![millionsmillions:
“The Lifespan of a Fact dramatizes a clash of sensibilities – a conflict between an aesthete for whom the rhythm of a number is more important than its accuracy and an empiricist for whom facts are, whether we like it or not, facts. A lot of D’Agata’s adjustments to the actual do seem, in themselves, fairly harmless. For much of the book, the conflict between the checker and the checked reads as a conflict between two equal and opposite forces of fastidiousness: fastidiousness about fact, and fastidiousness about art.”
Mark O’Connell, “Cool story, bro.”
&
“Whither the fact-checker? For starters, there’s the pursuit of truth and knowledge and all else that is good in the world. This isn’t as squishy and idealistic as it sounds. I know many writers who were profoundly moved by the act of fact-checking, and I, too, found it to be a revelatory, if depressing, experience: In more than one case, I came across an entire news story based on a misinterpreted statistic. Still, it would be absurd to claim that the abundance of fact-checking in the U.S. can be explained because Americans as a people value accuracy more than the Japanese or the French. It would also be very hard to verify.”
Atossa Araxia Abrahamian,”Fact Check!”
[Image]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1r8xztnzo1r6xvfko1_500.jpg)
“The Lifespan of a Fact dramatizes a clash of sensibilities – a conflict between an aesthete for whom the rhythm of a number is more important than its accuracy and an empiricist for whom facts are, whether we like it or not, facts. A lot of D’Agata’s adjustments to the actual do seem, in themselves, fairly harmless. For much of the book, the conflict between the checker and the checked reads as a conflict between two equal and opposite forces of fastidiousness: fastidiousness about fact, and fastidiousness about art.”
Mark O’Connell, “Cool story, bro.”
&
“Whither the fact-checker? For starters, there’s the pursuit of truth and knowledge and all else that is good in the world. This isn’t as squishy and idealistic as it sounds. I know many writers who were profoundly moved by the act of fact-checking, and I, too, found it to be a revelatory, if depressing, experience: In more than one case, I came across an entire news story based on a misinterpreted statistic. Still, it would be absurd to claim that the abundance of fact-checking in the U.S. can be explained because Americans as a people value accuracy more than the Japanese or the French. It would also be very hard to verify.”
Atossa Araxia Abrahamian,”Fact Check!”
[Image]
