An example of metaphor used in writing about science:
"the air of paradox should be thin in the sciences, where we never bother to state conditionals with antecedents known to be false…Take for instance 'Clairvoyants discover every secret': This statement is vacuously true because…there are no clairvoyants. Yet we do not accept this truth because it is pointless, just as the zoologist has no use for the truth 'Centaurs are wise'."
Mario Bunge
Bunge, M. (2017/1998). Philosophy of Science. Volume 1: From problem to theory (Revised ed.). Routledge.
'vacuously true : That is, it is not false (there are no clairvoyants that fail to discover every secret), but it has no substative content.
There are no clairvoyants that do not discover every secret (because there are no genuine clairvoyants) just as there are no centaurs who are not wise (because there are no real centaurs).
[Please be aware that a word may have different nuances, or even a different meaning, according to context.]« Back to Index
