more from this thinker     |     more from this text


Single Idea 10367

[filed under theme 7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 8. Facts / b. Types of fact ]

Full Idea

It can be argued that if all facts are logically equivalent, then there is only one fact - the True.

Gist of Idea

There is only one fact - the True

Source

Jonathan Schaffer (The Metaphysics of Causation [2007], 1.1)

Book Ref

'Stanford Online Encyclopaedia of Philosophy', ed/tr. Stanford University [plato.stanford.edu], p.6


A Reaction

[he cites Davidson's 'Causal Relations', who cites Frege] This is the sort of bizarre stuff you end up with if you start from formal logic and work out to the world, instead of vice versa.


The 12 ideas with the same theme [possible different types of fact]:

There are simple and complex facts; the latter depend on further facts [Chrysippus, by Cicero]
Russell asserts atomic, existential, negative and general facts [Russell, by Armstrong]
There are no positive or negative facts; these are just the forms of propositions [Wittgenstein]
That Queen Anne is dead is a 'general fact', not a fact about Queen Anne [Prior,AN]
Negative facts are supervenient on positive facts, suggesting they are positive facts [Armstrong]
Since 'no bird here' and 'no squirrel here' seem the same, we must talk of 'atomic' facts [Dummett]
Facts are object-plus-extension, or property-plus-set-of-properties, or object-plus-property [McGinn]
Why can there not be disjunctive, conditional and negative facts? [Kirkham]
Tensed and tenseless sentences state two sorts of fact, which belong to two different 'realms' of reality [Fine,K]
There is only one fact - the True [Schaffer,J]
We may believe in atomic facts, but surely not complex disjunctive ones? [Horsten]
Worldly facts are obtaining states of affairs, with constituents; conceptual facts also depend on concepts [Audi,P]