[Ads-l] "Alternative facts" for EOTY

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Mon Jan 23 20:56:37 UTC 2017


On Sun, Jan 22, 2017 at 11:27 PM, Baker, John <JBAKER at stradley.com> wrote:

> 2.      She could have meant that Spicer was presenting an alternative
> version of the facts that arguably was based on evidence as good or better
> than the evidence supporting the facts reported by the press.


Something like the speed of light, which was once thought to be
instantaneous, on the basis of facts supported by empirical evidence*, but
which was later shown to be merely really fast, on the basis of
alternative facts supported by better empirical evidence.

*E.g. two guys, each with a shaded lantern on a moonless night, go to
separate hilltops a measured mile apart. One drops the shade of his
lantern. As soon as the other sees the light from the first guy's lantern,
he drops the shade of his own lantern. Observers measure the time-lapse
between the two flashes of light. It turns out that, regardless of how far
apart the guys, abstracting away from the necessary response-time, there is
no lapse of time between the two flashes.

-- 
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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