[Ads-l] "Alternative facts" for EOTY

ADSGarson O'Toole adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM
Wed Jan 25 16:48:15 UTC 2017


Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> The Net finds numerous recent posts asserting that leading self-help guru
> Friedrich Nietzsche once wrote, "What is the truth but a lie agreed upon?"
>
> And if a bigshot said it, it must be true.
>
> GB reveals no authentic attributions to Freddy, and none before 2016.

I have examined a family of relayed sayings about historical truth:

What Is History But a Fable Agreed Upon?
http://quoteinvestigator.com/2016/07/05/fable/

[Begin excerpt]
Dear Quote Investigator: A popular skeptical viewpoint about history
can be expressed in a few different ways:

1) What is history but a fable agreed upon?
2) History is a set of lies agreed upon.
3) History is a set of lies that people have agreed upon.
[End excerpt]

Garson

>
> A blog site confidently attributes "Truth Is a Lie Agreed Upon" to (wait
> for it)..."Abraham Lincoln."
>
> Cf. the older and ever-popular "History is a lie agreed upon."
>
> So who, Garson, really introduced the phrase attributed to Nietzsche?
>
> JL
>
> On Tue, Jan 24, 2017 at 8:30 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> > On Jan 24, 2017, at 8:14 PM, Joel Berson <berson at ATT.NET> wrote:
>> >
>> > A la "alt right"?
>> >
>> > Joel
>>
>> Seems so.  OED, s.v. “alt”:
>> Alternative; spec. denoting a version of some cultural phenomenon (orig.
>> and esp. music) that is regarded as outside the mainstream of its genre.
>> [citing “alt.rock” and “alt country”]
>>
>> So alt facts would be a cultural phenomenon regarded as outside the
>> mainstream of the fact genre (in being, well, not true).
>>
>> LH
>> >
>> >
>> >      From: Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>> > Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2017 8:02 PM
>> > Subject: Re: [ADS-L] "Alternative facts" for EOTY
>> >
>> > MSNBC is now using the short form "alt facts."
>> >
>> > JL
>> >
>> > On Tue, Jan 24, 2017 at 3:06 PM, Jonathan Lighter <
>> wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >> Wrong! Wrong!
>> >>
>> >> Not a falsehood! It's an important alternate fact.
>> >>
>> >> Also note my signature line of many years standing.
>> >>
>> >> JL
>> >>
>> >> --
>> >> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
>> truth."
>> >>
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > --
>> > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
>> truth."
>> >
>> > ------------------------------------------------------------
>> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > ------------------------------------------------------------
>> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> >
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



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