Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Tim Rentsch Newsgroups: comp.lang.c Subject: Re: transpiling to low level C Date: Tue, 07 Jan 2025 21:38:38 -0800 Organization: A noiseless patient Spider Lines: 40 Message-ID: <865xmpamqp.fsf@linuxsc.com> References: <86ikrdg6yq.fsf@linuxsc.com> <20241222002032.0000104c@yahoo.com> <20241222021851.0000059f@yahoo.com> <20241222030451.00005565@yahoo.com> <86o713dvo7.fsf@linuxsc.com> <86ed1i9w4g.fsf@linuxsc.com> <87cyh14ihg.fsf@bsb.me.uk> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Injection-Date: Wed, 08 Jan 2025 06:38:39 +0100 (CET) Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="6e19b66cb0c542b6b8c649f7413a0cd9"; logging-data="2790757"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1/z/PrBNLYubKJlmiqngmU8iudwbChUL84=" User-Agent: Gnus/5.11 (Gnus v5.11) Emacs/22.4 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:O4ST4mobCxPRV3gyy3SZzMjDfGc= sha1:Dxou7kqSDHs/vpPfw984IVEQxW0= Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.c:389867 Ben Bacarisse writes: > Tim Rentsch writes: > >> A statement of fact is a statement concerning an objective question, >> such as "Is every even number greater than 4 the sum of two prime >> numbers?". A statement of fact can be right or wrong or true or >> false, even if it isn't known at the present time which of those is >> the case. The statement "Four colors suffice to color any planar >> map such that adjacent regions do not have the same color" is a >> statement of fact, both now and 60 years ago before the statement >> had been proven. Both P==NP and P!=NP are statements of fact, even >> though one of them must certainly be false; the key property is >> that they are objective statements, subject to falsification. If I >> say "The Earth is flat", that is a statement of fact, even though >> the statement is false. > > I think you go too far. The word "fact" is not neutral as far as its > truth is concerned, and writing "a statement of fact" does not > significantly change that. Most dictionaries define a fact as something > that is true (or at least supported by currently available evidence). > One online essay[1] concludes that > > "A statement of fact is one that has objective content and is > well-supported by the available evidence." > > [1] https://philosophersmag.com/the-fact-opinion-distinction/ I will concede that the phrase "statement of fact" can be used in the sense you describe. I believe it is also true that "statement of fact" is used in the sense I describe, and that sense appears among the alternatives in various well-regarded dictionaries. In any case, my point was not to have a debate about the meaning of a phrase, but to clarify the intended meaning of my earlier remarks. I was making a statement about an objective question, one subject to independent verification or falsification. I was not offering a comment that was merely expressing a personal point of view.