{"id":6409,"date":"2016-05-28T13:13:06","date_gmt":"2016-05-28T13:13:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2016\/05\/28\/facts-and-states-of-affairs-terminological-questions\/"},"modified":"2016-05-28T13:13:06","modified_gmt":"2016-05-28T13:13:06","slug":"facts-and-states-of-affairs-terminological-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2016\/05\/28\/facts-and-states-of-affairs-terminological-questions\/","title":{"rendered":"Facts and States of Affairs: Terminological and Substantive Questions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bo Meinertsen writes,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Do you prefer the term 'facts' to 'states of affairs'? I take it you do — you certainly used the former most. But why, actually, did you use the latter in your Nous<\/em> article? <\/span><\/p>\n

Personally, I used 'facts' in my Ph.D. dissertation, but afterwards started using 'state of affairs', very much to be in the spirit of Armstrong, so to speak. But it is quite inconvenient and a little disagreeable-sounding. And one can — as demonstrated by important philosophers in the area, like you — perfectly well use 'facts' for worldly entities, as opposed to true propositions. One can also use it for both, in one and the same text, as in Arianna Betti's book, Against Facts<\/a> (though that might give rise to some problems.)<\/span><\/p>\n

So I wonder if I should return to using the term 'fact' for my book, which is derived from my dissertation. In my case, it's a terminological question only, so in principle I guess I can postpone deciding on this till later.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In the Nous<\/em> article I used 'states of affairs' because I was drawing heavily from Armstrong. I now use 'fact' and 'state of affairs' interchangeably, but favor 'fact' on account of its brevity. If facts are truth-makers, however, then we cannot mean by 'fact' what Frege means by Tatsache<\/em>, namely, a true proposition, where a proposition or thought (Gedanke<\/em>) is the sense (Sinn<\/em>) of a context-free declarative sentence (Satz<\/em>). (Frege 1976, 50) Propositions are either true or false, but no fact is either true or false. A proposition is a truth-bearer<\/em>, but a fact is a truth-maker<\/em>. Propositions are bivalent, but there is no corresponding bivalence with respect to facts on the concretist conception. It is not as if some facts obtain and others do not: a fact cannot exist without obtaining.<\/span><\/p>\n

By my count there are at least three correct uses of 'fact.'  <\/span><\/p>\n

Logical<\/em>:  A fact is a true proposition.  <\/span><\/p>\n

Epistemological<\/em>: A fact is a proposition either known to be the case or believed on good evidence to be the case.  <\/span><\/p>\n

Ontological<\/em>:   A fact is not a proposition, but a proposition-like entity in external reality that can serve as truth-maker for declarative sentences and the propositions they express.  For example, Al's being fat<\/em> is a fact in the ontological sense, a complex having as primary constituents Al and the property of being fat.  This fact in the ontological sense makes true the fact in the logical sense expressed by 'Al is fat.'  The fact that<\/em> Al is fat is made true by the fact of<\/em> Al's being fat<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n

I use 'fact' in the ontological sense.  But what reason do we have to posit facts in this ontological sense?<\/span><\/p>\n

There is more to the truth of a contingent sentence than the sentence that is true.  'Al is fat' is a true contingent declarative sentence.  By my lights it cannot just be true<\/em>:  there has to be something external to the sentence that 'makes' it true, that 'grounds' its being true. This external something cannot be another sentence or someone's say-so.  This external something is something 'in the world,' i.e., in reality outside mind and language.  What's more, this external something cannot be Al construed as an individual.  It must be a proposition-like entity, Al's being fat<\/em>.  This is what Armstrong calls a state of affairs and what I call a fact (and sometimes a state of affairs).  It is not a proposition though it is proposition-like:  it has a structure that mirrors the structure of a proposition.  Clarity is served if we refer to such truth-making facts as concrete facts to distinguish them from abstract facts and a abstract states of affairs.  As concrete, the fact of Al's being fat<\/em> is spatially located.<\/span><\/p>\n

This truth-maker principle goes beyond what we could call the veritas-sequitur-esse<\/em> principle.  The latter says merely that every true contingent sentence\/proposition is about something that exists.  It says that there are no truths about nonexistent items, contra<\/em> Meinong.  The VSE principle is satisfied by 'Al is fat' if just Al exists in reality or just Al and fatness.  The TM principle takes it a step further.  It requires Al, fatness, and their togetherness in the fact of Al's being fat<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRelated articles<\/span><\/legend>\n
\n
\"\"<\/a>Will the Real Truth-Maker of 'Al is Fat' Please Stand up?<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>Facts, Opinions, and Common Core<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>Tropes as Truth-Makers? Or Do We Need Facts?<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/fieldset>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bo Meinertsen writes, Do you prefer the term 'facts' to 'states of affairs'? I take it you do — you certainly used the former most. But why, actually, did you use the latter in your Nous article? Personally, I used 'facts' in my Ph.D. dissertation, but afterwards started using 'state of affairs', very much to … Continue reading “Facts and States of Affairs: Terminological and Substantive Questions”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,237],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-constituent-ontology","category-facts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6409","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6409\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}