【“多重事实”的迷思】（One event / incident, multiple facts?）

很多年前，在我做第二期博士后的时候，碰到了一个有些“特别”的老板。他算是学界大佬，是我们这个方向知名学术刊物的主编，手上经费很充足。他让我带两个人，负责他的一个项目。几百万美元的基金已经拿到手，但需要出数据、发文章。

In the past, when I was on my second postdoc stint, my advisor was quite "special". He was a big shot in academia, the editor-in-chief of a well-known academic journal in our field, and had ample funding. He asked me to lead a team of a couple of assistants, responsible for one of his projects. We had already secured grants of several million dollars, but we needed to produce data and publish articles.

我在他的实验室每周至少干70个小时，然而一年以后进展甚微。大约在2007年冬天的一个傍晚，在他的巨型办公室，我俩有一段不长的交谈。我们分坐在对角线的位置，相隔10米不止。黄昏天色黑下来，他不开灯，暗得脸都看不清。那气氛真是几分肃杀。我告诉他，他想要的data不可能得到。我详细地向他论证、说明，告诉他谁也做不到。

I worked at least 70 hours per week in his lab, but couldn’t achieve much after a whole year.  On a winter evening around 2007, in his massive office, we had a brief conversation. We sat diagonally across from each other, more than 10 meters apart. The dusk settled in, and he didn't turn on the lights, making the room so dim that faces couldn't be clearly seen. The atmosphere was somewhat oppressive. I told him that the data he wanted was impossible to obtain. I elaborated and explained in detail, telling him that it was an unattainable task for anyone.

然而他却说，你那么聪明的人是应该能得到的。我争辩说，他提出模型有问题，不可能得到预期的东西 — That’s the fact.

However, he insisted, saying that someone as intelligent as me should be able to get it. I argued that the model he proposed was flawed, and it was impossible to achieve the expected results—that's the fact.

屋子的那一端传来他的笑声。no， no， no，他说，假如马路上出了一个交通事故，你站在马路的一边，我站在马路的另一边 – Then， we are seeing two different facts.

Laughter emanated from his end of the room. "No, no, no," he said, "Imagine there's a traffic accident on the road. You're standing on one side, and I'm on the other – then, we are seeing two different facts."

我目瞪口呆……几个月以后，我离开了他的实验室去了公司。

I was shocked… A few months later, I left his lab and joined the industry.

那一年半，从某种意义上讲是不堪回首的。但他那句振聋发聩的话，却在后来的日子里对我颇有帮助 — 在看人和想事、做事诸方面都有难以言状的启发。而且，近距离观察大佬和他的左膀右臂们组成的shady圈子，也是难得的人生经历。

That year and a half, in some ways, was not something I would want to revisit. But his stunning words actually have been helpful to me in the days that followed—making me in understanding people, thinking about things, and approaching tasks from a different angle that are hard to put into words. Additionally, witnessing the shady circler of the big shot and his right-hand people up close was a rare life experience.

由于这样一个经历，我后来也经常思考one event/incident，multiple facts 是否合理的问题。我了解到，在英语里，fact与reality是有些不同的（我暂把truth，belief等放在一边）。Reality是一个总体，一个比较抽象的概念。记得有一次在一个博览会上，我跟一个公司的业务员说你们公司的口号“Help scientists to do science“ 挺好，他马上说这不是slogan，这是reality。我想他是要强调的是这是公司的总体定位，不需要具体的例子。而fact是构成reality的具体方面，它经常是可观察、可测量的，也是可以根据某些标准作结论的。比如从科学实验的结果看，尼古丁具有很强的成瘾性，这是fact；但从社会现实和社会规则来看，吸烟并不等同于吸毒，这又是另一个fact。

Due to this experience, I often pondered the question of whether "one event / incident, multiple facts" is reasonable. I learned that in English, "fact" and "reality" are somewhat different (I put aside other concepts, such as "truth" and "belief"). Reality is a general concept, a more abstract idea. I remember once at an expo, I told a company's salesperson that their slogan "Help scientists to do science" was good, and he immediately said it's not a slogan; it's reality. I think he wanted to emphasize that it's the overall positioning of the company, not needing specific examples. A fact is a specific aspect that makes up reality; it is often observable, measurable, and can be concluded based on certain standards. For example, from the results of a scientific experiment, nicotine is highly addictive—that's a fact. But from the perspective of societal norms and rules, smoking is not equivalent to drug use—that's another fact.

但我依然有无解的困惑：用我前老板的例子，马路的两侧假如看到的（或者录像中显示的）是相互矛盾的facts，那么法律上怎么判定呢？或者，这种矛盾其实根本不应该存在？

Yet, I still have unsolved puzzles: in the example of my former boss, if the facts seen (or shown in videos) on both sides of the road are contradictory, how does the law make a judgment? Or, such a contradiction actually shouldn’t exist?

【英文根据ChatGPT版编辑、修改】

• 《唐宋韵》48.《除夜作》高适
• 《“多重事实”的迷思》（One event / incident, multiple facts?）
• 【斯人已逝（之三：Tony）】
• 《金陵五题》(选二) 刘禹锡 (Five nostalgic poems on Nanjing)
• 【愿那灯火的盛宴重新点燃】

唐宋韵发过的热帖：

• 【斯人已逝（之三：Tony）】
• 【愿那灯火的盛宴重新点燃】（May the feast of lights be rekindled. )
• 《唐宋韵》47.《金陵五题》（选二）刘禹锡
• 【老同学聚会“13点”公约 】（ A Goofy Convention for Schoolmate Reunion)
• 习、拜握手与“芬太尼”那张牌（Xi, Biden Handshake and the Fentanyl Card）
• 《唐宋韵》46.《宿骆氏亭寄怀崔雍崔衮》李商隐（Unburden Myself In Arduous Journey）
• The Glorious Temple of Geometry (3. Johnson’s Theorem)
• 《唐宋韵》45.《枫桥夜泊》张继 （Mooring by Maple Bridge at Night)
• We were close, but they've passed (2. Lao Xu)
• 【捣练子令- 梦金陵】(Dream back to Nanjing)

• 前段时间，美国就有所谓'Alternative fact"的提法 -永远老李-   (531 bytes) (4 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 11:26:50

• 在很多事情上，狡辩的空间是很大的，即便是你说的“飞起来”和“安全”，也有不同的角度和标准。 -唐宋韵-    (0 bytes) (1 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 11:55:19

• 我感觉这时一个相当冷酷的硬指标。世界上只有这两家能造大型飞机 -永远老李-   (159 bytes) (2 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 12:04:06

• 至少“安全”与否，是可以通过嘴皮子调整的。 -唐宋韵-    (0 bytes) (0 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 13:31:42

• worked at least 70 hours per week。。这是在中国老板的实验室？：）） -盈盈一笑间-    (0 bytes) (2 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 12:18:19

• 不是。大学里理工博士猴干70小时不罕见。 -唐宋韵-    (0 bytes) (0 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 12:22:30

• facts和truth的区别是什么呢？怎么觉得实验室老板有偷换概念的嫌疑呢？ -盈盈一笑间-    (0 bytes) (1 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 12:20:57

• 所以我说他shady啊。他实验室的人分4等，一个黑社会。 -唐宋韵-    (0 bytes) (3 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 12:26:00

• 遇到坏老板，上班如上坟。果断离开，及时止损，为上策。 -盈盈一笑间-    (0 bytes) (1 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 12:56:00

• +1 -豆青-    (0 bytes) (0 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 13:01:54

• The ousted Stanford head seemed to run another 黑社会 :-) -7grizzly-    (0 bytes) (2 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 14:24:11

• 难道是校友？请展开说说。：） -盈盈一笑间-    (0 bytes) (0 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 18:58:26

• Fact is based on reality, but reality is influenced by fact -豆青-    (0 bytes) (2 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 13:06:14

• I agree w/ the 2nd half of this sentence, but not 1st half. -唐宋韵-    (0 bytes) (0 reads) 11/29/2023 postreply 13:11:09

• A coin has two sides :)) -卫宁-    (0 bytes) (0 reads) 11/30/2023 postreply 07:29:34

• 国人比较高大上，喜欢追求truth，但truth除非是上帝，有上帝视角，否则很难得到。但人能得到碎片，facts。 -dhyang_wxc-    (1371 bytes) (1 reads) 11/30/2023 postreply 10:34:07