Full Idea
It must not be supposed that a negative fact contains a constituent corresponding to the word 'not'. It contains no more constituents than a positive fact of the correlative positive form. The differenece between the two forms is ultimate and irreducible.
Gist of Idea
A positive and negative fact have the same constituents; their difference is primitive
Source
Bertrand Russell (Our Knowledge of the External World [1914], VIII.279), quoted by Michael Potter - The Rise of Analytic Philosophy 1879-1930 41 'Neg'
Book Reference
Potter,Michael: 'The Rise of Anaytic Philosophy 1879-1930' [Routledge 2020], p.277
A Reaction
['Harvard Lectures'] The audience disliked this. How does one fact exclude the other fact? Potter asks whether absence is a fact, and whether an absence can be a truthmaker.