1. Is there a clear way of distinguishing factual issues from
nonfactual ones? 2. Aren't people ever entitled to their own opinions?
1. Is there a clear way of distinguishing factual issues from nonfactual ones? If you want a simple criterion you can apply in every case
to give you an uncontroversial answer, you should know that philosophers have
tried to develop one for thousands of years and haven't yet come up with a standard
that everyone agrees to. That is not to say that no one will ever develop such
a criterion, only that none exists today-which is what this question is asking
for.
However, there are good practical ways of drawing a distinction. First, reflect
on what type of answer you expect to reach on the issue. If there is a fact
down the line that resolves the issue, then you are addressing a factual matter.
That is, if a claim, C, is a claim about a matter of fact, then either C is
a fact or the contradiction of C is. Take the claim "The universe began
with an explosion." If that claim is true, it is a fact that the universe
began with an explosion. If the claim is false, it is a fact that the universe
did not begin with an explosion. Either way you wind up with a fact; so the
claim concerns a factual matter.
Put this point another way. There is no room in the universe for both a fact
and the contradictory fact. When we disagree about a factual matter, at least
one side is wrong. And that wrongness is itself a fact: To call people wrong
for having believed the sun to go around the earth is to state a fact about
their error.
In a second strategy for identifying factual matters, you can look at how the
people involved in a disagreement defend their positions. You can ask: Do any
arguments exist, either that might work or that you feel compelled to make,
to settle the issue?
Some people put sugar in their coffee and others don't. Rarely do they have
cause to sit down and discuss their practices. For this reason, the preference
for sugar or no sugar usually counts as a nonfactual issue. Now, suppose someone
did feel inclined to argue against sweetening coffee, saying that the sugar
harms your teeth, or that it contains empty calories. Now we have factual matters
in the air.
Somewhere along the way, you might respond that the benefits of not adding sugar
don't make up for the effect on the taste of the coffee. Your co-conversationalist
might urge you to try sugarless coffee for a week and see how you like it, but
you could answer that you've tried it plenty of times already and the coffee
just doesn't taste as good. It would be fruitless for the person to keep at
the subject, insisting that coffee tastes better without the sugar. Your discussion
has returned to judgments of taste that no observation or argument can settle:
This has become again a nonfactual issue.
Finally, prepare to err on the side of caution when drawing this distinction.
It gets tempting to sweep all difficult, complex, and especially emotionally
charged issues into the dustpan of pure opinion. Yielding to that temptation
leads to errors about which issues belong where. If, on the other hand, you
act from the prejudice that an issue concerns a matter of fact, only changing
your mind when you feel forced to acknowledge that there's no way of reasoning
about an opinion, you will make sounder judgments about which claims are which.
top 2. Aren't people ever entitled to their own opinions? Of course they are. Criticizing the overindulgent appeal
to that principle does not mean that we need to hammer the disagreement out
of anyone whose opinions are different from our own. But it helps to see why
the principle comes to be applied overindulgently.
The problem begins with confusion between factual and nonfactual issues. In
the nonfactual case there is (by definition) no argument, evidence, or credible
authority through which to decide on the truth of a claim. When two people disagree
on whether falling asleep is pleasant, argument and observation become bootless.
Such cases lead us to say that both people are entitled to their opinions.
If all opinions were about nonfactual issues, people would be entitled to all
their opinions. But the fact that you hold an opinion on a subject does not
automatically make the subject a matter of opinion-you may just as easily hold
an opinion about a factual matter. An opinion is the first word on a subject,
not the last word: We need to go on to classify the subject as a factual matter
or not. Resorting to the plea of tolerance on opinions stops us from taking
this next step. top
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