In US slang "That's a pipe!" means that it's certain. "That's a pipe!" is short for, "That's a lead pipe cinch." I have no idea why a lead pipe cinch should mean certainty.

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Dear David F,

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"I have no idea why a lead pipe cinch should mean certainty."

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Here are a few suggestions ...

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/lead-pipe-cinch.html

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Dear Banjo,

Thank you for that.

Dear Paspoirot, my sweet little pipette, how can you say that three out of four are right?

Going by your very strict definition of ‘truth’, surely only one of my four assertions could be right.

And that is that it is a computer image of a picture of a pipe that we are looking at!

You say that there are three truths here. But csteele says that there are not multiple truths.

Who’s right? (Of course, I think you are both wrong)

Ludwig,

There's no contradiction.

Picture or image, whichever way it's generated, is what you've got.

But it is not a pipe.

Dear Ludwig,

My mistake. When I said Poirot was becoming a pipette it doesn't then follow that she is now one.

I should know by now I need to be careful around your good self.

I referred to a pipette because her post to you was beautifully succinct and measured to a tee, plus the play on 'pipe' made it impossible to resist.

And impish because I'm sure I saw the glint in her eye from here.

Poirot is not a pipette.

Now to your statement; “These stars are shining. You could also say that these non-existent stars are shining. Both would be true, yes?”

Relatively yes but absolutely? Of course not.

If you were to visit a gallery to view Magritte's picture of a pipe you might claim that as it hangs on the wall it is being perfectly still. That would be true in relative terms, particularly in relation to yourself, but it is not the absolute truth. It happens to be moving at great velocity around the Earth's axis which in turn rotates around our Sun at high speed which is also moving as our galaxy rotates etc.

There is only on absolute truth, the picture is not perfectly still.