Since When Does Saying Something Make It So
Since When Does Saying Something Make It SoHow many times have you heard someone say something about a subject that is obviously not true, only to go on with more stuff assuming that the reader or hearer has bought into the falsity.
This is a well-known syndrome. After all, WhatItellYouThreeTimesIsTrue.
If you have experienced this at all frequently, increment this count ->(00011) by one (only once per person please)
This is one of the things used in propaganda. The oft repeating of the falsehood by others together with continuing assumption as to it being bought leads to the belief that since so many people are saying it, it must be so.
Repeating lies does not make them true, no matter how many times, or by how many people they are repeated.
Perhaps one should apply the wiki tag will be "DeletedUnlessDefended" to such unsupported statements.
See also BigLie?. This goes farther in project planning. The first person to make an assertion has effectively "got dibs" on reality. If anyone now chooses to disagree, the burden of proof lies with the dissenter. "Since I've made the claim, it must be assumed to be true until properly refuted, with proof."
Such statements are often prefixed with "We've told our customer for this project that ..." with the implication that if you disagree then you're directly impugning the character of the speaker ("them's fightin' words, boy!"). A further implication is that, since we've told the customer, then it must be assumed true for this project. Nasty stuff.
Umm, the "problem" described on this page is a non-issue, at least as it is described in the first paragraph. If someone makes a statement believing it to be true, then goes on to write (or say) more stuff that's predicated on that assumption, where's the problem? Should they perhaps state an assumption, and then continue from there as if they didn't believe it? That wouldn't make much sense. I don't see the what the original point of this page was.
Believing something to be true and knowing that it is true are different things. Basing statements on precedent things only believed, but not known, is a bad construction process. Worse is basing statements upon that which is known to be false, imagined or unsupportable. It makes the statement fiction or tainted or dishonest. (Example - Subject: Emails about Controversial issue ( East Anglia) http://www.google.com/search?q=east+anglia+emails&rlz=1I7RNTN_en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7 )
You might consider the issues related to this as reflected in current news stories related to a prominent news anchor who fell victim to such assumptions and has since announced his retirement. It may prove dangerous to ones credibility to propagate things as being true without there being some semblance of veracity in such propagations. One merely compounds the matter by basing further statements on the questioned veracity. Ultimately, truth will out. It is sad that there are those who do not see the point and the problem of proclaiming truths that are false, and refuse to amend or realize after being brought face to face with the real truth that further reliance and insistence in falsehood and pretense of truth is self-defeating.
I ran into a case of this today, it was one based on false interpretation of a state of things, when the state of it could be nothing else. It was something like: A is so, because B did not happened when we tried C. What was missing was that because of a factor D, B could never happen, the reason being that when D was present and being used, it made it so that B could not in any case happen, however many time C was tried. At a later time, when D was missing, an obsever noticed that a little of B was happening, in the presence of only a little of C. The observer then applied more of C, with the result that B began to happen in response to C. This ending up proving that A was not so.
I observed this in a traumatic real-life event. I was so changed by this event that I will never jump to concluding that A is so, simply because some one indicates or states that it is so. -- DonaldNoyes.20100419
So you say. ;-) (DonaldNoyes says that, due to a traumatic event, DonaldNoyes will never jump to a conclusion simply because some one indicates or states that it is so. So it must be true.)
My statement (about the traumatic event causing a perpetual change) is probably not true, since it is a belief that it would be a good rule to follow, and intentions exist that it will be followed. It has been said "never say never". Intentions can change and are only proven when tested by time, Let it be so with this one. (Test each of these statements for truth, don't jump to any conclusions, SinceWhenDoesSayingSomethingMakeItSo)
Other demonstrations and indicators of SinceWhenDoesSayingSomethingMakeItSo: (add your own line)
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