论罗素的事实概念——兼与翟玉章教授商榷

On Russell's Conception of Fact——A Discussion with Professor Zhai Yu-zhang

事实概念的合法性一直是符合论者与反符合论者争论的焦点所在。最近,南京师范大学的翟玉章教授通过对罗素的事实概念进行梳理认为,就对真和假的解释而言,事实是空洞的。此外,他还认为,事实概念本身就预设了真概念。就反符合论者对事实的拒斥而言,翟教授的观点具有普遍性,因而非常值得予以关注。通过考察罗素持有符合论的历史以及他对于事实之本性的论述,试图表明事实并非是罗素为了解释真/假而特设的。此外,通过考察事实需要预设真这一观点的可能涵义,翟教授的论证可能包含着某种混淆,因而值得商榷。

whether facts are real entities or not lies in the center of the academic disputes between defenders and critics of the correspondence theory of truth. Recently, Professor Zhai Yu - zhang of Nanjing Normal University argued, by investigating Russell＇ s conception of facts, that fact is redundant for truth and falsehood. Moreover, he al- so believed that the concept of fact itself has presupposed the concept of truth. As for the rejection of facts by the critics of the correspondence, Professor Zhai＇ s opinion is so commom that we should pay attention to it. In this pa- per, we try to show, by inspecting the history that Russell advanced the concept the fact and his statements of the es- sence of fact, that fact is not such an entity that Russell postulates it for interpreting truth and falsehood. Moreover, by examining what it means that the concept of fact presupposed the concept of truth/falsehood, we believe that there may be some confusion in the argument of Professor Zhai that need to discuss further.