respectively of cognition and evaluation--as contents of psychological actions--as neither in the subject nor naturally occurring. "Fact" and "value" are epistemological conveniences. (ITOE 241)

When you say, "Facts are what is the case. They do not require anyone to comprehend the case they are to be the case"--I have to ask, doesn't a value require a valuer? Doesn't a fact require a thinker?

Just as the referents of values, as actively chosen by someone, are concrete things (material or spiritual) that can satisfy human needs--so the referents of facts are concrete things that are conceptually identified, as actively thought by someone. As existents become values by means of deliberations; so they become facts by means of propositions. Values and facts don't present themselves in nature ready-made; both require effort to obtain, with no guarantee of success.