I'm not sure if this is the proper
section to discuss this in, but I feel
like this is pretty existentialist
thinking.

It seems to me that the words Truth and Fact are often used interchangeably. I posit that there is a very significant difference between Fact and Truth, and that using them synonymously is a fallacy to be consciously avoided. I've come to understand the difference between Fact and Truth
as this:

A fact is a reality that cannot be
logically disputed or rejected. If I
say "fire is hot," I don't care how
great your reasoning skills are, if
you touch fire your skin will burn
(and don't give me that "but people can walk on hot coals!" bull. There's a difference between the transfer of heat through conduction and training one's body to deal with the agonizing pain of said conduction).

Now when I say this, I am not speaking a truth, I am speaking a fact. If you say "fire is not hot," you are not lying, you are incorrect. Facts are concrete realities that no amount of reasoning will change. When one acknowledges a fact, they are doing just that. Facts are not discovered, facts are not created, facts are simply acknowledged.

A Truth on the other hand, is almost the opposite. Truths are those things that are not simply
acknowledged, but must be
discovered, or created. If I say "God exists," and I possess strong
reasoning for the affirmative of
that statement, then God really
does exist, that is a reality.

However, if another individual
possesses strong reasoning for the
negative, and because of this
reasoning they believe that God
does not exist, then that is also a
reality. If we were to debate our
ideologies, and my reasoning
appeared stronger than theirs, they may choose to adopt my belief that God does exist. If they do, then the existence of God is just as true as the nonexistence of God which they believed a week ago. Truths, as opposed to fact, are much more fluid and malleable than their empirical counterparts.

Now, facts may often be used to
substantiate one's assertions on
certain truths, and truths may be
used to help us better understand
certain facts. However, to assert a
fact as a truth, or a truth as a fact, is backwards thinking, and
antithetical to intelligible progress. I know this may seem obvious to some, but I see plenty of people on this site, and in real life misjudging the values of certain assertions based on this misconception. I myself must be constantly reminded of this concept, as it's easy to let them sort of run together when caught up in the insatiable quest for knowledge. I just wanted to point out what I've figured to be the pitfalls of that assumption, and see what other people think of this notion.