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aprrrr | 14 years ago

> The goal is not to determine what is objective fact. There is no such thing, not even in natural sciences such as physics. Dont forget that.

I'm not sure where you're going with that; follow that line of thought too far and you end up with solipsism.

Practically speaking, sure there are objective facts. The properties of mechanics and electromagnetism are facts, or close enough for everyday purposes. What happens when you throw a ball or turn on a light is not a cultural construct.

re: history, sure, no person has the Pure Truth, and any history reflects the viewpoint of its author(s). It's still useful to distinguish between things that happened and things that didn't happen.

For instance, World War II did not begin when Queen Mab, having been cast out of the Garden of Eden by Shiva, built a clone army in her underground fort in Antarctica then invaded Loompaland. That simply didn't happen.

It seems to me that there are objective facts; we just can't know them perfectly. Still, it's very useful to try to get an approximation.

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