universal healthcare

[Jester]

Difficult, yes, but not quite impossible. For instance, if Spiro Agnew were to attribute anything to anyone, then it is most probably false. :w00t:

Actually, it is a problem not unlike etymology. One searches through the literature for occurrences of the quotation, or of similar statements. If the first occurrence is from a source long after the person supposedly quoted has died, then the probability is extremely large that the attribution is spurious. If there are occurrences prior to . . . but you get the idea. It's just simple academic research -- tedious and boring, but not impossible.

I would say impossible, at least in any practical sense. What if an exhaustive search of known archives yields nothing, and no plausible contemporary source comes forth, but then, years later, someone produces a personal letter buried in a family attic somewhere that contains the quote? There would be no academic way to know, but Franklin corresponded with a hell of a lot of people in his day. And, even if the first known instance of a quote is before someone was born, that doesn't mean they didn't repeat it, or come up with it independently. And so on.

So, yes, we can develop very good probabilities. But, for perennially unsourced quotes from people whose archives have been trawled a hundred times (like Franklin), my policy is guilty until proven innocent, and the possibility of some unknown obscure source for a well-known, widely dispersed quote does not much trouble me.

-Jester