The Seat Theorem

A derivation that contentful verdicts cannot be seat-free, and that the only coherent residue of neutrality is declaration. Version: v2.4 Abstract A seat-free resolution of a question is one whose answer is fixed by the situation alone, with no contribution from any chosen standpoint. The intuition that such resolutions are the goal of careful inquiry — that a good answer is one issued from nowhere in particular — is widespread and, this note argues, structurally impossible to satisfy for any question with content. The argument is short and example-free. It rests on two premises (a property of a situation has its value fixed by that situation; a parameter that co-determines a verdict without being fixed by the situation is an index of evaluation, not a feature of the situation) and one definition (a question has content iff the situation does not by itself settle it). From these, the Coupling Theorem: a verdict is seat-free if and only if it is contentless. Its contrapositive —…