Comment by bsder
10 years ago
> And what precisely is a fact, but an argument about the state of the world being a specific way?
Thankfully not. A "fact" is something that can be measured in such a way that even if you are totally antagonistic to my arguments, we will get the same result.
Now your "argument" may attempt to prove the irrelevancy or inadequacy of my facts, but the facts themselves should be unfudgeable.
The problem is that it is far far too expensive to rigorously verify all the facts one hears. So in practice humans need to rely on the trustworthiness of the person or institution saying them.