Are your facts wrong?
Are your facts wrong?
(OP)
The discussion over "troops" reminds me of another irritant of mine. I've always considered "wrong facts" to be an oxymoron, and that facts by definition can never be wrong. Seems the dictionary disagrees with my assessment. We live in a world where "facts" may not necessarily be factual. Sigh.
Any comments?
Quote:
fact (f?kt)
n.
2c Something believed to be true or real: a document laced with mistaken facts
USAGE NOTE Fact has a long history of usage in the sense “allegation of fact,” as in “This tract was distributed to thousands of American teachers, but the facts and the reasoning are wrong” (Albert Shanker). This practice has led to the introduction of the phrases true facts and real facts, as in The true facts of the case may never be known. These usages may occasion qualms among critics who insist that facts can only be true, but the usages are often useful for emphasis.
Any comments?





RE: Are your facts wrong?
Hg
Eng-Tips guidelines: FAQ731-376
RE: Are your facts wrong?
To paraphrase a line from "Men In Black":
"A thousand years ago, everybody know that the Earth was the center of the solar system. Five hundred years ago every body know that the Earth was flat."
Just to further confuse things, both of those sentences are wrong on two levels. The Earth was never at the center of the solar system, nor was it ever flat. There certainly were some people who did not know either of those things at the times referenced.
Do two wrongs make a right?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
The other bigger question question is whether someone can "know" something that is false. That's one of the central questions of epistemology (what is knowledge?) and a favorite topic in semantics (what does the word "know" mean?). There are books written about this.
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/EPISTEMI.html
And ultimately we could get to that old "what if I'm just a brain floating in a jar" question.
Hg
Eng-Tips guidelines: FAQ731-376
RE: Are your facts wrong?
"I've told you a million times not to exaggerate."
"I must have sent 100 e-mails on that topic."
RE: Are your facts wrong?
jimbo
Buy a dictionary, keep it nearby and USE it. Webster's New World Dictionary of American English is recommended, and Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.
RE: Are your facts wrong?
If you try to put the wrong wheels on your car, they are still wheels, they just don't fit your car.
JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com
RE: Are your facts wrong?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
"The fact is that I once was mistaken but have since been corrected and am now right."
<LOL>
~NiM
RE: Are your facts wrong?
but 3 lefts will
"If A equals success, then the formula is: A = X + Y + Z, X is work. Y is play. Z is keep your mouth shut."
-- by Albert Einstein
RE: Are your facts wrong?
but 2 Wrights made a Flier.
HgTX: I don't have any qualms...can I get one at the used qualm store or Walmart?
jmw: yes, they are wheels..but the fact is, those wheels aren't in the owners manual.
kchayfie: or wrongly assumed fact. (when self professed experts quote facts, the assumption is the fact is incorrect. However, it was originaly called a "fact" so it becomes a wrong fact...???)
rerig (Dallas)
RE: Are your facts wrong?
It is agreed that facts are unalterable or unchangeable, however, as long as "wrong" is a qualifier that doesn't deny the "facticity" of fact, there can be wrong facts, can't they ?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
That line from MIB always annoyed me because it perpetuates the myth that people used to think the world was flat.
People have known the world is round for thousands of years at least...
RE: Are your facts wrong?
David
RE: Are your facts wrong?
Ciao.
RE: Are your facts wrong?
What if the meaning of wrong is: aggrieving, harming, illegitimate, incorrect, iniquitous, malign, mistaken, shameful, unlawful, and so on ? Could then a fact be wrong ?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
The medievil peasant who never left his village had a hard time comprehending this novel and possibly heretical concept and, since within his limited horizons it meant nothing anyway, was probably quite content with the view that the earth was flat. As a working idea, it was sound.
Of course, they had problems with the concept of an infinite unbounded environment and, believing that the surface had to be finite, then had problems with "where is the edge and what happens when you find it?" and "what is below us and above us?"
The "round" earth theory is a great 3D solution where you can have a finite and unbounded surface. It also largely accounts for the "what's under us?" question, but not the "what's above us?" and "where are we?" problems.
The problem for us today is that in the new string theory we have 11 dimensions, not 3, so what shape is the earth really? Is our 3d view of a round earth as simplistic as early mans 2D view and our answers to the questions that brings just as imaginative?
In the peasants 2D world earth is flat, in the days of the early navigators and map makers this proved a problem temporarily solved by a 3D round earth and then set by by theologists declaring this was not so, just as they later declared the earth to be the centre of the universe and the solar system.
We (I) am, of course, rather more 3D than our (my) 2D medievil forebears, but to people working with 11D I suspect I am even more primitive to them that the peasant is to me; I have enough trouble with conceptualising a finite boundless universe except some kind of rotation through a 4th dimension, by analogy to our 2D world turned through a 3rd dimension. Of course, apart from some kind of Klines flask or something this is a difficult concept and I have no idea of what this shape "really" is.
If anyone knows the answer, please let this peasant know.
So a "Fact" is only a fact withinin a certain set of conditions. We can compare the "facts" of a Newtonian and a relativistic world and the "truth" becomes the version that best fits the circumstances in a practical world.
JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com
RE: Are your facts wrong?
Interesting topic...flat earth. My physics teacher would always bash the flat earth society.
http
It's seems their offical website http://www.flat-earth.org/ has fallen off the face of the earth...so to speak.
RE: Are your facts wrong?
h
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
http://www.ews.uiuc.edu/~akapadia/moon.html
Ciao.
RE: Are your facts wrong?
the surface of the water flat, or does it have a high point at the center of the pool?
surprisingly, unless the person had some training in physics the answer would be: flat.
fyi... the rail in the test basins for ship models is corrected for the earth curvature.
the middle ages mindset is alive and kicking...
saludos.
a.
RE: Are your facts wrong?
Anyonw that believes that astronauts never landed on the moon, has too much space between the ears.
Also, the Earth is a bit oval and "wobbles" as it spins around it's axis.
Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site
FAQ559-1100
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RE: Are your facts wrong?
"It isn't what we don't know that gives us trouble, it's what we know that ain't so"
www.SlideRuleEra.net
RE: Are your facts wrong?
As an engineer, while I understand the physics, I would say the surface of the pool is flat, or at least close enough for my purposes.
Would you like to define flat? How close to flat does the surface of the pool have to be to actually meet the definition of flat?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
RE: Are your facts wrong?
whilst the surface of the oceans is somewhat (perhaps ideally) spherical, it is obviously affected by gravity, rotation, weather, the moon, etc ...
clearly, as sms says, to an engineering approximation the surface of the pool is flat,
but perfectly, mathematically, i'd guess it'd be concave (slightly, oh so very slightly), but it is probably more more significantly ... is the floor of the pool flat ? (and how flat is flat?)
and now, to finish the paperwork ...
RE: Are your facts wrong?
In metrology class, while studying laser interferometry, we were told there would be a discrepancy between 'master level' and the laser. This was due to the curvature of the Earth.
Measurements triangulated by the laser were to be taken as true-flat. Master levels were discrepant by 0.0002" per 10ft. This could be significant if you were lapping (calibrating) a surface plate larger than 10ft.
regards,
Hydroformer
RE: Are your facts wrong?
Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site
FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716
RE: Are your facts wrong?
If the water contacts the line it will form a meniscus at the line.
Whether the vessel is a bowl, glass, a pool or an ocean there will be a surface tension induced deviation at the boundaries.
Spotting the surface with a laser eliminates most Earthly interference (gravity / inertia / curvature) from the observation. (assuming air pressure, humidity, composition are constant in the measurement field)
regards,
Hydroformer
RE: Are your facts wrong?
Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site
FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716