"Say nothing that is not entirely true"

September 6, 2010 10:03 AM

I have a dim memory of a comment by the authors of a science textbook, stating that they had attempted to avoid making any statements that were not entirely true, and describing how difficult this had been. My attempts to find the quotation with Google, the Oxford Dictionary of Scientific Quotations, and Gaither’s Dictionary of Scientific Quotations have all failed. It was probably an undergraduate textbook in physics, chemistry or biology.
posted by James Scott-Brown to Science & Nature (2 answers total)

I don't know the quotation you're thinking of, but I have exactly the same thought ("It is difficult to say only things that are entirely true") every time I have to write a 100-word conference abstract.
posted by fantabulous timewaster at 4:02 AM on September 7, 2010

This is probably not exactly what you're looking for but what you describe reminds me of Korzybski's General Semantics and Bourland's E-Prime, a version of English in which one is supposed to avoid any form of the "is" of identity and the "is" of predication.

While this form of English wouldn't prevent anybody from stating things that aren't entirely true it would make it very difficult for anybody to sell falsehoods as absolute truths.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 4:15 PM on September 7, 2010