assertion

Etymology

From Middle French assertion, from Latin assertio.

noun

1. The act of asserting; positive declaration or averment.
2. Something which is asserted; a declaration; a statement asserted.
   You're a man of strong assertions!
   Suppose you are given the semifactual assertion, "even if Nora had liked mathematics then she would have became a scientist" and then you find out that Nora did in fact become a scientist. 26 January 2007, Ruth M. J. Byrne, The Rational Imagination: How People Create Alternatives to Reality, MIT Press, page 140
3. A statement or declaration which lacks support or evidence.
   That's just a bare assertion.
   Drivers' union ASLEF bluntly rebuffed the claim of unofficial action, calling it a lie. And Avanti West Coast was unable to provide any proof for its assertion, when questioned by RAIL. August 24 2022, Philip Haigh, “Network News: Union slams Avanti West Coast: 'lie' as services slashed”, in RAIL, number 964, page 6
4. Maintenance; vindication
   the assertion of one's rights or prerogatives
5. (programming) A statement in a program asserting a condition expected to be true at a particular point, used in debugging.
   The user should be absolutely confident that the error issued is a real design error. In other words, a user should be confident that his assertion code is correct and that the assertion failure is not a false condition. 2006, Srikanth Vijayaraghavan, Meyyappan Ramanathan, A Practical Guide for SystemVerilog Assertions, page 284