Facts, Opinions and Commonplace Assertions

In Katy, Texas, a Seventh Grade teacher gave students a quiz, in order to gauge their understanding of the difference between “fact,” “opinion” and “commonplace assertion.” One statement the students were to identify was “God is real.”

One student, based upon her Christian Faith, answered the statement as “fact.” Her teacher marked it as incorrect.

Immediately, FOX News began its spin machine, attempting to portray this as persecution against Christians. The spin went like this: Evil Teacher Orders Good, Innocent Christian Student to Deny Her Faith. It is truly the stuff of those chain e-mails that ill-informed, gullible people believe so enthusiastically, especially if they hold a predisposition to believe them, anyway.

The school has apologized to the student and her family for such an injustice.

What is wrong with this picture?

What is wrong is that “fact” is, in fact, incorrect.

Now, I am not going to try to justify the question’s presence. I argue that such a hotbed issue should not have been a question on the quiz in the first place. Couldn’t whoever made the quiz find a better phrase to identify? My opinion, however, is irrelevant to the body of this post.

But let’s take a look at the phrase “God is real” and at her answer. First, in the spirit of all good discussion, let’s define our terms.

Merriam Webster defines "fact" as follows: "Something that truly exists or happens; something that has actual existence; a true piece of information."

The same dictionary defines "opinion" as: "A belief, judgement or way of thinking about something: what someone thinks about a particular thing.

Commonplace assertion does not appear in Merriam Webster, but the commonly given goes something like this: "A statement which is asserted by many to be true, but does not meet the criteria to be labeled a fact."

So, what criteria are there to make something a fact, as this was the student’s response?

To begin, facts are falsifiable. What does this mean, you ask?

From Wikipedia (oddly enough, the most thorough definition): "A statement is called falsifiable if it is possible to conceive an observation or an argument which proves the statement in question to be false. In this sense, falsify is synonymous with nullify, meaning not "to commit fraud" but "show to be false".

Second, facts are testable.

What we mean here is, subject to scientific test – which Merriam Webster defines as "a critical examination, observation or evaluation: trial: specifically: the procedure of submitting a statement to such conditions or operations as will lead to its proof or disproof or to its acceptance or its rejection.

As you can see also, falsifiability is a pre-requisite for testability.

So is God’s existence falsifiable, in the scientific sense? Many on both sides of the argument have attempted to find ways in which the Deity Hypothesis can be falsified. However, as knowledge of God’s existence or nonexistence is a pre-requisite for determining a falsifiable test (one of few such cases), falsifiability is, currently, impossible.

Is God’s existence testable? Falsifiability is a pre-requisite for testability. How can one test God’s existence, if one cannot come up with criteria to ascertain if God does not exist? A control scenario is required, and no such scenario can exist if the proposal is not falsifiable.

Is God quantifiable? If God were to appear and subject Himself to the required tests, He would be. However, if God were to appear to all the world at once in each generation, why would we need further evidence of His existence?

So the statement, “God is real,” whether the statement is true or untrue, does not qualify under the criteria for fact.

What about “opinion?”

Whether God exists or does not exist is not opinion. One would hope that, for anybody making a positive claim on this issue on either side, the statement would be a conclusion, rather than an opinion. As the reader can tell, this essayist has no respect for the concept of “faith” whatsoever, on any issue, from any side. In terms of Epistemology, where the concept is generally applied, it is useless.

So what is left for a possible answer is “commonplace assertion.” Remember the criteria for this label.

Is God’s existence commonly asserted to be true? Yes.

Does it fall under the criteria to be labeled a fact? We have, at least partially, demonstrated here that it does not.

Therefore, the answer to the question is, Commonplace Assertion. The student put “fact.” The teacher marked it wrong. The teacher was correct. There are no demands for the student to deny anything and no persecution. Except, perhaps, against an instructor trying to teach a valuable lesson in basic critical thinking. 

Now again, I say that having this as one of the statements to be labeled was, at least, irresponsible – no matter how much I wish more people could recognize the difference. 

The next question is, did this student really feel that she was being asked to deny her religion, or is she, perhaps, being exploited by demagogues with overactive persecution complexes?

These choices are not mutually exclusive, so considering her youth and the implications from certain aspects of Society, I am going to say, both.

But only time can tell.