Is everything an opinion?

I've heard some people say that everything is an opinion.

In honesty, I don't see how it could be.

Think about this:
I win the lottery. Is that an opinion? No, it's a fact that I won the lottery. I have proof that I won. The ticket that I bought won the lottery. I got the money for winning. Is that an opinion?

Also, if you think that just because you think that something is not a fact because you think it is not a fact, then you are simply wrong, because if everyone's opinion changed a fact, no one could have an opinion, because everyone's opinion would change everyone's opinion, so the idea of an opinion itself wouldn't exist. Also, why would you think that you are so special that your opinion changes a fact?

If everything was an opinion, wouldn't it be a truth that everything is an opinion? Wouldn't that make it a fact that everything is an opinion, itself proving that everything is not an opinion, because everything being an opinion would be fact, and a fact is not an opinion.

Everyone has opinions on everything, but just because you have an opinion on something doesn't mean that that one thing is not a fact.

Some things are opinions, such as a preference on a food or a favorite anything. Those things are opinions, and there is no fact to what food is the best, or who has the best singing voice in the world.

To me, the idea of everything being an opinion makes no sense, because everything being an opinion would leave huge gaps in everything. It's my opinion that it makes no sense that everything is an opinion. However, it is a fact that everything is not an opinion, and it is also a fact that everything is not a fact. (Oh, it would also be a fact that there is no such thing as a fact if everything was an opinion, again disproving that idea in general.)

Logic simply says that everything is not an opinion.

Agreed. I tend to think that the saying 'everything is an opinion' or 'well, that's your opinion' (when stating a fact) are used when the person saying them realises they are losing an argument or debate. In all the experiences I've had with it (being said to me), it's always been said dismissively, as if it was a wrong opinion. I tend to see that as the end of the debate, because once that has been said, I know I won't be changing any minds anytime soon. In other words, the other person isn't interested in learning more about the subject or seeing different point of views, they are just interested in winning.

I'm also agreeing

The simple test is "if you can prove it, it's not an opinion, it's a fact"
Opinions are routed primarily in beliefs, facts are based on indisputable evidence.

Talon said:

If everything was an opinion, wouldn't it be a truth that everything is an opinion? Wouldn't that make it a fact that everything is an opinion, itself proving that everything is not an opinion, because everything being an opinion would be fact, and a fact is not an opinion.

Logic simply says that everything is not an opinion.

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Loving this bit right here. Keep on exploring the logical implications of ideas. Just one issue:

"itself proving that everything is not an opinion"

you mean

"itself proving that not everything is an opinion"

It's not really possible for everything to be an opinion, as you've very kindly pointed out. It leads to a bit of a paradox, somewhat like, "this statement is false" or A man receiving a wish from a genie who wishes that wishes couldn't come true. It's not really a paradox because it can be solved by just saying, "oh, well not everything is an opinion". Simple enough.

The root of the problem stems from the utter ignorance and blunt denial of any sort of learning; people don't like to be wrong. Human nature dictates that most people will do almost anything to avoid being wrong, even if they themselves know that they are wrong. They have a certain ego to keep, and want to keep it intact to boost their confidence. If people think that they are coming close to being utterly wrong without a way of denial they'll try to end the conversation before they're wrong or dismiss you altogether. It's truly infuriating when it happens.

As infuriating as it is, the best thing is to know that you are correct and that they are wrong. The whole point is to gain knowledge on a subject and them making it an issue of ego only shows that they lack something you have, wisdom.

Opinions are purely based on beliefs. Those who deny facts are simply wrong about it; there's no two-ways about it. This comes up quite a bit when people talk about creationism. We know for a fact what has happened in general about the Earth's past, but people choose to make it a matter of beliefs when it is not. It's a difficult topic, so I won't go any further into it, but know that what makes a truly good person is the ability to admit defeat.

This came up for me because I have a friend who insists that everything is an opinion.
His reason behind this:

• I can't prove him wrong (Even though I have multiple times)
• He can simply say something isn't a fact, and then it isn't.
• Facts leave gaps (Clearly it's the other way around)
• I can't prove him wrong
• I can't prove him wrong
• I can't prove him wrong
• He said so
• I can't prove him wrong

Some other simple things that you should know about this individual, just for some perspective:
God complex
Insanely arrogant
Thinks that every girl at our school loves him, even when they clearly don't
Once told one of his girlfriends "Go out with me, or we never talk again", pressured her into being with him, and then got mad when she told him she doesn't like him, and still thinks she loves him.
Claims to be "Self-Aware". A self aware person would realize that they aren't a God, and that not everyone loves them.
Talks in an extremely arrogant manner, and wonders why people get pissed at him so much.

So as you can see, he has some serious issues, such as admitting defeat. I have issues with admitting defeat, but I'll give up when I know for certain I'm wrong.

He really truly believes in Relativism. He thinks that because it's a paradox that it has to be true, because he thinks that the only definition of a paradox is "Something that can't be true, but is." when in reality it means "Something that contradicts itself", which technically mean the same thing, but they get blown out of proportions in different ways.

I'm with everyone else who has responded before me. If an opinion can be proven wrong, then it's not an opinion, but a false statement. There are good opinions, and there are bad opinions, as what SPPF user BCVM22 has said. You cannot believe how painful it is to hear someone using the opinion excuse in every rant/argument/claim they make on the internet and how many brain cells I had to recover by watching/reading responses that debunk them.

Everything is an opinion: False. Major trauma to the brain cavity can cause sever hemorrhaging, brain damage, and death. The opinion on whether or not that kabar knife will cause internal bleeding is not valid, as stabbing anyone with a kabar knife that isn't secretly a robotic assassin from the future will cause major damage to key arteries and biological organs. There are facts of reality, and opinions that can be perceived from these facts but the basis on whether or not opinions are of an integral part of the process of these facts is a shaky guess at best. Gravity (at least on our planet) is not an opinion, and if you try to break that law you'll create more work for that poor sap with the snow shovel that has to scoop up your remains from the pavement; but I guess you could have an opinion that you could fly. Your friend is. . . how do I say this. . . a nitwit.

Talon said:

Think about this:
I win the lottery. Is that an opinion? No, it's a fact that I won the lottery. I have proof that I won. The ticket that I bought won the lottery. I got the money for winning. Is that an opinion?

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Depending on your perspective of winning, it is. :p

To put what I mean to say in as simple a way as possible, not everything is an opinion, however, nothing is truly a fact.
Consider the philsophical question of whether the entire universe is a constuct created by your own mind. The evidence to disprove this would be the world continuing to go on, after you die. But, if you die you won't see the evidence, and to you the world may as well have ended.
This is a question meant to change your perspective. It can't be disproven, but it can't be proved true, either. Any answer is merely an opinion.

The exact basis of a 'fact' is an indisputable and perpetual truth. But to be honest, we don't know if anything is perpetually true, and very few things are indisputable (and nothing is, to some people).
If you want to be logical, then the meaning of a 'fact' debunks the very existence of one. The argument of everything being an opinion is founded on the inexistence of 'fact', and a grasp towards the closest thing to a fact as most people can comprehend, in other words, an opinion.

If you want my opinion about it, though, the whole affair is far too wishy-washy.
And, if I read the word 'opinion' one more time right now, I'm gonna punch something. And that's a fact.

Not everything is an opinion. You can't prove that 2 + 2 = 5, for example. It will equal 4 no matter what.

Kyoe said:

Depending on your perspective of winning, it is. :p

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Not really, because there is a set definition on winning in this case. You can not lose the lottery. You can either win, or not win. "Losing" the lottery isn't a thing. You either win, or don't. There is no disputing that I won the lottery (I wish I actually had... but I'm 16 so...). There is proof that I did. You can have a different opinion on winning the lottery, but your opinion on whether or not I did does not change the fact that I did.
Everyone has an opinion on everything, but everything is not an opinion. If everything was an opinion, then telling someone "The world doesn't revolve around you" would be a false statement, because if everything was an opinion, technically the world DOES revolve around them, because they make it whatever they want with their opinions. But in reality, the world doesn't revolve around you, and you don't make the world.

Talon said:

Not really, because there is a set definition on winning in this case. You can not lose the lottery. You can either win, or not win. "Losing" the lottery isn't a thing. You either win, or don't. There is no disputing that I won the lottery (I wish I actually had... but I'm 16 so...). There is proof that I did. You can have a different opinion on winning the lottery, but your opinion on whether or not I did does not change the fact that I did.
Everyone has an opinion on everything, but everything is not an opinion. If everything was an opinion, then telling someone "The world doesn't revolve around you" would be a false statement, because if everything was an opinion, technically the world DOES revolve around them, because they make it whatever they want with their opinions. But in reality, the world doesn't revolve around you, and you don't make the world.

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Your takeaway from my whole post was a joke, followed by a colon p?

Tch, I never said everything is an opinion, I only gave an explanation as to why some people do. In fact, I even condemned the belief that everything is an opinion as taking a basic theorem and running in the wrong direction with it.

Also:

But in reality, the world doesn't revolve around you, and you don't make the world.

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Checkmate. =D
Remember that philosophical question I mentioned in my last post? Well, it's a catch 22. Nobody can honestly tell if the world will end with them, or not, since the question is entirely a personal one, and when they die it becomes irrelevant.
Reality is only an shared perception based on facts, but as we've already been through, facts are self-defeating by definition.

I gotta say though, not bad for a 16 year old to be thinking about this sort of thing. =3
When I was sixteen the only thing I really thought about was.... um, sport activities...

Are we Interneting?

*checks*

Yes.

Everything and one online has an opinion, and we all think we're intitled to share them most of the time. It's incredibly easy to have one when you're hiding behind a computer screen because that fear of getting punched in the face isn't looming over you.

True, not everything is an opinion, due to definitions and axioms. Still, one can discuss on where the border line lies between opinions and facts. This might move the subject a little, but is science for example an opinion?
Science mostly isn't considered as a religion, but there is in fact not much difference. Both science and religions have their theories about the creation and existence of the universe. The difference between an opinion and a fact is often based on the question if it's provable. But the question is: When is something proved? Centuries ago religion seemed proved because of it just seemed the only logical explanation for everything happening around us. Now we use scientific research to observe things closer and base new theories thereof. This is somehow the same. Religion used to be seen as the only truth and still is by some people. But are things like for example science also opinions or are they facts?

Kyoe said:

Your takeaway from my whole post was a joke, followed by a colon p?

Tch, I never said everything is an opinion, I only gave an explanation as to why some people do. In fact, I even condemned the belief that everything is an opinion as taking a basic theorem and running in the wrong direction with it.

Also:


Checkmate. =D
Remember that philosophical question I mentioned in my last post? Well, it's a catch 22. Nobody can honestly tell if the world will end with them, or not, since the question is entirely a personal one, and when they die it becomes irrelevant.
Reality is only an shared perception based on facts, but as we've already been through, facts are self-defeating by definition.

I gotta say though, not bad for a 16 year old to be thinking about this sort of thing. =3
When I was sixteen the only thing I really thought about was.... um, sport activities...

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Well not that I don't think about too :P I just really like pondering about the superstitious and unknown. I want to be a Bio-Engineer when I graduate from high school, and I'm going to go to probably 6-8 years of college to prepare for it (I need a scholarship. Bad. Like really bad.). Mostly I would want to work in the field of GMOs and other things more on the controversial and unknown sides of Biology. So things like this are just what I enjoy thinking about, and Relativism is a big one for me, because I know someone who will take this idea to the grave, no matter how many times he is proved wrong (And it really pisses me off)

There's three ways to approach this topic, the first one going a bit like this: not everything is an opinion, as stated above by everyone else. True, indisputable facts exist, and an opinion is something subjective; if the statement brought into question is objective or can be confirmed by a large number of people, it is fact.

The second way to go about this is through semantics: with enough effort, 'opinion' is a label that could be potentially applied to anything. 'Winning' the lottery is just your opinion, because one may very well consider 'winning' to be a test of skill, rather than luck, and so you were rather 'assigned' the prize by a random number generator, but then again, that's just their opinion, and so on and so forth.

The third way to go about it is simply questioning reality: if nothing around us is real, then there's no such thing as indisputable facts, leaving opinions as the only possible logical path. However, I personally find this as the most infuriating, because it makes any question impossible to fully answer, because the hard facts that we need can't be found with our current senses and equipment; at the same time, it makes any progress in conversation impossible, because questioning reality essentially becomes the accepted scapegoat. However, assuming we were living in a simulated reality, the question 'is everything an opinion' refers to our perceived universe, meaning that, even if our cosmos is a fantasy, we might as well treat it as real because we have nothing else. What's the point in asking questions about a world outside of our perceived one we have no possible way of answering?

AmourPearlShipper said:

Not everything is an opinion. You can't prove that 2 + 2 = 5, for example. It will equal 4 no matter what.

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Only in a decimal system like the one we have. Mathematics is, ironically, a popular source of debate as to whether it is opinion or fact. Are numbers intrinsic to our universe, or a tool developed by the human mind to better understand it?

As people have stated, only things that can be realistically proven are facts. But as for opinions, whether something is good or not? Yeah, those are full-fledged opinions.

But one thing that bothers me is when people make "favorites" lists when they know that there's a chance someone won't like what they have on their lists, yet they then proceed to make a "worst" list of the same subject instead of "least favorites" or "most hated".

My view: there are three different types of statement:

1. Facts - provable statements with evidence you can bring up e.g. "the Earth is spherical, I can prove it by showing you an image".
2. Opinions - statements related to thoughts on a subject (related to liking or disliking typically), these cannot be wrong but also cannot be proved e.g. "Jennifer Lopez's music is very good"
3. Beliefs - statements about a subject based on the facts surrounding it, these can be wrong and a lot of people tend to claim they can't be by mixing them up with opinions. An example of this is "I think that black people are inferior to white people" because both the people who share this belief and do not share this belief can bring up facts to prove or disprove it.

It's important to make the distinction between opinions and beliefs in particular because a lot of the time poor arguers will hide behind the (true) statement that an opinion cannot be wrong, even though what they're saying is not an opinion but a belief and therefore can very easily be disproved.

this topic is pointless based on the fact that nobody has ever tried to say everything is an opinion. the OP just made that opposing argument up.

Suwandi said:

this topic is pointless based on the fact that nobody has ever tried to say everything is an opinion. the OP just made that opposing argument up.

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I've heard it before too. It's often used as a thought-killing cliche designed to discourage further probing of someone's idea by saying "oh everything's an opinion don't question what i say blah blah blah" and that sort of thing.