less parentheses --> fewer parentheses
lamb...@my-deja.com
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Johan Kullstam
> I can't stand it any longer. The correct word is "fewer".
well, if you went with my original suggestion, find or hack a font to
have small sized and visually less obtrusive parentheses, then perhaps
less is correct.
--
J o h a n K u l l s t a m
[kull...@ne.mediaone.net]
sysengr
Jochen Schmidt
> I can't stand it any longer. The correct word is "fewer".
Hm please forgive us inferior foreigners for straining your patience
so long.
Do you speak in German so perfectly as you speak in English?
Go sit in a corner and think about that!
--
Jochen Schmidt
j...@dataheaven.de
http://www.dataheaven.de
Dave Pearson
> small sized and visually less obtrusive parentheses, then perhaps less is
> correct.
Along these lines, I remember someone suggesting the idea of getting emacs
to display them in a colour that is almost the same as your background
colour so that, while they are there, they are almost not there. I thought
that sounded like an interesting idea.
Has anyone hacked any of the emacs lisp modes to do this? It seems that
parens don't have a face in GNU/X emacs so it didn't seem trivial.
--
Take a look in Hagbard's World: | lbdb.el - LBDB interface.
http://www.hagbard.demon.co.uk/ | sawfish.el - Sawfish mode.
http://www.acemake.com/hagbard/ | uptimes.el - Record emacs uptimes.
emacs software, including.......| quickurl.el - Recall lists of URLs.
Erik Naggum
| Do you speak in German so perfectly as you speak in English?
|
| Go sit in a corner and think about that!
You aren't excused for this argument just because you're German.
Language skills is not like a disease the better the less afflicted.
If you can no longer improve your English, that's an indictment of a
dysfunctional brain that _I_ certainly would not have made public.
I do, however, speak and write English better than a very large
fraction of its native speakers. This is _not_ an accomplishment,
mind you, and chances are pretty high you wouldn't be impressed with
a random native speaker of English who spoke German as perfectly as
he spoke English. For illumination, _I_ speak Swahili _exactly_ as
well as I speak Mandarin Chinese.
The argument you made is usually made by people who _want_ to be
sloppy and incompetent, and who are consequently scornful of whoever
actually know their stuff. I find such scorn towards competence to
be _fantastically_ offensive. It undermines and ridicules all that
is human: our ability to learn from those who know more than us, to
share experiences so we do not have to make them all our own, to be
able to reason about thus derived knowledge without each one of us
having to start from first principles. Ridicule those who have the
better skills, and you exemplify the anti-humanity that is prevalent
in "modern" culture, which almost deifies stupidity, because it so
democratic: _Everyone_ can be stupipd. Not everyone can be skilled
in every skill. How unfair, then, to be supremely skilled when
others are not skilled at all! How _arrogant_ to know something so
much better than your fellow man! There lies the road to darkness.
The less/fewer distinction is listed in a small book I got from my
copy editor years ago: "1001 Pitfalls in English Grammar" -- it
turned out to be exceptionally valuable. Of course, without the
occasional reminder from people who actually _define_ the language,
it is nigh impossible to improve. Scorn them, and they will not try
again with you, and perhaps not with others. Scorn stupidity and
lack of skills, instead, but more importantly, listen well to those
who know something you don't and learn from them, _especially_ if
they disagree with you in whatever way. (If you can't learn from
something or someone that disagrees with you, chances are you can't
learn from anything.)
This has the obvious repercussions for Common Lisp usage.
#:Erik
--
If this is not what you expected, please alter your expectations.
Boris Schaefer
| Along these lines, I remember someone suggesting the idea of getting emacs
| to display them in a colour that is almost the same as your background
| colour so that, while they are there, they are almost not there. I thought
| that sounded like an interesting idea.
|
| Has anyone hacked any of the emacs lisp modes to do this? It seems that
| parens don't have a face in GNU/X emacs so it didn't seem trivial.
Actually it is trivial. Here's what I posted just a few days ago to
comp.lang.scheme:
(defvar paren-face 'paren-face)
(make-face 'paren-face)
(set-face-background 'paren-face "black")
(set-face-foreground 'paren-face "white")
(add-hook 'scheme-mode-hook
'(lambda ()
(setq scheme-font-lock-keywords-2
(append '(("(\\|)" . paren-face))
scheme-font-lock-keywords-2))))
Changing this to lisp-mode-hook and lisp-font-lock-keywords should
work for Lisp-mode and, as far as I could tell, it works in both GNU
and XEmacs.
--
bo...@uncommon-sense.net - <http://www.uncommon-sense.net/>
Remember, even if you win the rat race -- you're still a rat.
FM
>* Jochen Schmidt <j...@dataheaven.de>
>| Do you speak in German so perfectly as you speak in English?
>|
>| Go sit in a corner and think about that!
> You aren't excused for this argument just because you're German.
> Language skills is not like a disease the better the less afflicted.
> If you can no longer improve your English, that's an indictment of a
> dysfunctional brain that _I_ certainly would not have made public.
> I do, however, speak and write English better than a very large
> fraction of its native speakers.
Perhaps.
> This is _not_ an accomplishment,
> mind you, and chances are pretty high you wouldn't be impressed with
> a random native speaker of English who spoke German as perfectly as
> he spoke English. For illumination, _I_ speak Swahili _exactly_ as
> well as I speak Mandarin Chinese.
> The argument you made is usually made by people who _want_ to be
> sloppy and incompetent, and who are consequently scornful of whoever
> actually know their stuff. I find such scorn towards competence to
> be _fantastically_ offensive. It undermines and ridicules all that
> is human: our ability to learn from those who know more than us, to
> share experiences so we do not have to make them all our own, to be
> able to reason about thus derived knowledge without each one of us
> having to start from first principles. Ridicule those who have the
> better skills, and you exemplify the anti-humanity that is prevalent
> in "modern" culture, which almost deifies stupidity, because it so
> democratic:
Wow. In a sweep of a paragraph, you attempt to declare
the essence of humanity, while exhibiting extreme
contempt for those promoting, knowingly or not, the
antithesis of your declaration. That exemplifies what
I consider an obstacle to our progress.
> _Everyone_ can be stupipd. Not everyone can be skilled
> in every skill. How unfair, then, to be supremely skilled when
> others are not skilled at all! How _arrogant_ to know something so
> much better than your fellow man! There lies the road to darkness.
Anotherp brilliant paragraph overshadowed by the lack
of a proper referent. The previous poster impled no
such thing. Arrogance is not necessarily conveyed by
superior knowledge.
> The less/fewer distinction is listed in a small book I got from my
> copy editor years ago: "1001 Pitfalls in English Grammar" -- it
> turned out to be exceptionally valuable. Of course, without the
> occasional reminder from people who actually _define_ the language,
> it is nigh impossible to improve. Scorn them, and they will not try
> again with you, and perhaps not with others.
So the original poster is such a valuable resource for
learning English that we must revere him while he shows
little tolerance for the misuse of the language by non
native speakers? Hell no, if I was learning Chinese and
if some Chinese punk said that he couldn't stand my
Chinese, I naturally wouldn't trust him to be able to
stand what it takes to teach me. Teaching is often an
art of patience and tolerance and those who lack these
qualities should not be in the practice.
> Scorn stupidity and
> lack of skills, instead, but more importantly, listen well to those
> who know something you don't and learn from them, _especially_ if
> they disagree with you in whatever way. (If you can't learn from
> something or someone that disagrees with you, chances are you can't
> learn from anything.)
There are differences among disagreement, knowledge,
and contempt.
Dave Pearson
> Actually it is trivial. Here's what I posted just a few days ago to
> comp.lang.scheme:
>
> (defvar paren-face 'paren-face)
> (make-face 'paren-face)
> (set-face-background 'paren-face "black")
> (set-face-foreground 'paren-face "white")
>
> (add-hook 'scheme-mode-hook
> '(lambda ()
> (setq scheme-font-lock-keywords-2
> (append '(("(\\|)" . paren-face))
> scheme-font-lock-keywords-2))))
I read comp.lang.scheme and, for some reason, I missed this (yes, on looking
back it is there). This is just what I was looking for. Time to experiment.
Many thanks.
> Changing this to lisp-mode-hook and lisp-font-lock-keywords should work
> for Lisp-mode and, as far as I could tell, it works in both GNU and
> XEmacs.
Yes, it works fine for `lisp-mode'.
Erik Naggum
| In a sweep of a paragraph, you attempt to declare the essence of
| humanity, while exhibiting extreme contempt for those promoting,
| knowingly or not, the antithesis of your declaration. That
| exemplifies what I consider an obstacle to our progress.
Why don't you say that you are much more interested in good
relations between people than in learning something from others,
whan that's what you are really arguing for?
It seems you missed the point entirely, but _learning_ is quite the
personal responsibility, clearly distinct from the task of teaching.
I'm saying you should learn from everything and everyone you can,
_especially_ that which disagrees with you, and that includes style
and form, while you seem to be saying that if those who know
something aren't about to spend the time and effort to _teach_
someone who doesn't want to learn, you should disregard them and
their knowledge. This is what I refer to as "arrogant ignorance".
Of course I have nothing but contempt for that, but you're so
amazingly mistaken in your opening paragraph that it isn't worth my
time to "teach" a pig to read.
The antithesis of my position is: "be stupid, don't learn form
others, hate the competent". If this is not what you consider
furthering the progress of humanity, feel free to elaborate.
| There are differences among disagreement, knowledge, and contempt.
_Really_? You might consider spending the few minutes it takes to
read my web pages. Start at <URL:http://naggum.no/erik/>.
Thom Goodsell
vs. descriptive linguistics, Mirraim-Webster seems to indicate that
"fewer" is correct, though "less" is more popular. Fortunately, I
think I'm correct in assuming that neither Strunk nor White read this
newsgroup, so we could always just let this issue slip quietly away.
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?less
Thom
Paul Foley <myc...@actrix.gen.nz> writes:
> On Tue, 22 Aug 2000 17:24:27 GMT, lambdaman wrote:
>
> > I can't stand it any longer. The correct word is "fewer".
> =
>
> Nonsense; "less" is fine.
>
> -- =
>
> And =E6lc =FEara =FEe gehier=F0 =FEas min word, and =FEa ne wyrc=FE, se b=
> i=F0 gelic =FE=E6m
> dysigan menn...
>
> (setq reply-to
> (concatenate 'string "Paul Foley " "<mycroft" '(#\@) "actrix.gen.nz>"))=
>
--
Scientist t...@cra.com
Charles River Analytics (617) 491-3474 x574
Cambridge, MA, USA http://www.cra.com/
Chris Page
parenthesis are quite heavy when compared to other fonts, or printed
versions of the same font. For example, Monaco's parenthesis take up most of
the glyph "box" and are nearly 180 degree arcs.
In a good quality font, especially when printed, parentheses are quite
shallow, making them closer to vertical bars, and their ends are tapered,
which lightens them.
Picking the right font can play an important role in the readability of
Lisp.
--
Chris Page
Mac OS Guy
Palm, Inc.
let mail-to = concatenate( "Chris Page <page", "@", "best.com>");
Kent M Pitman
> Another issue with parentheses is that in some mono-spaced screen fonts
> parenthesis are quite heavy when compared to other fonts,
This is presumably the reason that the choice of "fewer" vs "less" matters
to some of our readers. (And, incidentally, it matters to me also, though
probably not to the degree that I would have raised it here.)
A need for fewer parens means fewer parens and is a problem not to be solved
by typography. On the other hand, narrower parens would seem to resolve in
an overall lessening of the mass of parens (if not their count), and so
would be something that typography can affect. ;-) So the question isn't
whether one or the other is right, but just which are we meaning to discuss?
;-)
Here's hoping we've all now learned our less'n and that I'm not just
fewling the fire...
FM
>* da...@dartmouth.edu (FM)
>| In a sweep of a paragraph, you attempt to declare the essence of
>| humanity, while exhibiting extreme contempt for those promoting,
>| knowingly or not, the antithesis of your declaration. That
>| exemplifies what I consider an obstacle to our progress.
>
> relations between people than in learning something from others,
> whan that's what you are really arguing for?
You misunderstood my proposition.
> It seems you missed the point entirely, but _learning_ is quite the
> personal responsibility, clearly distinct from the task of teaching.
> I'm saying you should learn from everything and everyone you can,
> _especially_ that which disagrees with you, and that includes style
> and form, while you seem to be saying that if those who know
> something aren't about to spend the time and effort to _teach_
> someone who doesn't want to learn, you should disregard them and
> their knowledge.
The world is large enough that one shouldn't have to
learn from each and every know-all one faces. The
chance is that, the more one acts like an arrogant
bastard, the less knowledge he has to offer you.
Besides, you did clearly imply teaching in your
previous post, stating (something to the effect of)
that if you condemn those who try to teach or
correct you, they won't try again to other people.
Quite frankly, I often take the task of learning
quite seriously myself, but I never found the grave
need to learn from those I consider assholes.
> This is what I refer to as "arrogant ignorance".
> Of course I have nothing but contempt for that, but you're so
> amazingly mistaken in your opening paragraph that it isn't worth my
> time to "teach" a pig to read.
>
> The antithesis of my position is: "be stupid, don't learn form
> others, hate the competent". If this is not what you consider
> furthering the progress of humanity, feel free to elaborate.
I won't try to elaborate everything here, but there's
a bit more to that. The guy you replied to didn't per
se "hate" or condemn the competence, just an arrogant
display of such.
> _Really_? You might consider spending the few minutes it takes to
> read my web pages. Start at <URL:http://naggum.no/erik/>.
I must say that I agree with most of the things
on your pages, though I don't get as annoyed by
incompetence as you do.
Barry Margolin
Thom Goodsell <t...@shalott.cra.com> wrote:
>In an effort to quell the impending flame-war over prescriptive
>vs. descriptive linguistics, Mirraim-Webster seems to indicate that
>"fewer" is correct, though "less" is more popular. Fortunately, I
>think I'm correct in assuming that neither Strunk nor White read this
>newsgroup, so we could always just let this issue slip quietly away.
Whatever is officially correct, Usenet is not the appropriate place to
worry about it. This is not a writing class, where we're graded on our
proper use of the language. It's an informal discussion group, where
people can write as they're likely to speak in ordinary conversation.
People don't ordinarily speak with perfect grammar, and no one but an anal
retentive would expect such in casual email or posts.
BTW, the netiquette guide specifically recommends *against* spelling and
grammar flames. Precisely for the reason that they result in these
off-topic threads that go on and on.
BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't ordinarily
post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that spelling/grammar
correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it out, you'd better be able
to take it.
--
Barry Margolin, bar...@genuity.net
Genuity, Burlington, MA
*** DON'T SEND TECHNICAL QUESTIONS DIRECTLY TO ME, post them to newsgroups.
Please DON'T copy followups to me -- I'll assume it wasn't posted to the group.
Dorai Sitaram
Chris Page <pa...@best.NOSPAM.com> wrote:
>Another issue with parentheses is that in some mono-spaced screen fonts
>versions of the same font. For example, Monaco's parenthesis take up most of
>the glyph "box" and are nearly 180 degree arcs.
>
>In a good quality font, especially when printed, parentheses are quite
>shallow, making them closer to vertical bars, and their ends are tapered,
>which lightens them.
>
>Picking the right font can play an important role in the readability of
>Lisp.
Indentation programs used by editors for Lisp
code rely on the fact that the font is monospace.
Non-monospace will complicate them considerably.
--d
Chris Page
wrote on 2000.08.23 11:46:
> In article <B5C94874.736D%pa...@best.NOSPAM.com>,
> Chris Page <pa...@best.NOSPAM.com> wrote:
>> Another issue with parentheses is that in some mono-spaced screen fonts
[...]
>> In a good quality font
[...]
>> Picking the right font can play an important role in the readability of
>> Lisp.
>
> Indentation programs used by editors for Lisp code rely on the fact that the
> font is monospace. Non-monospace will complicate them considerably.
You are absolutely correct. However, if you meant to counter me there is no
need to do so, as I never said anything about not using mono-spaced fonts.
But now that you bring it up: Editors should be able to present code in
multiple fonts, styles, etc. including variable-width fonts. Indentation can
easily be maintained regardless of the fonts used, just look at any decent
word-processor for an example of this.
Rainer Joswig
<pa...@best.NOSPAM.com> wrote:
> in article 8o165t$5u2$1...@news.gte.com, Dorai Sitaram at ds...@goldshoe.gte.com
> wrote on 2000.08.23 11:46:
>
> > In article <B5C94874.736D%pa...@best.NOSPAM.com>,
> > Chris Page <pa...@best.NOSPAM.com> wrote:
> >> Another issue with parentheses is that in some mono-spaced screen fonts
> [...]
> >> In a good quality font
> [...]
> >> Picking the right font can play an important role in the readability of
> >> Lisp.
> >
> > Indentation programs used by editors for Lisp code rely on the fact that the
> > font is monospace. Non-monospace will complicate them considerably.
>
> You are absolutely correct. However, if you meant to counter me there is no
> need to do so, as I never said anything about not using mono-spaced fonts.
Many developers are using variable-width fonts for Macintosh
on the Mac (together with source coloring and using diverse
source styles). "Geneva" is a widely used font for that. I'm
not using it (I'm used to fixed width fonts), but the single
best feature is, that it saves a lot of space on the screen.
> But now that you bring it up: Editors should be able to present code in
> multiple fonts, styles, etc. including variable-width fonts. Indentation can
> easily be maintained regardless of the fonts used, just look at any decent
> word-processor for an example of this.
MCL does that. Users have contributed several systems to do
that. One of the coolest is "COLOR-CODED" written by Glen Foy.
<ftp://ftp.digitool.com/pub/mcl/contrib/color-coded.sea.hqx>
You can see a screen shot of a source file (CLIM code written by me) and
the preference dialog for "COLOR CODED" at:
http://corporate-world.lisp.de/mcl/styles.jpg
Rainer Joswig
--
Rainer Joswig, Hamburg, Germany
Email: mailto:jos...@corporate-world.lisp.de
Rainer Joswig
Joswig <jos...@corporate-world.lisp.de> wrote:
> In article <B5C98083.73D4%pa...@best.NOSPAM.com>, Chris Page
> <pa...@best.NOSPAM.com> wrote:
>
> > in article 8o165t$5u2$1...@news.gte.com, Dorai Sitaram at ds...@goldshoe.gte.com
> > wrote on 2000.08.23 11:46:
> >
> > > In article <B5C94874.736D%pa...@best.NOSPAM.com>,
> > > Chris Page <pa...@best.NOSPAM.com> wrote:
> > >> Another issue with parentheses is that in some mono-spaced screen fonts
> > [...]
> > >> In a good quality font
> > [...]
> > >> Picking the right font can play an important role in the readability of
> > >> Lisp.
> > >
> > > Indentation programs used by editors for Lisp code rely on the fact that the
> > > font is monospace. Non-monospace will complicate them considerably.
> >
> > You are absolutely correct. However, if you meant to counter me there is no
> > need to do so, as I never said anything about not using mono-spaced fonts.
>
> Many developers are using variable-width fonts for Macintosh
insert "Common Lisp" here. ;-)
Erik Naggum
| The world is large enough that one shouldn't have to learn from each
| and every know-all one faces.
That depends very much on _what_ you learn. I find it odd that you
should learn exactly what people try to communicate.
| The chance is that, the more one acts like an arrogant bastard, the
| less knowledge he has to offer you.
How did you arrive at this conclusion? It is all too human to
believe that he who has one flaw has them all, but this is not based
in anything but the wishful thinking of one-dimensional moralists.
| Besides, you did clearly imply teaching in your previous post,
| stating (something to the effect of) that if you condemn those who
| try to teach or correct you, they won't try again to other people.
There's quite the important distinction between teach and correct.
| Quite frankly, I often take the task of learning quite seriously
| myself, but I never found the grave need to learn from those I
| consider assholes.
So you think that only nice guys have something to tell you, which
goes to support my conclusion about your priorities: good relations
first, then increased knowledge.
You know, the very essence of the ad hominem argument, which most
people don't exactly take pride in the way you do, is that you don't
want to listen to the argument because of the person. I consider it
an incredibly unintelligent approach to both people and arguments.
I'd rather dismiss the person for his arguments any day.
| I won't try to elaborate everything here, but there's a bit more to
| that. The guy you replied to didn't per se "hate" or condemn the
| competence, just an arrogant display of such.
As I have belabored, if you can't learn from the harsh parts of
life, what do you expect to learn from the soft and kind?
| I must say that I agree with most of the things on your pages,
| though I don't get as annoyed by incompetence as you do.
I guess it depends on the degree to which you waste otherwise
valuable time and money because of incompetence.
Erik Naggum
| Indentation programs used by editors for Lisp
| code rely on the fact that the font is monospace.
| Non-monospace will complicate them considerably.
Not true. Kent Pitman posted an article some time ago about this.
You basically write spaces at the beginning of the line with the
same width as the nearest non-space character above it. Elegant,
even brilliant, but really trivial after the fact of invention.
Erik Naggum
| BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't ordinarily
| post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that spelling/grammar
| correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it out, you'd better be able
| to take it.
Is this your psychotic prejudice running amuck again? Just _where_
did I "dish out" any spelling/grammar corrections? Please feel free
to post as many message-IDs as you can possibly find.
Your hatred blinds you, Barry. Just open your eyes and stop hating.
It'll do any other remaining mental processes of yours a world of
good, too.
Apologies for your behavior are no longer accepted, Barry. The last
time you apologized for attributing actions to me that I had never
committed, I thought you had learned something valuable, but I have
come to conclude that you're so overpowered by your hatred that even
the ability to remember who did what has deteriorated.
Please confine your criticism of me to what I actually do, will you?
Better yet, figure out why you keep attributing the evils of the
world to me unfairly, then figure out a way to stop doing it, OK?
Barry Margolin
>* Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>| BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't ordinarily
>| post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that spelling/grammar
>| correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it out, you'd better be able
>| to take it.
>
> Is this your psychotic prejudice running amuck again? Just _where_
> did I "dish out" any spelling/grammar corrections? Please feel free
> to post as many message-IDs as you can possibly find.
I interpreted your message that began with something like "You aren't
excused because you're German" as a complaint about people with poor skills
in English. Did I misunderstand the point of that message?
I'm not able to communicate in any foreign language (I learned French in
high school, but never to a level of fluency, and I've forgotten much of
it). So I have full respect for anyone who can carry on any level of
conversation in a foreign language, and don't expect them to know my
language perfectly.
Coby Beck
Erik Naggum <er...@naggum.net> wrote in message news:31760555...@naggum.net...
| * da...@dartmouth.edu (FM)
| | The world is large enough that one shouldn't have to learn from each
| | and every know-all one faces.
[snip]
| | Quite frankly, I often take the task of learning quite seriously
| | myself, but I never found the grave need to learn from those I
| | consider assholes.
|
| So you think that only nice guys have something to tell you, which
| goes to support my conclusion about your priorities: good relations
| first, then increased knowledge.
|
I think the relevant point here is that knowledge is available from a wide variety of
sources so it is not necesary to go to all the trouble it takes communicating with
people who dump alot of personl crap into otherwise normal conversations.
Pearls of wisdom are not so rare that one must reach into the toilet to grab them.
Coby
Jochen Schmidt
little discussion would surely be ok.
Erik Naggum wrote:
> You aren't excused for this argument just because you're German.
> Language skills is not like a disease the better the less afflicted.
> If you can no longer improve your English, that's an indictment of a
> dysfunctional brain that _I_ certainly would not have made public.
My comment was not a statement that I don't want/can further improve
my language skills. I didn't dislike the fact that he has corrected a
common English grammar-pitfall but the way he articulated it.
I may have exaggerated in my post but I often see native-English
speaking people who never thought that there are other people which
haven't learned English from early childhood on.
I may be wrong but if he says he can "no longer stand it" then he
ditches the posters that have been caught in this common pitfalls as
idiots that can not even speak right english.
> I do, however, speak and write English better than a very large
> fraction of its native speakers. This is _not_ an accomplishment,
> mind you, and chances are pretty high you wouldn't be impressed with
> a random native speaker of English who spoke German as perfectly as
> he spoke English. For illumination, _I_ speak Swahili _exactly_ as
> well as I speak Mandarin Chinese.
I know that I don't speak perfect English but I think most people can
understand what I say. If you speak so perfect English then be happy.
You certainly won't reached that level of ability without hard learning and
many mistakes.
>
> The argument you made is usually made by people who _want_ to be
> sloppy and incompetent, and who are consequently scornful of whoever
> actually know their stuff.
As I said above I really want to extend my skills and certainly don't want
to be sloppy and incompetent - so I'am not one of those people you
mentioned.
In my opinion the way the original poster wrote is scornful to the posters
that don't speak perfect english.
> I find such scorn towards competence to
> be _fantastically_ offensive.
I find scorn towards the people who want to learn but haven't reached the
state of being perfect _fantastically_ offensive.
> It undermines and ridicules all that
> is human: our ability to learn from those who know more than us, to
> share experiences so we do not have to make them all our own, to be
> able to reason about thus derived knowledge without each one of us
> having to start from first principles. Ridicule those who have the
> better skills, and you exemplify the anti-humanity that is prevalent
> in "modern" culture, which almost deifies stupidity, because it so
> democratic: _Everyone_ can be stupipd. Not everyone can be skilled
> in every skill. How unfair, then, to be supremely skilled when
> others are not skilled at all! How _arrogant_ to know something so
> much better than your fellow man! There lies the road to darkness.
>
> The less/fewer distinction is listed in a small book I got from my
> copy editor years ago: "1001 Pitfalls in English Grammar" -- it
> turned out to be exceptionally valuable. Of course, without the
> occasional reminder from people who actually _define_ the language,
> it is nigh impossible to improve. Scorn them, and they will not try
> again with you, and perhaps not with others. Scorn stupidity and
> lack of skills, instead, but more importantly, listen well to those
> who know something you don't and learn from them, _especially_ if
> they disagree with you in whatever way. (If you can't learn from
> something or someone that disagrees with you, chances are you can't
> learn from anything.)
You're right it is counterproductive to argue the way I argued in my
posting against people who try to help other people to extend their
abilities. But on the other side if all corrections would be made this way
I'm sure fewer and fewer people would overcome themselves to post at a
newsgroup that uses a language that they are not very good in.
(I personally know many people who don't ever tried to post because they
think they are not good enough in writing English)
We should not demotivate the people if we want them to learn something.
But again - You're right that my posting was not very fair, so please
excuse me.
Erik Naggum
| I interpreted your message that began with something like "You
| aren't excused because you're German" as a complaint about people
| with poor skills in English. Did I misunderstand the point of that
| message?
Yes. Of course you did. You can't even read anything I say without
_imputing_ so much vile crap to it that one _has_ to wonder whence
it all comes. There should be enough to attack me for in what I
actually do, but you have to go out of your way to make it worse by
attacking me for what I do not do, what I do not say, and you have
_zero_ ability or willingness to question your own actions when you
do this. Have you ever wondered what this makes you?
Try reading what I wrote again, and restrict yourself to what I
wrote, no Barry-Margolin-interpretations of it this time, OK?. I
actually suggest you pretend someone else wrote it, so you can keep
your head screwed on straight for a change.
I'll answer the question a couple paragraphs up for you: You're the
kind of man who would willingly jail and hang people for actions you
_want_ them to have committed, Barry. You've done this before, and
you'll do it again, as you do not learn from your past mistakes.
Paul Foley
> I can't stand it any longer. The correct word is "fewer".
Nonsense; "less" is fine.
--
And ælc þara þe gehierð þas min word, and þa ne wyrcþ, se bið gelic þæm
Bruce Hoult
<myc...@actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
> On Tue, 22 Aug 2000 17:24:27 GMT, lambdaman wrote:
>
> > I can't stand it any longer. The correct word is "fewer".
>
> Nonsense; "less" is fine.
No it's not. "less" refers to continuous quantities while "fewer"
refers to discrete quantities.
Maybe I should of staid out of you're discussion, aye?
-- Bruce
Paul Foley
Maybe, but for sure you should have checked a dictionary first :-)
My dictionary (1943 Concise Oxford; none of that misspelled American
rubbish) actually gives "fewer" as a definition for "less", along with
a sentence involving "less men" as an example of use (which is
precisely equivalent to "less parentheses"; QED)
If you're going to flame grammar, complain about people using "they"
when they mean "he", or "who" when they mean "whom", etc. :-)
--
Nomina stultorum in parietibus et portis semper videmus. -- Cicero
FM
>* da...@dartmouth.edu (FM)
>| The world is large enough that one shouldn't have to learn from each
>| and every know-all one faces.
> That depends very much on _what_ you learn. I find it odd that you
> should learn exactly what people try to communicate.
If you meant learning by a counter-example then, I
guess you can still *learn*. But then being hostile
then doesn't preclude such possibility either. If
you're being an asshole, I can condemn you AND still
learn from you. Your argument is that you shouldn't
try to learn only from those who are nice to you,
I argue, then, that you don't have to be nice to learn
from someone. Since the poster to whom you replied first
in this thread could have learned this particular
point in the English grammar anyhow (which is really
pointless since "less" is a suitable substitution for
"fewer" in colloquial English), your objection then is
quite irrelevant.
>| The chance is that, the more one acts like an arrogant bastard, the
>| less knowledge he has to offer you.
> How did you arrive at this conclusion? It is all too human to
> believe that he who has one flaw has them all, but this is not based
> in anything but the wishful thinking of one-dimensional moralists.
Where do you get this "moralists" crap from? Anyhow,
I find it humorous that you redefined what it is to be
"human" again.
>| Besides, you did clearly imply teaching in your previous post,
>| stating (something to the effect of) that if you condemn those who
>| try to teach or correct you, they won't try again to other people.
> There's quite the important distinction between teach and correct.
Irrelevant, you implied the importance of activity on
the part of the one sharing knowledge, yet you turn
around and say you can learn from them without having
them *teach* you. In other words, you somehow pointed
out that you should be nice to those who have knowledge
to share, while still arguing that *they* don't have to
do anything for you to learn from them. There's a clear
contradiction here, perhaps related to your changing
definition of what "learning from someone" means.
>| Quite frankly, I often take the task of learning quite seriously
>| myself, but I never found the grave need to learn from those I
>| consider assholes.
> So you think that only nice guys have something to tell you, which
> goes to support my conclusion about your priorities: good relations
> first, then increased knowledge.
Ridiculous. You face more people than you can possibly
relate to. You can't "actively" learn from everyone.
And so what if I had such priorities. Learning isn't
the most important activity
> You know, the very essence of the ad hominem argument, which most
> people don't exactly take pride in the way you do, is that you don't
> want to listen to the argument because of the person. I consider it
> an incredibly unintelligent approach to both people and arguments.
Irrelevant. If you're engaged in a formal debate, then
you are simply not allowed to dismiss an argument based
on the lack of credibility on the part of the opposition.
On the other hand, there's more information than you can
possibly imagine, and it's okay to dismiss certain sources
that you consider unreliable or offensive. For example,
when you're looking for a book in a certain area, do you
not pay attention at all to who wrote it? Do you read
every single newspaper in the world?
> I'd rather dismiss the person for his arguments any day.
That on the other hand, would, vaguely qualify as "ad
hominem" if you dismiss other aspects of a person based
on his "arguments" in a specific area. Perhaps that's
not how you meant it, but would you dismiss a Political
Science professor on what he has to say about the world
politics simply because he was unable to give coherent
arguments for his ideas on the design of a LispOS.
>| I won't try to elaborate everything here, but there's a bit more to
>| that. The guy you replied to didn't per se "hate" or condemn the
>| competence, just an arrogant display of such.
> As I have belabored, if you can't learn from the harsh parts of
> life, what do you expect to learn from the soft and kind?
Why do you assume that he didn't "learn?"
>| I must say that I agree with most of the things on your pages,
>| though I don't get as annoyed by incompetence as you do.
> I guess it depends on the degree to which you waste otherwise
> valuable time and money because of incompetence.
Then don't deal with it. If you find it necessary to
deal with incompetence, then it's your problem. Find
a better place to work, hire better people, etc, etc.
Dan.
FM
>Maybe, but for sure you should have checked a dictionary first :-)
>
>My dictionary (1943 Concise Oxford; none of that misspelled American
>rubbish) actually gives "fewer" as a definition for "less", along with
>a sentence involving "less men" as an example of use (which is
>precisely equivalent to "less parentheses"; QED)
My dictionary also lists it as one possible definition,
with a note saying that it is often considered incorrect.
>If you're going to flame grammar, complain about people using "they"
>when they mean "he",
That's a problem with the English language not having an
acceptable neutral pronoun to substitute he/she with.
>or "who" when they mean "whom", etc. :-)
I don't think using "who" instead of "whom" is considered
"incorrect" these days.
Dan.
Bruce Hoult
<myc...@actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
> On Thu, 24 Aug 2000 07:53:12 +1200, Bruce Hoult wrote:
>
> > In article <m24s4cx...@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz>, Paul Foley
> > <myc...@actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
>
> >> On Tue, 22 Aug 2000 17:24:27 GMT, lambdaman wrote:
> >>
> >> > I can't stand it any longer. The correct word is "fewer".
> >>
> >> Nonsense; "less" is fine.
>
> > No it's not. "less" refers to continuous quantities while "fewer"
> > refers to discrete quantities.
>
> > Maybe I should of staid out of you're discussion, aye?
>
> Maybe, but for sure you should have checked a dictionary first :-)
>
> My dictionary (1943 Concise Oxford; none of that misspelled American
> rubbish) actually gives "fewer" as a definition for "less", along with
> a sentence involving "less men" as an example of use (which is
> precisely equivalent to "less parentheses"; QED)
Well, my 1990 Concise Oxford labels that meaning as "disp.", meaning
disputed or controversial. In other words, acknowledges that some people
use it in that way but it isn't correct.
> If you're going to flame grammar, complain about people using "they"
> when they mean "he", or "who" when they mean "whom", etc. :-)
Sweet as, bro.
-- Bruce
Chris Page
jos...@corporate-world.lisp.de wrote on 2000.08.23 14:12:
> You can see a screen shot of a source file (CLIM code written by me) and
> the preference dialog for "COLOR CODED" at:
>
> http://corporate-world.lisp.de/mcl/styles.jpg
Thanks! This is an excellent illustration of my point that programs can and
should be presented in a much richer way than plain text.
Erik Naggum
| I think the relevant point here is that knowledge is available from
| a wide variety of sources so it is not necesary to go to all the
| trouble it takes communicating with people who dump alot of personl
| crap into otherwise normal conversations.
The amount of effort required is highly dependent on the person. To
some people, the existence of a nude image of a woman somewhere in
the world is an extreme personal affront, and you cannot get through
to them no matter how hard you try. Others are similarly unable to
deal with the existence of whatever "offends" and ticks them off.
I'm arguing that the more effort it takes for you to learn something
from a disagreeable source, the less you _will_ learn and the lesser
human you are because you are distracted by qualities in others that
would render yourself without support from others if it weren't for
the fact that others are not so uptight and irrational as yourself.
But then again, I'm not exactly a right-wing Republican.
| Pearls of wisdom are not so rare that one must reach into the toilet
| to grab them.
Your feeling of having to reach into the toilet _is_ your problem.
If you feel "dirtied" by the world in general, it is a psychological
disorder you should seek help to get rid of if it gets out of hand.
Erik Naggum
| If you meant learning by a counter-example then, I guess you can
| still *learn*.
Please listen carefully, now. You're still in the frame of mind
where people who know something that others don't _teach_ it and
where learning means listening to someone who communicates what they
know that whoever listens presumably don't. Learning isn't like
that at all. It isn't like that even in schools and universities.
Learning is, to repaet myself, a profoundly _personal_ experience,
and it's about your relationship with the world around you, and that
_includes_ people, but they are far from primary. Knowledge does
not reside in the communications of knowledgeable people. _Your_
knowledge exists in _your_ brain. It's _your_ responsibility to
stuff _your_ brain with knowledge any way you can.
| Anyhow, I find it humorous that you redefined what it is to be
| "human" again.
It is consistent with your idea of learning that concepts have only
one meaning, and that people "define" humanity as one single aspect
every time they point to some essential feature. I am, however,
quite amazed by this mode of thinking.
| Irrelevant, you implied the importance of activity on the part of
| the one sharing knowledge, yet you turn around and say you can learn
| from them without having them *teach* you.
No, I certainly did not imply the importance of any activity on the
part of the one "sharing" knowledge. Even if I did, I'm very far
from turning around: I have never said or implied that "learn" is
_only_ the passive, receiving end of "teach". Quite the contrary:
Learning is an _active_ process.
| In other words, you somehow pointed out that you should be nice to
| those who have knowledge to share, while still arguing that *they*
| don't have to do anything for you to learn from them.
No, I have never argued for anyone being nice. I wonder if your
world isn't coming in only two colors and that if I deny something,
you automatically think that the contrary has been asserted. This
is just not the case. I have argued that if you are _hostile_ to
someone who knows more than you or are skillful and competent, they
won't share anything with you. Nothing in that implies being nice.
Just be normal. Nice is nicer than normal.
| There's a clear contradiction here, perhaps related to your changing
| definition of what "learning from someone" means.
Nope, the contradictions are your own quite amazingly sloppy work.
"Not nice" doesn't mean "hostile", just as "not hostile" doesn' mean
"nice". Both concepts imply the presence of a quality, and it is
that presence that is denied in with "not", meaning that a
contradition of either concept means that the quality is _absent_,
not that some other quality (which one?) is present.
| Ridiculous. You face more people than you can possibly relate to.
| You can't "actively" learn from everyone.
I can, because I don't put people first. You do, so you can't. And
I don't learn _from_ people, I learn _via_ people. I also don't
teach people, I teach the stuff I know. If people want to learn,
that's good. If they don't, they'd better not pretend to know what
they don't.
| And so what if I had such priorities. Learning isn't the most
| important activity
Thank you. This is what I have wanted you to come out and say,
because clearly you put something, and my guess/hunch/view on that
is that that is people relations, first. Then you'll never really
learn, because you learn what other people tell you at best, not the
stuff they are talking about.
| > You know, the very essence of the ad hominem argument, which most
| > people don't exactly take pride in the way you do, is that you don't
| > want to listen to the argument because of the person. I consider it
| > an incredibly unintelligent approach to both people and arguments.
|
| Irrelevant. If you're engaged in a formal debate, then you are
| simply not allowed to dismiss an argument based on the lack of
| credibility on the part of the opposition. On the other hand,
| there's more information than you can possibly imagine, and it's
| okay to dismiss certain sources that you consider unreliable or
| offensive.
Oh, great, so unless you're in a formal debate, ad hominems are
perfectly OK? Well, I tend to think there's something wrong with
the people behind an argument quite often, but I still don't dismiss
their _arguments_ as such. You do. I consider that moronic at best.
However did you manage to confuse "unreliable" with "offensive"?
And if this isn't saying "only nice people are reliable", nothing is.
| For example, when you're looking for a book in a certain area, do
| you not pay attention at all to who wrote it? Do you read every
| single newspaper in the world?
Highly irrelevant, and stupid too boot.
| > I'd rather dismiss the person for his arguments any day.
|
| That on the other hand, would, vaguely qualify as "ad hominem" if
| you dismiss other aspects of a person based on his "arguments" in a
| specific area.
Perhaps you should to look up what "argumentum ad hominem" means
before you make a bigger fool of yourself?
Dismissing the person means just that: I don't want to have to deal
with the _person_. Since you obviously have not yet grasped the
very important distinction between a person and his actions and work
or whatever his professional role, but still speak in terms of
people when you want to gain knowledge of whatever you experience as
the real world, there is no hope for you until you realize that in
your quest for knowledge, people are just _media_. (People are, of
course, very nice to be around as such, but if you can't deal with
the two functions of always learning and being with other people,
you aren't really with other people, either.)
| Perhaps that's not how you meant it, but would you dismiss a
| Political Science professor on what he has to say about the world
| politics simply because he was unable to give coherent arguments for
| his ideas on the design of a LispOS.
Irrelevant, and an incredibly stupid example. Is this really the
best you can do if you have to ridicule your opponents? Clearly,
learning is so far down on your list, I'll bet you'll have to go to
classes to get into it, and that probably doesn't work well, either.
| > As I have belabored, if you can't learn from the harsh parts of
| > life, what do you expect to learn from the soft and kind?
|
| Why do you assume that he didn't "learn?"
Why do you assume that? Can't you deal with conditionals, either?
| Then don't deal with it. If you find it necessary to deal with
| incompetence, then it's your problem. Find a better place to work,
| hire better people, etc, etc.
Oh, geez. Spare me such infantile naļvité! Show me a country where
incompetent people are banned from power, private or public, and
I'll pack up and move. If it doesn't exist (which, since you have
so problems with conditionals, it doesn't), there's no such thing as
"go start your own country", or "go live on your own planet" unless
you're just as moronic as I'm beginning to suspect you are. (That's
an instance of dismissing the person for his arguments.)
Erik Naggum
| I may be wrong but if he says he can "no longer stand it" then he
| ditches the posters that have been caught in this common pitfalls as
| idiots that can not even speak right english.
I think you're assuming much too much. Just because you can't stand
something someone does, doesn't mean you can't stand that someone as
a whole. Even incredibly obese slobs who stink of last week's sweat
and drool on their dirty clothes may have something useful to say or
do, but "I can't stand this smell" is a perfectly valid statement.
| I know that I don't speak perfect English but I think most people
| can understand what I say. If you speak so perfect English then be
| happy. You certainly won't reached that level of ability without
| hard learning and many mistakes.
I'm trying to tell you that you're so amazingly mistaken in how you
deal with people who speak English reasonably well. I tried very
hard to point out that speaking better English than most native
speakers is _not_ an accomplishment. Speaking better Norwegian than
most Norwegian native speakers is not an accomplishment, either. So
your _accusation_ about speaking perfectly is offensive because it
is so incredibly irrelevant.
Of course language training for a non-native speaker involves a lot
of mistakes, and if it weren't for retards like Barry Margolin who
only use other people's mistakes to shoot them down when he feels
his hatred is justified, it's possible to identify specific mistakes
and not repeat them. Otherwise, you'll have to pay _very_ close
attention to how other people write. Of course, if you're _really_
good, some people _will_ hate you for that, too, and then try to
kill you or at least harrass you to death if you make a mistake.
However, since there are so many people who go ballistic every time
you tell them how something is supposed to be said/written/used, you
have two types of reactions: the getting-irritated-until-you-explode
and suppress-it-and-take-it-out-on-someone-else types. Of course,
there are people who wouldn't know a mistake from a correct usage,
and thus don't care at all, and some of those go ballistic even at
exposure to the concept that something might be _wrong_.
I really thought that by highlighting the uselessness of comparing
the _relative_ skills in two languages through an example with
Swahili and Mandarin Chinese, you would understand that someone who
is able to correct someone because of frequent mistake, does _not_
have to be "perfect" or any other popular accusation against the
skillful and competent, and he may in fact _be_ just as good in
German or whatever, without being anywhere _near_ perfect. In my
particular example, "I speak Swahili _exactly_ as well as I speak
Mandarin Chinese", this is true only because I speak both of them
_not_at_all_. Get it?
| In my opinion the way the original poster wrote is scornful to the
| posters that don't speak perfect english.
Nobody in their right mind is scornful of someone who doesn't do
something "perfectly". I assume that people are irritated by
repeated and unfixed mistakes, which is quite another thing.
However, it is so alien to me that someone should have something
against a _person_ merely because of his actions that I cannot even
fathom how one can see scorn towards a repeated mistake as scorn
towards those who make it. A lot of people can't deal with the
distinction between person and action, but that always seemed such
an obviously serious character flaw that it cannot be assumed.
| > I find such scorn towards competence to
| > be _fantastically_ offensive.
|
| I find scorn towards the people who want to learn but haven't reached the
| state of being perfect _fantastically_ offensive.
But whence this obsession with "perfect"? And how the hell do you
know that he addressed "people who want to learn"? That's a highly
unwarranted assumption if there ever was one. I hope your "want to
learn" does not excuse every mistake people make as long as the
underlying _motive_ is whether they want to learn. (I always argue
that if you try something too often and you consistently fail, it's
better to give it up.)
| But on the other side if all corrections would be made this way I'm
| sure fewer and fewer people would overcome themselves to post at a
| newsgroup that uses a language that they are not very good in.
Only if they take it personally. That's a bad idea on USENET. Only
if someone is really after _you_, should you consider that, and you
know that for certain only when they prove that it doesn't matter
what you _do_ -- they'll criticize _you_, anyway, and for the really
hard evidence: look for criticism of what you _haven't_ done. False
accusations are the best proof ever that it's highly personal, and
that the person on the other end is a deranged lunatic, too. That's
so infrequent that you have to wait for solid evidence, though.
| (I personally know many people who don't ever tried to post because
| they think they are not good enough in writing English)
I have seen a lot of really weird posts by people who effectively
say "I can read English, but I can't write squat, so pleae have me
excused". It's something hard to figure out what they mean, but
at least they're aware of their predicament.
| But again - You're right that my posting was not very fair, so
| please excuse me.
Sure, excused. :) But drop the "perfect" obsession, please.
Barry Margolin
> Try reading what I wrote again, and restrict yourself to what I
> wrote, no Barry-Margolin-interpretations of it this time, OK?. I
> actually suggest you pretend someone else wrote it, so you can keep
> your head screwed on straight for a change.
Try as I might, I can't seem to read that message without seeing insults in
it. Some excerpts:
If you can no longer improve your English, that's an indictment of a
dysfunctional brain that _I_ certainly would not have made public.
Shouldn't the word be "indication", not "indictment"? An indictment is a
formal accusation, not the evidence that leads to it.
The argument you made is usually made by people who _want_ to be
sloppy and incompetent, and who are consequently scornful of whoever
actually know their stuff.
Are you, or are you not, ridiculing the person you addressed with these
comments? And do you deny that you take this tone frequently with posters
who don't measure up to your expectations of language or technical
precision?
BTW, if you didn't use such an ideosyncratic quoting style, I would be less
likely to prejudge your posts. I wouldn't know who they're from (I usually
page past the headers quickly, and only look back at them if I need to).
But your posts virtually scream "Here comes another Naggumism!".
Dorai Sitaram
FM <da...@dartmouth.edu> wrote:
>Paul Foley <myc...@actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
>
>>If you're going to flame grammar, complain about people using "they"
>>when they mean "he",
>
>That's a problem with the English language not having an
>acceptable neutral pronoun to substitute he/she with.
Problem? "They" is a grammatically plural
pronoun whose referent can be logically singular or
plural. It isn't the only such pronoun in English.
Consider "you".
(And the royal "we". Thus we have pronouns in
all three persons that are both gender- and
number-unspecific. ;-> )
--d
Erik Naggum
| Try as I might, I can't seem to read that message without seeing
| insults in it.
That's because when you see it's from me, Barry, you can't see
anything else. You say so yourself: You prejudge my articles.
Whatever you claim to see is certainly no excuse to accuse me of
what _isn't_ there, which is what I'm reacting to, and which I'm
challenging you to defend. Your hatred is legendary, but it should
stop short of false accusations. Why doesn't it? Are you insane?
Now, give me some message-ID's where I "dish out" spelling and
grammar flames or go kill yourself in shame, will you?
| Shouldn't the word be "indication", not "indictment"?
Why do you _continue_ your spelling/grammar/etc bashing when you
have _yet_ to prove that you have the right to do so? Do you even
remember by now that all this is predicated on your false accusation
against me that _I_ dish out same so you can retaliate against me?
So what is this? Proactive retaliation, Barry Margolin style? You
have already established that you are more than willing to accuse
people wrongly without remorse, as if your own psychosis is excuse
enough to do whatever you want. Have you killed any people because
they "might" do you harm if they were as bad as you have conjured up
your insane visions that they are? Do you kill people, Barry?
| And do you deny that you take this tone frequently with posters who
| don't measure up to your expectations of language or technical
| precision?
So _this_ is your justification for false accusations against me!
I'm _so_ impressed. What does it take for you to realize that what
you keep doing is evil no matter what anyone else does in this world?
Come on, now, give me some message-IDs where I "dish out" spelling
and grammar flames! You can do it, Barry, you can even figure out
the checksum in my message-IDs and post some fakes, can't you?
| BTW, if you didn't use such an ideosyncratic quoting style, I would
| be less likely to prejudge your posts.
No, I don't think so. I don't think you are at all able _not_ to
"prejudge" my posts. It's all in your mind, Barry. Please get some
professional help to stop prejudging my posts. It has nothing to do
with the quoting style. Seek professional counseling, Barry.
And what, precisely, has kept you from reading my posts if they are
so easily identifiable to you? Are you so far into psychosis that
you have lost whatever remnant of free will caused your evil, Barry?
I'm looking forward to the message-IDs, so people can look at the
whole article in context, because you sure can't, as that would
deflate the entire defense for your incredibly evil behavior.
You're much worse than I am, Barry: You hate. You'll kill if you
could get away with it, and I suspect that one day, perhaps in the
past, you really will kill someone in that blind hatred of yours.
Barry Margolin
> I'm looking forward to the message-IDs, so people can look at the
> whole article in context, because you sure can't, as that would
> deflate the entire defense for your incredibly evil behavior.
Rather than actually containing grammar criticism, it seems to be
insulting the other poster for his unwillingness to accept unsolicited
grammar corrections. Not a significant difference, IMHO.
> You're much worse than I am, Barry: You hate.
Would you please stop using that word? I dislike you and think you're
extremely annoying when you post your tirades, but I don't hate you (or
anyone else, for that matter).
But I guess if I'm really psychotic as you said, I wouldn't know it, so my
response obviously means nothing.
FM
> Please listen carefully, now. You're still in the frame of mind
> where people who know something that others don't _teach_ it and
> where learning means listening to someone who communicates what they
> know that whoever listens presumably don't. Learning isn't like
> that at all.
You hinted at that practice. I can learn from whomever I want,
regardless of how I act to them. Why do you assume otherwise?
> It isn't like that even in schools and universities.
> Learning is, to repaet myself, a profoundly _personal_ experience,
> and it's about your relationship with the world around you, and that
> _includes_ people, but they are far from primary. Knowledge does
> not reside in the communications of knowledgeable people. _Your_
> knowledge exists in _your_ brain. It's _your_ responsibility to
> stuff _your_ brain with knowledge any way you can.
And YOU listen carefully now. Who says I'm not doing that?
>| Anyhow, I find it humorous that you redefined what it is to be
>| "human" again.
> It is consistent with your idea of learning that concepts have only
> one meaning, and that people "define" humanity as one single aspect
> every time they point to some essential feature. I am, however,
> quite amazed by this mode of thinking.
Nope, you were the one proclaiming that "[Such scorn] undermines
all that is human." Note "all." I'm quite amazed by your utter
inability to note contradictions in your own thoughts. Multiple
referents for a single word don't bail you out, considering that
each was vague; you were obfuscating the meaning of your sentences
using these words, inviting uncertainty and certain criticism.
> No, I certainly did not imply the importance of any activity on the
> part of the one "sharing" knowledge. Even if I did, I'm very far
> from turning around: I have never said or implied that "learn" is
> _only_ the passive, receiving end of "teach". Quite the contrary:
> Learning is an _active_ process.
Bull, you still don't get it. I never said anything about
learning being a passive process. But you did say:
"Scorn them, and they will not try again with you,
and perhaps not with others."
If learning was a process that you describe as above,
why would I care if they will try again with me or
with others?
> No, I have never argued for anyone being nice. I wonder if your
> world isn't coming in only two colors and that if I deny something,
> you automatically think that the contrary has been asserted. This
> is just not the case. I have argued that if you are _hostile_ to
> someone who knows more than you or are skillful and competent, they
> won't share anything with you. Nothing in that implies being nice.
> Just be normal. Nice is nicer than normal.
Fine, then. If you're being normal to someone who's being
an asshole to you, you're being nice.
>| There's a clear contradiction here, perhaps related to your changing
>| definition of what "learning from someone" means.
> Nope, the contradictions are your own quite amazingly sloppy work.
Your own sloppy work, in actuality. You seem quite certain
of your own criticism, when you have no idea what you're
talking about or what I'm talking about for that matter.
> "Not nice" doesn't mean "hostile", just as "not hostile" doesn' mean
> "nice".
Learn English. "Not nice" almost always means a degree of
hostility, and "not hostile" consequently means a degree
of being nice. Those are relative terms.
> Both concepts imply the presence of a quality,
Only when you see that quality as a continuum which
extends in several directions where the above words
have both absolute and relative referents in.
> and it is
> that presence that is denied in with "not", meaning that a
> contradition of either concept means that the quality is _absent_,
> not that some other quality (which one?) is present.
Again, I suggest you learn English. When someone says
"I don't like you" that doesn't mean she is simply not
in the state of likeing you - it means she hates (to
a lesser degree than this strong word denotes) you.
>| Ridiculous. You face more people than you can possibly relate to.
>| You can't "actively" learn from everyone.
> I can, because I don't put people first. You do, so you can't.
More bullshit. So if you go to a stadium filled with 40000
people, do you learn from each and every one? If that's what
you consider learning, I'm doing fine.
> And
> I don't learn _from_ people, I learn _via_ people.
More bullshit.
>| And so what if I had such priorities. Learning isn't the most
>| important activity
> Thank you. This is what I have wanted you to come out and say,
> because clearly you put something, and my guess/hunch/view on that
> is that that is people relations, first. Then you'll never really
> learn, because you learn what other people tell you at best, not the
> stuff they are talking about.
Of course you have no idea what you're talking about. One, my
priorities aren't simple as you have delineated before. Two,
one doesn't have to put forward learning as the single most
important priority to be able to learn at all.
>| > You know, the very essence of the ad hominem argument, which most
>| > people don't exactly take pride in the way you do, is that you don't
>| > want to listen to the argument because of the person. I consider it
>| > an incredibly unintelligent approach to both people and arguments.
>|
>| Irrelevant. If you're engaged in a formal debate, then you are
>| simply not allowed to dismiss an argument based on the lack of
>| credibility on the part of the opposition. On the other hand,
>| there's more information than you can possibly imagine, and it's
>| okay to dismiss certain sources that you consider unreliable or
>| offensive.
> Oh, great, so unless you're in a formal debate, ad hominems are
> perfectly OK? Well, I tend to think there's something wrong with
> the people behind an argument quite often, but I still don't dismiss
> their _arguments_ as such. You do. I consider that moronic at best.
I don't. So you do read every single newspaper writer,
every single website that claims to have information,
before you dismiss them? The term "ad hominem" is
meaningless outside of the context of a debate of some
sort.
> However did you manage to confuse "unreliable" with "offensive"?
> And if this isn't saying "only nice people are reliable", nothing is.
Somehow, you manage to show your misunderstanding of
the word "or." There are offensive sources and there
are unreliable sources. I tend to avoid both. Why it
came to your mind that I confused one with the other
is completely beyond my imagination.
>| For example, when you're looking for a book in a certain area, do
>| you not pay attention at all to who wrote it? Do you read every
>| single newspaper in the world?
> Highly irrelevant, and stupid too boot.
It is quite relevant to what you said. You said you
shouldn't dismiss anyone based on their credibility
alone.
> Perhaps you should to look up what "argumentum ad hominem" means
> before you make a bigger fool of yourself?
Actually, you're the one in a greater need of a dictionary.
> Dismissing the person means just that: I don't want to have to deal
> with the _person_.
Which would you hinder your learning from the person.
> Since you obviously have not yet grasped the
> very important distinction between a person and his actions and work
> or whatever his professional role, but still speak in terms of
> people when you want to gain knowledge of whatever you experience as
> the real world, there is no hope for you until you realize that in
> your quest for knowledge, people are just _media_.
Which is why you said:
"Scorn them, and they will not try again with you,
and perhaps not with others."
Confusion orients from my attempts to try to write
in your own lingo, which of course confuses and
upsets you greatly, because of the inherent
contradictions you discover.
>| Perhaps that's not how you meant it, but would you dismiss a
>| Political Science professor on what he has to say about the world
>| politics simply because he was unable to give coherent arguments for
>| his ideas on the design of a LispOS.
> Irrelevant, and an incredibly stupid example.
Not as stupid as trying to use "ad hominem," which is
a logical fallacy, but isn't at all relevant outside
of formal logical context to criticize a person's
practice. In fact that example of "dismissing a person
based on his arguments" is an example of ad hominem.
In other words, ad hominem is an example of using
irrelevant information for a logical basis, and it's
not logical to dismiss a person based on his
arguments in a certain area. If that weren't a case,
you'd be dismissed out of this newsgroup for your
utterly incompetent arguments in this thread.
>| > As I have belabored, if you can't learn from the harsh parts of
>| > life, what do you expect to learn from the soft and kind?
>| Why do you assume that he didn't "learn?"
> Why do you assume that? Can't you deal with conditionals, either?
Using conditionals as rhetorically of course. If you're that
much of an idiot that you cannot appreciate, or understand
the difference, why bother?
>| Then don't deal with it. If you find it necessary to deal with
>| incompetence, then it's your problem. Find a better place to work,
>| hire better people, etc, etc.
> Oh, geez. Spare me such infantile naïvité!
Oh geez. Someone can't deal with rhetorical points. If
you find incompetence ubiquitous and annoying to the
point that you think it should be punishable by law,
you are in need of a change of scenery. Competence
is a relative word and if you find incompetence
everywhere, your standards are out of touch with
reality.
Note a paradox in the sentence I'm referring to in your
own website.
> Show me a country where
> incompetent people are banned from power, private or public, and
> I'll pack up and move. If it doesn't exist (which, since you have
> so problems with conditionals, it doesn't), there's no such thing as
> "go start your own country", or "go live on your own planet" unless
> you're just as moronic as I'm beginning to suspect you are. (That's
> an instance of dismissing the person for his arguments.)
That's still your problem. Why do you find the need to
actively *hate* it? FYI, I heard the guys who work in
hell are extremely competent.
Your main mode of argument is to read between the text,
find all the irrelevant points that I *might* be
implying and then attack them while dismissing all the
relevant points with insults. Of course when you argue
your own points, you riddle them with a lot of irrelevant
garbage while leaving out crucial points and when I point
out the flaws, you augment your arguments with additional
points that you never made, blast me for not getting
those points in your original arguments, and add some
more insults.
Dan.
FM
>FM <da...@dartmouth.edu> wrote:
>>Paul Foley <myc...@actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
>>>If you're going to flame grammar, complain about people using "they"
>>>when they mean "he",
>>That's a problem with the English language not having an
>>acceptable neutral pronoun to substitute he/she with.
>Problem? "They" is a grammatically plural
>pronoun whose referent can be logically singular or
>plural.
Interesting. Any source? I did see it as a suggestion,
but I don't think I have ever read that it is correct
for "they" to have a singular referent.
Dan.
Christopher Browne
>* Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>| BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't ordinarily
>| post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that spelling/grammar
>| correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it out, you'd better be able
>| to take it.
>
> Is this your psychotic prejudice running amuck again? Just _where_
> did I "dish out" any spelling/grammar corrections? Please feel free
> to post as many message-IDs as you can possibly find.
When you start getting involved in a "spelling/grammar correction"
thread, that means jumping down the slippery slope that leads to
people getting more and more picky about spelling and grammar.
Where you get "psychotic prejudice" from is not clear.
> Your hatred blinds you, Barry. Just open your eyes and stop hating.
> It'll do any other remaining mental processes of yours a world of
> good, too.
Perhaps he hates you, or perhaps _you're_ the one in a blind fury
about this. His comment about you seemed to me to be a relatively
minor "aside."
It seems like quite a leap for you to jump to accusative phrases like:
"Is this your psychotic prejudice running amuck again?"
"Your hatred blinds you"
"You're so overpowered by your hatred"
Such comments seem to point in a rather different direction than to
the conclusion that _Barry_ is filled with blind hatred. They seem
suggestive of hatred residing elsewhere.
--
(concatenate 'string "cbbrowne" "@" "hex.net")
<http://www.hex.net/~cbbrowne/>
"Perfection is reached, not when is nothing more to add, but when
there is nothing more to take away." -- Antoine de Sainte Exupery.
Barry Margolin
If you look up "they" at www.dictionary.com, it mentions this use with the
note "Usage problem". And if you look up "he", there's a long "Usage note"
that discusses the issue of gender-neutral pronouns. See
<http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=A0042019>. The plural
pronouns are accepted in colloquial prose, and are becoming acceptable in
more formal writings.
Raffael Cavallaro
wrote:
>| Pearls of wisdom are not so rare that one must reach into the toilet
>| to grab them.
>
> Your feeling of having to reach into the toilet _is_ your problem.
> If you feel "dirtied" by the world in general, it is a psychological
> disorder you should seek help to get rid of if it gets out of hand.
Surely one can't have missed the implication that abusive communication
is the toilet to which Coby referred. Coby doesn't feel "dirtied" by
"the wold in general," but by a minority of verbally abusive individuals
in it.
Quoting the full context, with **emphasis added**:
"I think the relevant point here is that knowledge is available from a
wide variety of sources so **it is not necesary to go to all the trouble
it takes communicating with people who dump alot of person[a]l crap into
otherwise normal conversations. **
Pearls of wisdom are not so rare that one must reach into the toilet to
grab them."
It is left as an exercise for the readers of c.l.l to puzze out who it
could be who would "dump alot of person[a]l crap into otherwise normal
conversations." It's no use pretending that "the world in general" is as
routinely abusive as this sort of person.
Ralph
--
Raffael Cavallaro, Ph.D.
raf...@mediaone.net
FM
>>Interesting. Any source? I did see it as a suggestion,
>>but I don't think I have ever read that it is correct
>>for "they" to have a singular referent.
>If you look up "they" at www.dictionary.com, it mentions this use with the
>note "Usage problem". And if you look up "he", there's a long "Usage note"
>that discusses the issue of gender-neutral pronouns. See
><http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=A0042019>. The plural
>pronouns are accepted in colloquial prose, and are becoming acceptable in
>more formal writings.
Wow. That's pretty refreshing. I still won't use it in
formal context though, a lot of old-school folks would
not be so tolerant with this use. Until it becomes more
widespread, and so long as some people have trouble with
using "he" in the general case, I guess we're stuck
with the inelegant "he/she" (or "one") for a while.
Dan.
Erik Naggum
| Rather than actually containing grammar criticism, it seems to be
| insulting the other poster for his unwillingness to accept unsolicited
| grammar corrections. Not a significant difference, IMHO.
Oh, geez, this is _so_ pathetic. No _actual_ criticism, of course!,
certainly _no_ dishing out, of course!, but something which Barry
Margolin, the ultimate hateful psycho, claims is not "significantly
different" because that way he can keep believing he's in the right.
You really are devoid of reasoning abilities behind all that hatred.
| Would you please stop using that word?
No. Provide some evidence of sanity and absence of hatred on your
part. _All_ you're doing is making it harder and harder to pretend
you aren't so hateful that you can't see or think straight. I don't
change my mind in the face of sheer lack of evidence the way you do,
so you have to _do_ something that can alter the impression you
leave that no matter _what_ I do, your psychotic hatred will "see"
something that isn't there but which you can accuse me of, and then
when you're exposed as a liar, fraud, and psychotic, the best you
can come up with is something that is "not significantly different"
to _you_. Well, big surprise, there! _Nothing_ is _significantly_
different from what you accuse people of, unjustly and falsely.
You don't _have_ to read what I post, you sick psycho. If you do,
it's because you need to feed your insanity and hatred and need to
take it out on me whenever there's something else that triggers your
psychosis. More importantly, there's _nothing_ I can do to make
these insane accusations of yours stop. Your hatred is eternal, and
no longer based in reality. We established that the first time you
_admitted_ that you couldn't see anything I did unless it fit your
preconceptions. I was stupid to accept your apology. You're not
the kind of person whose apologies can be accepted, Barry Margolin.
Erik Naggum
| Learn English. "Not nice" almost always means a degree of
| hostility, and "not hostile" consequently means a degree of being
| nice. Those are relative terms.
I suspected you wouldn't understand that and resort to some idiocy
like "learn English" when you clearly can't grasp a concept of
medium complexity in logic. I'm sorry I wasted any effort on you.
It was obvious that when you didn't clue in on "ad hominem".
I hope you figure out the concept of negation in your next life.
All your crap about contradictions have one root cause: That you
can't grasp the nature of negation.
#:Erik
Erik Naggum
| It is left as an exercise for the readers of c.l.l ...
:
| Raffael Cavallaro, Ph.D.
| raf...@mediaone.net
Why don't you explain the obvious one more time? I'm sure nobody
figured it out by themselves the first time, so your continued help
and guidance would be most welcome!
Erik Naggum
| Such comments seem to point in a rather different direction than to
| the conclusion that _Barry_ is filled with blind hatred. They seem
| suggestive of hatred residing elsewhere.
I guess you would blame the victim of hatred elsewhere. It's all
too common for bystanders to do that, but that's the kind of thing
that keeps the hatred going. Defend hatred, and you end up with
people who kill because they can no longer control it and whole
movements of people who blame some _group_ of people or just someone
for every ill on the planet. Remember the lynch mobs? Guess who
they would blame for their ills. You know this evil in progress
when you see a false accusation that is not corrected, but instead
reinforced, when criticized, and when the concept of justice is
discarded in favor of following the hateful emotions. Barry
Margolin has even admitted to be that kind of person previously.
He has learned exactly nothing.
Tim Bradshaw
> If you look up "they" at www.dictionary.com, it mentions this use with the
> note "Usage problem". And if you look up "he", there's a long "Usage note"
> that discusses the issue of gender-neutral pronouns. See
> <http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=A0042019>. The plural
> pronouns are accepted in colloquial prose, and are becoming acceptable in
> more formal writings.
Since this has come up again, I'll mention again that the use of
`they' to mean a generic singular person is native in my dialect ,--
at least I assume it is based on remembering having used it when I was
perhaps 10 or 11. Since, as a child, I probably spoke a fairly
prestigious dialect (English, home counties, private school, country
living, blah), and my parents were not very PC people, I find these
long discussions about how this use of `they' is a new and
not-entirely-acceptable thing rather amusing. There may be a
distinction between spoken and written English -- I'm not sure that I
or my parents would have *written* `they' like this -- and
dictionaries do tend to downplay spoken language, so maybe this is it.
--tim
FM
>| Learn English. "Not nice" almost always means a degree of
>| hostility, and "not hostile" consequently means a degree of being
>| nice. Those are relative terms.
> I suspected you wouldn't understand
Funny. I clearly understand the difference between
"not" used for logical negation and "not" used for
antonymic modification. It's your utter inability
to understand the dual use of the word, compounded
by your refusal to accept that the qualities in
question are inherently relative - boolean or
even trinary logic isn't sufficient to address
these qualities in meaningful form.
> that and resort to some idiocy
> like "learn English" when you clearly can't grasp a concept of
> medium complexity in logic. I'm sorry I wasted any effort on you.
> It was obvious that when you didn't clue in on "ad hominem".
What, you mean your pathetic attempt to relate the
idea of avoiding a person based on his previous
conduct to a logical fallacy? Or your implict rule
that you're the only one who's allowed to introduce
words with multiple referents and others are simply
forced to submit to your definitions, despite the
fact that your command of the English language,
notwithstanding your assertion to the contrary, is
questionable at best?
> I hope you figure out the concept of negation in your next life.
> All your crap about contradictions have one root cause: That you
> can't grasp the nature of negation.
You can't grasp that the word "not" is often used for
things other than logical negation in English. For some
reason, you are content to use the word "human" for
contrasting purposes, yet you bark just as one uses a
fairly standard definition of the word "not," which
happens to conflict with your notion of negation. To
use your own analogy, there seem to be only two colors
in your world. I hope you're born with better vision
in your next life. Yes it applies to this situation
in more than one way. Funny how one who takes learning
as seriously as he claims hasn't learned to see things
relatively and loses sight of things just as his world
of absolutes falls apart with each piece floating in
chaos.
Dorai Sitaram
FM <da...@dartmouth.edu> wrote:
>Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net> wrote:
>
>>>Interesting. Any source? I did see it as a suggestion,
>>>but I don't think I have ever read that it is correct
>>>for "they" to have a singular referent.
>
>>If you look up "they" at www.dictionary.com, it mentions this use with the
>>note "Usage problem". And if you look up "he", there's a long "Usage note"
>>that discusses the issue of gender-neutral pronouns. See
>><http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=A0042019>. The plural
>>pronouns are accepted in colloquial prose, and are becoming acceptable in
>>more formal writings.
>
>formal context though, a lot of old-school folks would
>not be so tolerant with this use. Until it becomes more
>widespread, and so long as some people have trouble with
>using "he" in the general case, I guess we're stuck
>with the inelegant "he/she" (or "one") for a while.
http://www.pemberley.com/janeinfo/janeinfo.html
assures me that _they_ for logical singular dates back
to the 14th century, and has been used by a pretty
respectable passel of writers from Chaucer and
Shakespeare through Austen and Dickens to Shaw and
Orwell. Looks pretty "old-school" to me (leading me
to wonder when and where in history did people start
worrying that _they_ for singular could be
wrong).
--d
Erik Naggum
| It's your utter inability to understand the dual use of the word
Really? And what is your grounds for concluding that? The whole
point in my discussion is to stress lack of absolutes and lack of
unique meanings. Your head doesn't really work, does it?
If you understand both uses, how come you have to fight against one
of them? That's what this idiocy of your boils down to.
| You can't grasp that the word "not" is often used for
| things other than logical negation in English.
Really? And how did you arrive at that conclusion when the issue is
whether you would understand the logical usage? You amaze me. I
thought intelligence at your level was accompanied by fur, grunts,
and bananas, but clearly it has developed language skills at quite
an advanced level.
| For some reason, you are content to use the word "human" for
| contrasting purposes, yet you bark just as one uses a fairly
| standard definition of the word "not," which happens to conflict
| with your notion of negation.
Really? Who's the one barking about "not", here? I'm perfectly
happy with multiple meanings, but I clearly don't use _all_ of them
at the same time. When you fight tooth and nail against the one
that is clearly implied, it's somewhat curious to watch you try to
blame me for it. But hey, Barry Margolin is on the loose, so I
guess it's infectious to blame me for things I don't do. Watch out,
though. Hatred is infectious, too.
| Funny how one who takes learning as seriously as he claims hasn't
| learned to see things relatively and loses sight of things just as
| his world of absolutes falls apart with each piece floating in chaos.
You just described yourself, but I guess you knew that. I doesn't
work very well to play the mirror game on people smarter than you.
I was talking about how important it is to learn from any source,
regardless of how some infantile reactions like saving face might
compel one to reject others, but it is clear that you will never
learn from a source that is not _very_ agreeable to you. Instead
you will defend that _you_ be right, rather than defend _what_ is
right and adapt your own views accordingly. You're a people person,
and it shows all too well. People persons are seldom right, but
they are very agreeable as long as others are agreeable to them. As
soon as someone tries to tell them something they don't know, it's
more important whether their image in the minds of others will
change than whether it's correct or useful, and if the image is
under threat, god help whoever told them the bad news.
Thank you for letting me know that you're the kind of person who
doesn't give a flying fuck about what's true, correct, or useful as
long as the one telling you about it offends you in ways completely
irrelevant to the information you receive. One-dimensional people
are so amazingly useless.
FM
> Really? And how did you arrive at that conclusion when the issue is
> whether you would understand the logical usage? You amaze me. I
> thought intelligence at your level was accompanied by fur, grunts,
> and bananas, but clearly it has developed language skills at quite
> an advanced level.
Ah, more lovely insults. Do you ever have any idea what
you are talking about?
>| Funny how one who takes learning as seriously as he claims hasn't
>| learned to see things relatively and loses sight of things just as
>| his world of absolutes falls apart with each piece floating in chaos.
> You just described yourself, but I guess you knew that. I doesn't
> work very well to play the mirror game on people smarter than you.
You surely don't work well. Glad you figured that out.
> I was talking about how important it is to learn from any source,
> regardless of how some infantile reactions like saving face might
> compel one to reject others,
Like you exemplified when Barry corrected your mistake?
> but it is clear that you will never
> learn from a source that is not _very_ agreeable to you.
What is clear? You surely like to talk about things you have
no idea about.
> Instead
> you will defend that _you_ be right, rather than defend _what_ is
> right and adapt your own views accordingly.
That's what exactly you're doing.
> You're a people person,
> and it shows all too well.
That's something I've never been accused of.
> People persons are seldom right, but
> they are very agreeable as long as others are agreeable to them. As
> soon as someone tries to tell them something they don't know, it's
> more important whether their image in the minds of others will
> change than whether it's correct or useful, and if the image is
> under threat, god help whoever told them the bad news.
Again, nonsensical psychoanalysis. Of course you never really
bothered to learn all the relevant details. Funny how you
never learn when your arguments are under question.
> Thank you for letting me know that you're the kind of person who
> doesn't give a flying fuck about what's true, correct, or useful as
> long as the one telling you about it offends you in ways completely
> irrelevant to the information you receive. One-dimensional people
> are so amazingly useless.
You are keenly aware of your own uselessness so I won't
bother elaborating it here.
FM
>>>If you look up "they" at www.dictionary.com, it mentions this use with the
>>>note "Usage problem". And if you look up "he", there's a long "Usage note"
>>>that discusses the issue of gender-neutral pronouns. See
>>><http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=A0042019>. The plural
>>>pronouns are accepted in colloquial prose, and are becoming acceptable in
>>>more formal writings.
>>Wow. That's pretty refreshing. I still won't use it in
>>formal context though, a lot of old-school folks would
>>not be so tolerant with this use. Until it becomes more
>>widespread, and so long as some people have trouble with
>>using "he" in the general case, I guess we're stuck
>>with the inelegant "he/she" (or "one") for a while.
>http://www.pemberley.com/janeinfo/janeinfo.html
>assures me that _they_ for logical singular dates back
>to the 14th century, and has been used by a pretty
>respectable passel of writers from Chaucer and
>Shakespeare through Austen and Dickens to Shaw and
>Orwell. Looks pretty "old-school" to me (leading me
>to wonder when and where in history did people start
>worrying that _they_ for singular could be
>wrong).
Hmm. Then is it just the last few decades that
this usage has been considered incorrect or is
there any indication that these writers used
it accidentally? When was the English grammar
first codified?
Dan.
Dan.
Erik Naggum
| Do you ever have any idea what you are talking about?
Yes. All the time. I know that annoys some people to no end.
| Like you exemplified when Barry corrected your mistake?
And which "mistake" was that? He didn't understand what I wrote,
but chose to portray what I did as wrong. He always does that.
Barry Margolin always finds something wrong and bad in _anything_ I
do, and _especially_ if it isn't there. That's just how he is.
| > but it is clear that you will never learn from a source that is
| > not _very_ agreeable to you.
|
| What is clear? You surely like to talk about things you have
| no idea about.
Really? How come you provide me with the evidence and then object
to the conclusion? You could _do_ something to show that you learn
from a source that is disagreeable to you, instead of continuing to
reinforce my argument, you know.
| > Instead you will defend that _you_ be right, rather than defend
| > _what_ is right and adapt your own views accordingly.
|
| That's what exactly you're doing.
Geez, don't you tire of playing the mirror game? Do you really have
to prove that everything that can be said to you must bounce off?
No, I don't defend that _I_ am right. I defend what I happen to
think is right, right now, and this changes as I learn more, which I
do all the time. This means I continue to be more right than wrong,
which annoys people who are more wrong than right, and won't change
their mind to fix that dire predicament. If I have reason to change
my mind, that's OK, and I will defend something that someone else
said was right before I came to the same conclusion. The history of
this newsgroup shows that truth at several occasions. Of course you
wouldn't accept it.
| That's something I've never been accused of.
You've been around too many agreeable people, then. :)
| Funny how you never learn when your arguments are under question.
Huh? How _ever_ do you come up with your insane theories about me?
| You are keenly aware of your own uselessness so I won't bother
| elaborating it here.
Even more pathetic mirror game playing. Sheesh, get over it.
Erik Naggum
| When was the English grammar first codified?
At the time when Latin was regarded as the most correct language.
Hence the "prohibition" against trailing prepositions and split
infinitives, which are both very bad Latin, but perfectly valid
English. English grammar has had the bad fortune of having been
codified by people who didn't like the language as it was used, but
rather wanted to "fix" it to look more like that glamorous Latin.
thi
> prestigious dialect (English, home counties, private school, country
*bing* (sound of lightbulb): is this related to other singular-plural
localisms? to me the sentence "sun microsystems have released a chip"
sounds odd (i would use "has") but apparently this is the norm for many.
thi
Fred Gilham
> I guess we're stuck with the inelegant "he/she" (or "one") for a
> while.
I think the English are willing to use `it' as a neuter pronoun even
when speaking of people. I like this.
Examples include:
``A Bastible always keeps its word.'' --- E. Nesbit
``Find out what the baby is doing and make it stop.'' --- C. S. Lewis (I think).
So you could say ``When using unsafe languages, a programmer should
always declare its variables.''
My own pet peeve is the improper use of "it's". I think all economic
and intellectual activity ought to be stopped and the resulting unused
resources be devoted to setting this right.
I still remember seeing the editor of a computer user's group magazine
get so confused that he was using "it's" to mean possessive and "its'"
to mean "it is"! At least he did it consistently.
--
Fred Gilham gil...@csl.sri.com
Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity. It
is like the precious oil upon the head, running down upon the beard,
upon the beard of Aaron, running down on the collar of his robes. It
is like the dew of Hermon, which falls on the mountains of Zion. For
there the LORD has commanded the blessing, life for evermore. -Ps 133
FM
> Really? How come you provide me with the evidence and then object
> to the conclusion? You could _do_ something to show that you learn
> from a source that is disagreeable to you, instead of continuing to
> reinforce my argument, you know.
First of all, this is completely irrelevant. Second, the
burden of proof is on you, not me. This argument is not
about whether I learn from disagreeable sources or not.
If you decide to label me based on your guesswork, it's
your job to prove why these labels are correct, not my
job to prove that these labels are incorrect.
> Geez, don't you tire of playing the mirror game? Do you really have
> to prove that everything that can be said to you must bounce off?
Everytime you throw an insulting remark, it usually
applies to you as well. So I save time and bounce it
back to you. When you say something about me with
no basis other than your own hunch, I can simply
throw it right back at you with the same applicability.
> No, I don't defend that _I_ am right. I defend what I happen to
> think is right, right now, and this changes as I learn more, which I
> do all the time. This means I continue to be more right than wrong,
> which annoys people who are more wrong than right, and won't change
> their mind to fix that dire predicament. If I have reason to change
> my mind, that's OK, and I will defend something that someone else
> said was right before I came to the same conclusion. The history of
> this newsgroup shows that truth at several occasions. Of course you
> wouldn't accept it.
Yet everytime you get challenged, you issue random insults,
disguised under rhetorical conditions and points. I never
argue that I'm right anyways, not on newsgroups.
Dan.
Barry Margolin
>* Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>| Rather than actually containing grammar criticism, it seems to be
>| insulting the other poster for his unwillingness to accept unsolicited
>| grammar corrections. Not a significant difference, IMHO.
>
> Oh, geez, this is _so_ pathetic. No _actual_ criticism, of course!,
> certainly _no_ dishing out, of course!
Yes, there was actual criticism. Not of grammar, but of the poster's
intelligence. If anything, that's worse!
You're the psycho, Erik. You have a long history of posting long-winded,
insult-laden posts, criticizing nearly anyone who isn't the perfectionist
you are.
I usually don't read your posts all the way through, I skim them trying to
get the gist. They're extremely difficult to read, both because of the
vehemence and your rhetorical and sarcastic style (which another poster has
recently commented on). As a result, I sometimes get the precise point
that you're commenting on wrong; in this case, you weren't complaining
about the person's grammar itself, just his unwillingness to accept
criticism. Either way, your post was out of line; who are you to tell
someone what education is important for him?
Barry Margolin
>>assures me that _they_ for logical singular dates back
>>to the 14th century, and has been used by a pretty
>>respectable passel of writers from Chaucer and
>>Shakespeare through Austen and Dickens to Shaw and
>>Orwell. Looks pretty "old-school" to me (leading me
>>to wonder when and where in history did people start
>>worrying that _they_ for singular could be
>>wrong).
>
>Hmm. Then is it just the last few decades that
>this usage has been considered incorrect or is
>there any indication that these writers used
>first codified?
First of all, many of those writers wrote in colloquial style. While
Shakespeare's language seems very "literate" to us now, his audience was
common folks and phrases like "how now" were analogous to our "hi". So you
shouldn't look to them for examples of "proper" English.
Second, the rules that English teachers try to enforce are far different
from what is acceptable colloquially. Someone else mentioned Latin, and
most of the formal rules are in fact based on the Latin derivation of
English grammar. For instance, the rule about not splitting infinitives
comes from the fact that infinitives in Latin (and the romance languages
that came from it) are a single word, hence not splittable at all; yet in
common speech, this rule is almost universally ignored (e.g. "To boldly go
where no man has gone before"). The rule about not ending a sentence with
a preposition probably has a similar source (from what French I remember, I
can't imagine ending a sentence with "de" or "avec"), yet following it in
English usually results in constructions that most people consider awkward
(phrases like "with which"); Strunk and White's recommendation to use
active sentences rather than passive ones gets around the problem in
written English, but when speaking, the passive mode frequently results
from the train of thought.
The English teaching profession is extremely conservative about accepting
changes to what they consider "proper". They see grammar as prescriptive,
rather than descriptive, so they stick with the same rules they've been
forcing into children's heads for decades. So, despite what common
practice in spoken language is, they'll keep taking points off when kids
turn in papers that use "they" as the gender-neutral pronoun or split
infinitives. And editors of books, magazines, and newspapers, not wishing
to appear illiterate, will keep enforcing those rules on their writers. As
a result, there's a feedback system that keeps those rules in place,
regardless of what's happening in the "real world".
Barry Margolin
That one probably comes from the fact that the company name, which should
be treated as an aggregate and hence take singular verbs, is actually
written as a plural noun ("microsystems" rather than "microsystem"); once
they've used the plural word, the brain automatically uses the plural form
of the verb. But if someone refers to them simply as "Sun", I expect
they'll use the singular form more often.
Johan Kullstam
> In article <y16og2h...@glug.org>, thi <t...@glug.org> wrote:
> >Tim Bradshaw <t...@cley.com> writes:
> >
> >> prestigious dialect (English, home counties, private school, country
> >
> >*bing* (sound of lightbulb): is this related to other singular-plural
> >localisms? to me the sentence "sun microsystems have released a chip"
> >sounds odd (i would use "has") but apparently this is the norm for many.
>
> That one probably comes from the fact that the company name, which should
> be treated as an aggregate and hence take singular verbs, is actually
> written as a plural noun ("microsystems" rather than "microsystem"); once
> they've used the plural word, the brain automatically uses the plural form
> of the verb. But if someone refers to them simply as "Sun", I expect
> they'll use the singular form more often.
i think this is just a british style. any group is considered plural
even if the name looks singular. thus brits will say "pink floyd are
on tour," and such.
--
J o h a n K u l l s t a m
[kull...@ne.mediaone.net]
Don't Fear the Penguin!
Erik Naggum
| Everytime you throw an insulting remark, it usually
| applies to you as well. So I save time and bounce it
| back to you.
But then you are _admitting_ it applies to you when you bounce it
back! I didn't realize that you implicitly accept that the "insult"
is received and understood and accepted as applying to you when you
think it's a good idea to bounce it. How interesting that you
actually take the "insults" personally, after all. I really had no
idea. It looked you were this incredible moron who could barely
rephrase sentences and not understand, appreciate, or assimilate
anything, yet now you're saying that you actually get the picture!
| Yet everytime you get challenged, you issue random insults,
| disguised under rhetorical conditions and points. I never argue
| that I'm right anyways, not on newsgroups.
That's good, because now is another case of you being dead wrong.
Erik Naggum
| *bing* (sound of lightbulb): is this related to other singular-plural
| localisms? to me the sentence "sun microsystems have released a chip"
| sounds odd (i would use "has") but apparently this is the norm for many.
One of the first things you learn when you try to figure out what's
wrong with British Englishน, aside from misspelling -ize as -ise, is
that the British see plurals a in unexpected places. The British
are more true to the _lexical_ plural in their grammar. Americans
consider named groups a singular and have a much more abstract
understanding of how plural forms really are singular referents.
American English also tends to omit words more than British, and
this means you end up with grammatical forms that are valid only
_after_ the omitted words have been reintroduced. In British, it
seems the grammar applies to the remaining words, even though it
makes no sense with the omitted words reinstated.
One of the reasons I decided against British was that it was much
too rule-based and irrational at the same time: rules applied to
situations that clearly were mistakes, but in Britain, if a mistake
is old enough, it's just relabeled a "tradition". American English
cleaned up a lot of this historical garbage, in great part thanks to
the amazing work of Noah Webster. The British, of course, regard
this as "colonialisms" and are therefore prevented from learning
from Americans. One could almost mistake them for being French.
#:Erik
-------
น a.k.a. "how it differs from American English"
Erik Naggum
| Yes, there was actual criticism. Not of grammar, but of the poster's
| intelligence. If anything, that's worse!
That may be so, but you _actually_ posted an accusation that I had
dished out spelling and grammar flames. Do you remember this?
BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't
ordinarily post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that
spelling/grammar correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it out,
you'd better be able to take it.
You seem to be realizing that this was a lie, and I'm happy that you
do so, but you should be both brave and honest enough to say it out
loud and admit being a psychotic liar, Barry Margolin, because you
can't even see what's actually there.
| As a result, I sometimes get the precise point that you're
| commenting on wrong; in this case, you weren't complaining about the
| person's grammar itself, just his unwillingness to accept criticism.
No. Even that is wrong. I was critizing his use of the extremely
invalid "argument": "if you aren't perfect in <my language>, don't
criticize people writing in <your language>", where the person who
wrote this was German and hence wanted to silence all criticism of
those who didn't know German and English equally well. How stupid!
#:Erik
Barry Margolin
>* Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>| Yes, there was actual criticism. Not of grammar, but of the poster's
>| intelligence. If anything, that's worse!
>
> That may be so, but you _actually_ posted an accusation that I had
> dished out spelling and grammar flames. Do you remember this?
>
>BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't
>ordinarily post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that
>spelling/grammar correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it out,
>you'd better be able to take it.
Yes, I remember this. I have admitted that I misunderstood the precise
point of your post. But it's still the case that you were criticizing
someone for not taking steps to improve their grammar, and you apparently
haven't done so, either. That's what I meant when I said that it's not a
significant difference.
> You seem to be realizing that this was a lie, and I'm happy that you
> do so, but you should be both brave and honest enough to say it out
> loud and admit being a psychotic liar, Barry Margolin, because you
> can't even see what's actually there.
>
>| As a result, I sometimes get the precise point that you're
>| commenting on wrong; in this case, you weren't complaining about the
>| person's grammar itself, just his unwillingness to accept criticism.
>
> No. Even that is wrong. I was critizing his use of the extremely
> invalid "argument": "if you aren't perfect in <my language>, don't
> criticize people writing in <your language>", where the person who
> wrote this was German and hence wanted to silence all criticism of
> those who didn't know German and English equally well. How stupid!
That's not how I interpret such an argument. You read things too literally
(unfortunately, this is a problem of many denizens of Usenet newsgroups --
I've lost track of the many times when someone used the word "all",
obviously intending it as a hyperbole, and some anal retentive felt it
necessary to point out that there are exceptions).
IMHO, he was simply pointing out that he doesn't go around criticizing the
German of non-native German speakers, and he would appreciate the same
consideration of his handicap in English. This is a variant of the Golden
Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
You take this simple rhetorical remark, and turn it around to insult his
intelligence because he's not interested in hearing criticism of his
English from people who have no right to provide it. Like I said, you're
the psychotic -- you do things like this all the time to people in this
newsgroup. I'm sure I could find dozens of examples in deja.com, but I
really don't feel like doing all that work (there's no obvious keywords to
search for, so I'd have to read through all your posts, and you're quite
prolific). Furthermore, I doubt it's really necesary, as I believe that
other long-time regulars in the group will support my subjective claim.
You're obviously an intelligent person, Erik, but your frequent need to
belittle people suggests an emotional problem. But I'm not a psychologist,
that's just my lay opinion. Perhaps in person you're a nice guy -- it's
well documented that people display different personalities on line and in
real life. However, based on the impressions we've formed of each other
here, I doubt either of us will ever go out of our way to meet the other.
Kent M Pitman
I just heard the radio newscaster reading a story that ended
approximately like the following:
[... stuff about Massachusetts drivers being the safest in the
nation ...] The reason for this? Well, Massachusetts drivers drive
slower than drivers elsewhere in the nation, so they have less fatal
accidents. ^^^^
Barry Margolin
Which makes me think of "The Princess Bride": our accident victims are only
"mostly dead".
I wonder how far off-topic we can possibly get due to this. Well, anything
is more fun than continuing the Erik-barmar flamewar.
Tim Bradshaw
> One of the reasons I decided against British was that it was much
> too rule-based and irrational at the same time: rules applied to
> situations that clearly were mistakes, but in Britain, if a mistake
> is old enough, it's just relabeled a "tradition". American English
> cleaned up a lot of this historical garbage, in great part thanks to
> the amazing work of Noah Webster. The British, of course, regard
> this as "colonialisms" and are therefore prevented from learning
> from Americans. One could almost mistake them for being French.
We could never *really* be mistaken for the French. The French have
made the fatal decision of trying to codify their rules so anyone can
speak good French, whereas the British have carefully avoided writing
anything down, thus ensuring that the correct use of the language can
be used as an indicator of one's social background.
Seriously, I disagree at some level that human language can have
`rules which are mistakes', but I know what you mean -- things like
split infinitives are classic examples (does this rule exist in the US
too?).
I think the use of `they' is another one -- the rule makers hark on
about how you can't have a plural pronoun with a singular referent,
despite established usage (in Britain) both for `they' used in this
way and, in fact, for `you' -- should we go back to `thou'? So
successful have they been that the people who use `they' in this way
for hundreds of years are now dismissed as `PC'.
It may be that underlying this is the wish of the rule makers to make
English seem like Latin. I don't know if Latin can use plural
pronouns with singular referents in this way, but since both French
(vous / tu) and German (Sie / Du) do so, then if Latin doesn't then I
know what the rule makers would have chosen as their rule.
--tim
FM
>| Everytime you throw an insulting remark, it usually
>| applies to you as well. So I save time and bounce it
>| back to you.
> But then you are _admitting_ it applies to you when you bounce it
> back! I didn't realize that you implicitly accept that the "insult"
> is received and understood and accepted as applying to you when you
> think it's a good idea to bounce it. How interesting that you
> actually take the "insults" personally, after all. I really had no
> idea. It looked you were this incredible moron who could barely
> rephrase sentences and not understand, appreciate, or assimilate
> anything, yet now you're saying that you actually get the picture!
For some reason, in your world, if you decide to
insult someone, either he accepts the insult (in
case you're right) or doesn't understand it (in
which case *he* is a moron). And for the last time,
stop harrassing me via email. It get old pretty
quickly.
> That's good, because now is another case of you being dead wrong.
On the other hand, you argue that other people are
wrong, unintelligent, and etc, despite absolutely
no evidence in your favor.
Christopher Browne
>* Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>| BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't ordinarily
>| post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that spelling/grammar
>| correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it out, you'd better be able
>| to take it.
>
> did I "dish out" any spelling/grammar corrections? Please feel free
> to post as many message-IDs as you can possibly find.
When you start getting involved in a "spelling/grammar correction"
thread, that means jumping down the slippery slope that leads to
people getting more and more picky about spelling and grammar.
Where you get "psychotic prejudice" from is not clear.
> Your hatred blinds you, Barry. Just open your eyes and stop hating.
> It'll do any other remaining mental processes of yours a world of
> good, too.
Perhaps he hates you, or perhaps _you're_ the one in a blind fury
about this. His comment about you seemed to me to be a relatively
minor "aside."
It seems like quite a leap for you to jump to accusative phrases like:
"Is this your psychotic prejudice running amuck again?"
"Your hatred blinds you"
"You're so overpowered by your hatred"
Such comments seem to point in a rather different direction than to
the conclusion that _Barry_ is filled with blind hatred. They seem
suggestive of hatred residing elsewhere.
--
(concatenate 'string "cbbrowne" "@" "hex.net")
<http://www.hex.net/~cbbrowne/>
"Perfection is reached, not when is nothing more to add, but when
there is nothing more to take away." -- Antoine de Sainte Exupery.
Erik Naggum
| For some reason, in your world, if you decide to insult someone,
| either he accepts the insult (in case you're right) or doesn't
| understand it (in which case *he* is a moron).
Why do you keep making so many moronic statements about "my world"
and the like when you are so upset about the lack of supposed
evidence in my judgement? You are _providing_ me with such evidence
when you post such drivel.
| And for the last time, stop harrassing me via email. It get old
| pretty quickly.
I tried to talk to you without the burden of public exposure, but
your hostility was impenetrable, so I think it's fair to say that
the harrassment was from you to me, especially since you kept
insulting me no matter what I tried to calm you down. More
evidence, since you bring that up.
| On the other hand, you argue that other people are wrong,
| unintelligent, and etc, despite absolutely no evidence in your
| favor.
On the contrary, the morons provide me with ample amounts of
evidence, such as you do yourself. Congratulations!
Erik Naggum
| But it's still the case that you were criticizing someone for not
| taking steps to improve their grammar
No. I understand it's hard for you, but could you _please_ pay a
little attention when you want to keep telling me what I do? I did
not do what you malevolentely "interpret" me to have said, here.
Do you understand the difference between criticizing some person A
who has unfairly criticized some person B, and agreeing with person
B or whatever his messages was? I don't think you grasp the concept
of justice, Barry, or if you do, however unlikely, you have set out
to apply injustice on purpose. In brief, justice means the ability
to judge action without judging person. In this case, it is unfair
to criticize someone for over-interpreting the "can't stand it" the
way that German dude did, and I reserve the right to point that out,
without some dumbfuck like yourself telling me I agree with the
_over-interpretation_, of all things.
You never have managed to make that distinction in dealing with me,
and I doubt that you are so unintelligent that it isn't on purpose.
You continue to act as if your transgressions are perfectly OK
because you _feel_ justified by that hatred of yours. You continue
to believe that false accusations can get you anything, too.
You are amazingly willing to find positive, kind "interpretations"
of everyone but me, and this has been evident for years. I fail to
see what you gain in your sugar-coating whatever I criticize, except
for a very good way of expressing your hatred. Joe Random USENET
reader doesn't pay too much attention, so the lop-sided way you
"interpret" and see what isn't there goes unnoticed, and as long as
meny people think everything is OK if it's said with nice words, you
can look like this saint, but the way you will always exaggerate
what I do in the most negative direction possible and likewise
exaggerate what whoever you consider my victims do in the most
positive direction possible, is significant evidence of hatred at
work.
| That's not how I interpret such an argument.
Of course it isn't. If you understood what people said that I have
critized, you wouldn't have a case.
| You read things too literally ...
Really? As opposed to your "interpretations" all over the place?
| IMHO, he was simply pointing out that he doesn't go around
| criticizing the German of non-native German speakers, and he would
| appreciate the same consideration of his handicap in English.
Hello? Attention-deficit problems again? Listen carefully, Barry!
The person who used "less" instead of "fewer" in the header WAS NOT
German. Both the person who criticized and the person who used
"less" were native speakers. Moreover, the criticism was clearly
not of any _person_ (despite your predilection to think everything
has to be about people), but of a _phenomenon_.
So what has German to do with this at all? _NOTHING_
Nobody with a German "handicap" were corrected, Barry. The
comparison to German handicaps was completely uncalled-for,
irrelevant, and pointless.
| You take this simple rhetorical remark, and turn it around to insult
| his intelligence because he's not interested in hearing criticism of
| his English from people who have no right to provide it.
Wrong. This is so fucking _warped_! Only a severe psychosis could
ever come up with something so far from observable reality. The
record is there, Barry. Pay some attention to it if you want to
criticize and blame people for any wrong-doing!
It was _stupid_ to make the argument that was made, because it had
no place whatsoever in relation to what did in fact transpire. If
there were any intelligences insulted, it was _not_ because of the
surface stupidity that you see, but because the argument is a false
accusation, precisely of having attacked someone with a handicap,
which did _not_ happen, but you don't see them as bad because they
are not even wrong in your view of "justice".
| Furthermore, I doubt it's really necesary, as I believe that other
| long-time regulars in the group will support my subjective claim.
Oh, Christ, appeal to popularity, too! How low can you sink?
| You're obviously an intelligent person, Erik, but your frequent need
| to belittle people suggests an emotional problem.
I don't belittle people, OK? PAY ATTENTION IF YOU WANT TO CRITICIZE!
It is not my problem that you can't distinguish action and person,
but if you could at least make a mental note that you are wrong in
your "interpretation" so we could avoid doing this thing every time
you blow your hatchet because of something that isn't there, we
could have some peaceful coexistence, at least. As long as you keep
doing your insane stunt with "interpreting" things, is it to avoid
that "take it literally" error?, and you get it so amazingly wrong,
it _has_ to be corrected, and I do have a right to correct you when
you false accuse or anyone else of wrongdoing, regardless of how
many would "support" you in your false accusations.
At worst, I'm belittle the _role_ people choose to act on the Net.
They can choose another role. They can choose to act differently.
If I were belittling people, my criticism wouldn't stop if they
changed their actions. The fact is, I do. You, however, don't even
_allow_ me to have other roles than your psychotic vision, but will
attribute malice to me based on your one-dimensional interpretation
of _me_.
If people _feel_ belittled, that's no surprise, however -- I usually
flame those who don't want to pay attention, be careful, or think,
and if you don't want to think, you probably don't introspect enough
to realize what's being criticzed, either. Take you, for instance.
Yet, suppose for the sake of argument tha there is an emotional
problem: Why do you go out of your way to beat and harrass someone
who has a handicap that you _recognize_? Of course, some random
German with a handicap shouldn't be criticized for his English
mistakes, but it's perfectly OK for you to harrass someone with an
emotional problem? If anything, this would make you even _more_
evil, Barry. Good going!
I don't think a person can learn to pay attention if he doesn't,
unless it is extremely painful not to do it, which would cause most
people to rethink their situation. Of course, the morons would
automatically conclude that they do _nothing_ wrong whatsoever, and
of coruse they can't even figure out what's going on, so they begin
to hurl _personal_ accusations, and that's when the flames begin.
You're one of the worst to confuse person with action, Barry, and
you have not figured it out in a number of years. What would it
_take_ for you to understand that confusing action with person is
wrong? I don't think you could change that aspect of you, so I just
want you to stop doing what falls natural to you, that is, stop
making false accusations based in your "misunderstandings" and your
unique "interpretations", even though that's how you are.
FM
> Why do you keep making so many moronic statements about "my world"
> and the like when you are so upset about the lack of supposed
> evidence in my judgement?
Because you started? You made this into a flame war.
And *you* also started complaing about my supposed
"guesswork" when you started that one as well. It's
funny how every little thing that I supposedly do
that you complain about applies much better to
yourself. Anyhow, if you start calling someone names
with no justification whatsoever, expect the same and
don't whine like a baby.
> I tried to talk to you without the burden of public exposure,
You mean you sent me an insult-laden email. I have
no desire to exchange emails with a particularly
unpleasant stranger who has proven beyond doubt that
he is a complete waste of time.
> but
> your hostility was impenetrable,
I'll act hostile to any stranger who has the audacity
to do what you did. It's funny that you expect others
not to act hostile when you meticulous spit a
derogatory remark at a regular interval.
> so I think it's fair to say that
> the harrassment was from you to me, especially since you kept
> insulting me no matter what I tried to calm you down. More
> evidence, since you bring that up.
Unless you use insults to calm other people down, the
above is a completely false account of what happened.
In any case, that doesn't change the fact that you
sent an unsolicited email message telling me I'm an
idiot and if that's not an invitation for an email
flame-war, what is? I asked you to stop, yet you have
continued.
> On the contrary, the morons provide me with ample amounts of
> evidence, such as you do yourself. Congratulations!
Here comes another cheap shot.
Lieven Marchand
> We could never *really* be mistaken for the French. The French have
> made the fatal decision of trying to codify their rules so anyone can
> speak good French, whereas the British have carefully avoided writing
> anything down, thus ensuring that the correct use of the language can
> be used as an indicator of one's social background.
>
Someone recently refered me to:
Quirk, Randolph; Greenbaum, Sidney; Leech, Geoffrey; Svartvik,January: _A
Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language_.
Longman, 1985. ISBN: 3-526-51734-7. 1779pp.
That's certainly a lot of pages they avoided writing down.
French is probably a bad example in the sense that it's a very
dualistic language. The language that gets defined by the Academie and
the language actually used are growing apart at an alarming rate. I
speak and read French fairly well but I have an easier time reading
Moliere or Racine than trying to follow the conversation of some
schoolkids in the Brussels subway.
> It may be that underlying this is the wish of the rule makers to make
> English seem like Latin. I don't know if Latin can use plural
> pronouns with singular referents in this way, but since both French
> (vous / tu) and German (Sie / Du) do so, then if Latin doesn't then I
> know what the rule makers would have chosen as their rule.
Latin is inflected so gender/{singular/plural}/case have to
match. They have a "constructio ad sensum" thing that does about the
opposite: letting something that is grammatically singular but
logically plural take plural verbs.
Your French and German examples are not really relevant: vous/Sie are
form of politeness and are not considered plural in these cases. The
same happened in English with thou/you. The fact that people now
consider thou to be a more elevated form has to do with the influence
of the King James Bible that kept the usage alive. Politeness forms
are often unusual irregular. Icelandic has kept the original
Indo-European dualis forms for this.
--
Lieven Marchand <m...@bewoner.dma.be>
Lambda calculus - Call us a mad club
Erik Naggum
| Because you started?
Oh, grow up!
| You made this into a flame war.
No, _wars_ start with the party tha answers fire with fire, and they
stop when one party lays down their weapons.
I find it curious that you have zero introspective ability and don't
even recognize your own part in what's going on, but hide behind
"it's _your_ fault that I'm acting like a bad, bad moron!"
| It's funny how every little thing that I supposedly do that you
| complain about applies much better to yourself.
I wonder if you it is at all possible for you even to think about
any relation to _yourself_, if this game you play with mirrors is no
more than a deeply hysterical defense mechanism without which your
brain would implode and entire psychological infrastructure crumble.
| Anyhow, if you start calling someone names with no justification
| whatsoever, expect the same and don't whine like a baby.
Oh, now I'm "whining like a baby", too. You know, that mirror game
of yours is quite interesting, because clearly you have lost track
of who you're attacking. I'm _not_ the figure in your mirror, OK?
| You mean you sent me an insult-laden email.
No, I actually mean what I say. However, it _is_ clear that you
received it as such because you have lost or never had the ability
to introspect sufficiently to recognize that you didn't _need_ any
contents in any e-mail to be insulted. I could send you an empty
message (not even a subject header), and you would be insulted.
(That's the kind of thing that happened to poor Barry, too, he
doesn't have to see anything bad on my part to see red, my quoting
style is sufficient for him to prejudge my articles. You don't want
to end up like that, do you?) When this happens, when the outside
world no longer has any relevance to your emotions, I have solid
evidence of your mental state, but it _might_ be situational and not
evidence of low intelligence. When you figure out that you are
wholly responsible for your own actions, just like everybody else,
you will feel very ashamed of yourself. I'm only waiting for that.
| I have no desire to exchange emails with a particularly unpleasant
| stranger who has proven beyond doubt that he is a complete waste of
| time.
Thank you for continuing to waste your time here. At least I keep
you off the street and out of other kinds of trouble.
| I'll act hostile to any stranger who has the audacity to do what you
| did.
Suppose you interpret hostility where it wasn't, and you are at
fault for first attack with that justification. How do you expect
that whoever _you_ attack should respond to you? More importantly,
is there at all a way out of your mindless "you started it, so I
have to continue" line? It seems that as long as you continue to
insult and fight, you're keeping this going. You know, it would be
a brilliant move if you suddenly turned into this mature intelligent
being with adult-like features like responsibility and introspection
and you figured out that "hey, I could stop this any time I want".
I'm only waiting for you to realize that. I don't have to insult
you anymore, because you're doing such a marvelous job yourself.
| It's funny that you expect others not to act hostile when you
| meticulous spit a derogatory remark at a regular interval.
Yes, quite funny. I find it quite interesting that _anything_ I say
is interpreted as hostile once the recipient has lost his marbles.
I find it highly informative to sort people out that way, but most
of the people so sorted actually have a flash of insight after a
while and realize exactly what I've done to them. There's a reward
for me at the end of that flash of insight. You seem quite the
resilient dude, though. We've had another figure like here, some
time ago. Obviously not a very bright fellow, either.
| Unless you use insults to calm other people down, the
| above is a completely false account of what happened.
Look, if I said the weather was nice, you would be insulted.
| In any case, that doesn't change the fact that you sent an
| unsolicited email message telling me I'm an idiot and if that's not
| an invitation for an email flame-war, what is? I asked you to stop,
| yet you have continued.
Excuse me?
| > On the contrary, the morons provide me with ample amounts of
| > evidence, such as you do yourself. Congratulations!
|
| Here comes another cheap shot.
Actually, it's true. You don't _have_ to play the role of moron,
but you keep doing it as if you couldn't do anything else -- and
_that's_ what I'm trying to find out. If I were content to brand
you once and for all, like some Barry Margolin, I would have been
done with you once you looked like a moron, and I wouldn't even have
to answer you at all, but I'm trying very hard to make you snap out
of your moron role and realize that you're doing, why you're the one
doing it (as opposed to being done to, or blaming me for it). SO
SNAP OUT OF IT, MORON, and let some other role you can play that is
a little more mature and smarter than you want to look right now get
a word in edgewise, too. OK? Choose some other role. If you don't
(such as because I'm the one telling you to), you're providing me
with evidence that you really _are_ a moron, it's not some role you
have fallen into more or less of your own will. OK?
You see, there's some important stuff you could _learn_ from this,
but you're so dead set on defending _yourself_ that you completely
miss the opportunity to watch yourself in action, and that would be
_very_ educational for you. Trust me. :)
FM
> No, _wars_ start with the party tha answers fire with fire, and they
> stop when one party lays down their weapons.
So first fire is excused?
> I find it curious that you have zero introspective ability
This idiot doesn't even know what introspection means.
There is no way you can be qualified to talk about my
introspective ability when you cannot possibly look
beyond yourself. If I had ample introspective ability,
would I tell you the result of this introspection? This
all comes from your confused belief, or perhaps pretense,
that somehow I have certain problems that you yourself
don't. Or all this is just an attempt to focus attack
on me because you seem so hypocritically unable to have
any focus on you.
>| It's funny how every little thing that I supposedly do that you
>| complain about applies much better to yourself.
> I wonder if you it is at all possible for you even to think about
> any relation to _yourself_, if this game you play with mirrors is no
> more than a deeply hysterical defense mechanism without which your
> brain would implode and entire psychological infrastructure crumble.
You already act as though your brain had imploded. If
it had ever existed.
>| Anyhow, if you start calling someone names with no justification
>| whatsoever, expect the same and don't whine like a baby.
> Oh, now I'm "whining like a baby", too. You know, that mirror game
> of yours is quite interesting, because clearly you have lost track
> of who you're attacking. I'm _not_ the figure in your mirror, OK?
Of course by this "mirror game" you refer to the cycle
where you babble some nonsense and I point out the
hypocrisy in that nonsense by feeding it back to you.
Your attempt to bring in actual "mirror" to augment your
already fragile argument backfires when you consider what
"mirror" represents in your "mirror" game and what
direction it points to.
>| You mean you sent me an insult-laden email.
> No, I actually mean what I say.
Doesn't make it right of course, except in your closed little
mind.
> However, it _is_ clear that you
> received it as such because you have lost or never had the ability
> to introspect sufficiently to recognize that you didn't _need_ any
> contents in any e-mail to be insulted.
Of course none of this is clear unless your ability to
think clearly is completely absent from your brain and
you refer to anything that he can think of as insulting
to someone else as "clear."
> I could send you an empty
> message (not even a subject header), and you would be insulted.
Idiotic guesswork continues.
> When this happens, when the outside
> world no longer has any relevance to your emotions, I have solid
> evidence of your mental state, but it _might_ be situational and not
> evidence of low intelligence.
Solid evidence being your sad imagination of course.
> When you figure out that you are
> wholly responsible for your own actions, just like everybody else,
> you will feel very ashamed of yourself. I'm only waiting for that.
Funny how you forget that you are not responsible for
your own action. It's funny how you consistently direct
insults at people, and when those insults are thrown
back at you, then you cry about "mirror" game and that
"wars start with the party that answers fire with fire"
nonsense.
> Thank you for continuing to waste your time here. At least I keep
> you off the street and out of other kinds of trouble.
More nonsense.
>| I'll act hostile to any stranger who has the audacity to do what you
>| did.
> Suppose you interpret hostility where it wasn't, and you are at
> fault for first attack with that justification.
Unless hostility is so deeply embedded in your psyche
that you don't have to intend it to be clearly present
in your writing.
> How do you expect
> that whoever _you_ attack should respond to you?
Yet a completely different standard applies when you
interpret my writing as hostile.
> More importantly,
> is there at all a way out of your mindless "you started it, so I
> have to continue" line? It seems that as long as you continue to
> insult and fight, you're keeping this going. You know, it would be
> a brilliant move if you suddenly turned into this mature intelligent
> being with adult-like features like responsibility and introspection
> and you figured out that "hey, I could stop this any time I want".
> I'm only waiting for you to realize that. I don't have to insult
> you anymore, because you're doing such a marvelous job yourself.
Why don't YOU stop it? Basically it comes down to you
preaching about things that you don't practice. It only
makes sense that whoever started the fight (insults,
getting personal, and sending personal email, each of
which you started first) has a greater responsibility
to stop.
> Yes, quite funny. I find it quite interesting that _anything_ I say
> is interpreted as hostile once the recipient has lost his marbles.
So comparing my intelligence to that of an animal is not
exhibiting pure hostility, when no such comparison was
reasonable. Of course the above sentence is yet another
example of how you drop hostility into a sentence that
you would claim later as innocent. The pattern is so
apparent that I'd think your own introspection would
reveal it.
> I find it highly informative to sort people out that way, but most
> of the people so sorted actually have a flash of insight after a
> while and realize exactly what I've done to them.
Which is to try and piss them off using time-honored
techniques and then when they get mad and probably use
some of the techniques that you yourself employed to
piss you off, then you point at that as though it proves
your previous insults. Of course your entire strategy
relies on trying to keep the focus on the others by
implying that you are somehow above them. When criticism
is received, you preach self-introspection, with the
pretense that what you do is not subject to criticism.
That's the amusing part: that you now decided to post
nonsense about my introspective ability while calling
what I did "mirror games." Hell, the irony probably
escapes you.
> You seem quite the
> resilient dude, though. We've had another figure like here, some
> time ago. Obviously not a very bright fellow, either.
Of course Erik continues his nonsensical tirade about
how he is perceived as hostile or otherwise bad by
only those lacking mental aptitude. The logic is of
course essentially circular.
> Look, if I said the weather was nice, you would be insulted.
More sloppy guesswork continues. "Since you would be
insulted no matter what I said, the fact tha I insulted
you is immaterial" The amount of BS coming out of you
is quite amazing indeed.
> Actually, it's true. You don't _have_ to play the role of moron,
> but you keep doing it as if you couldn't do anything else -- and
> _that's_ what I'm trying to find out. If I were content to brand
> you once and for all, like some Barry Margolin, I would have been
> done with you once you looked like a moron, and I wouldn't even have
> to answer you at all, but I'm trying very hard to make you snap out
> of your moron role and realize that you're doing, why you're the one
> doing it (as opposed to being done to, or blaming me for it). SO
> SNAP OUT OF IT, MORON, and let some other role you can play that is
> a little more mature and smarter than you want to look right now get
> a word in edgewise, too. OK? Choose some other role. If you don't
> (such as because I'm the one telling you to), you're providing me
> with evidence that you really _are_ a moron, it's not some role you
> have fallen into more or less of your own will. OK?
Oh my god. This self-righteous idiot now acts though he
were both a player and a referee.
> You see, there's some important stuff you could _learn_ from this,
> but you're so dead set on defending _yourself_ that you completely
> miss the opportunity to watch yourself in action, and that would be
> _very_ educational for you. Trust me. :)
I'm not so interested in defending myself as I am in
learning how to piss off other people using carefully
laden insults. I'm not intent on using it myself,
except in extreme occasions, but that's the only thing
that you've shown any competence in. That's also one
thing I'm extremely bad at.
Tim Bradshaw
> Quirk, Randolph; Greenbaum, Sidney; Leech, Geoffrey; Svartvik,January: _A
> Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language_.
> Longman, 1985. ISBN: 3-526-51734-7. 1779pp.
> That's certainly a lot of pages they avoided writing down.
I think I was joking... but the important difference is that no one
tries to *define* English: academics may try to *describe* it as here,
but there's no language standard.
> Your French and German examples are not really relevant: vous/Sie are
> form of politeness and are not considered plural in these cases. The
> same happened in English with thou/you.
They are absolutely relevant: `they' with a singular referent is a
politeness form in English! That was my whole point...
--tim
Erik Naggum
| Erik Naggum <er...@naggum.net> wrote:
|
| > No, _wars_ start with the party tha answers fire with fire, and they
| > stop when one party lays down their weapons.
|
| So first fire is excused?
Is that really your preferred level of abstraction? Is the converse
true, that no matter what you do in response to a real or perceived
aggression, you are excused? Do you _really_ think this way?
Obviously, no, but it doesn't start _wars_. The party that feels or
is attacked has a choice. You had that choice, too. You chose to
make what you perceived as attack into a war by mounting resistance
way out of proportion, and you continue to so. Now you seem to be
unhappy about your choice, but you can still choose! I'm not
generous: My point is to see if you can realize that you had and
still have a choice, and make use of that realization.
I'm also working to break down what I consider the most incredibly
moronic aspect of some cultures: The belief that one loses face or
honor by embracing truth that is obtained from a very reliable,
trustworthy source that is in some other respects disagreeable, for
whatever irrelevant reason to the truth involved. This is probably
a fight like breaking down racism and other moronic group-think
judgments based on irrelevant factors, such as whether the source is
female, or gay.
In fact, I consider someone who has to make up stories about someone
based on _one_ facet he doesn't like, who tries to discredit the
works of someone based on some facet _completely_ irrelevant to the
work, etc, as a person who is even more despicable than a racist,
because the racist at least understands that society rejects his
moronic views. Nothing is worse than such a moron who feels that he
is _justified_ to make broad and sweeping claims about properties of
the person or group irrelevant to the role or work at hand, because
there is nothing that person can learn or even adjust as long as he
feels morally justified to commit the errors he commits.
The false accusation based in such inability to deal with people who
show some unusual, unexpected, or disagreeable aspect or another, is
the ultimate evil expression of the core properties of racism.
But what do people learn? "It's wrong to discriminate based on the
color of a person's skin, but anything else is perfectly legitimate"
describes how a large number of people think, but they haven't
grasped the core idea that produce racism and similar ills, and go
on with their lives, hating whole _persons_ based on some _aspect_
they don't like.
| This idiot doesn't even know what introspection means. There is no
| way you can be qualified to talk about my introspective ability when
| you cannot possibly look beyond yourself.
Introspection, like any other active thought process, has results
that are fairly easy to observe. It is very, very unlikely that a
person who engages in introspection will continue to act as if he
deals with other people's hostility when there _is_ no hostility.
It _is_ very, very unlikely that a person who has worked _himself_
into a mental corner that was never reasonable in the first place,
will back down unless he introspects. And you have done just that:
You have worked yourself up and you continue to be hostile no matter
what. You need to figure that out for yourself, of course, and I
don't think you will. You have invested so much in your idea that
I'm _hostile_ to you that you can't see that even though I'm not
nice to you, I'm not _hostile_, either. However, you missed that
little piece of logic, didn't you? If somebody isn't nice to you,
they must have _some_ amount of hostility. How about indifference?
| You already act as though your brain had imploded. If it had ever
| existed.
Don't you get tired of showing that you can't even invent your own
insults, but have to bounce everything back, just a tad worsened?
You see, every time you respond with something _worse_, you keep the
"war" going. I think you may be an Eliza programmed to keep such
quarrels going, because there's no purpose in your continuing this.
There is for me, of course: I want to see how long it takes you to
wake up and snap out of your moronic, hostile role.
| Of course by this "mirror game" you refer to the cycle where you
| babble some nonsense and I point out the hypocrisy in that nonsense
| by feeding it back to you.
And this is an argument for what? Cut-and-paste-debates? You
really don't believe in the utility of this activity for any other
purpose than to quarrel for the sake of quarreling, do you? If so,
please let me know. It would be illuminating. So far, it looks
like a person at mental age 5 who wants to beat someone, but misses.
| Your attempt to bring in actual "mirror" to augment your already
| fragile argument backfires when you consider what "mirror"
| represents in your "mirror" game and what direction it points to.
It's very important to you that things backfire, so I assume you
have much experience with just that, but in this case, it doesn't do
_you_ any good. (It probably never _did_ you any good, but just
because you might have been harmed by something backfiring doesn't
mean you won't _repeat_ the mistake that caused it to backfire on
you.) It doesn't prove any hypocrisy, it proves that you choose a
role that has the intelligence of a normal 5-year-old. Just choose
another role. (If you don't because _I_ tell you, please say so. I
will consider that the final proof that you really _are_ retarded.)
| > When you figure out that you are wholly responsible for your own
| > actions, just like everybody else, you will feel very ashamed of
| > yourself. I'm only waiting for that.
|
| Funny how you forget that you are not responsible for your own
| action.
Are _you_ exempt from statements _you_ make about "everybody else"?
Is that why you failed to grasp the universality of what I said?
| It's funny how you consistently direct insults at people, and when
| those insults are thrown back at you, then you cry about "mirror"
| game and that "wars start with the party that answers fire with
| fire" nonsense.
Does this imply that you think wars can have only one fighting
party? That quarrels can have only one quarreler? Well, you're
actually doing a pretty good job of providing ammunition for that
argument the way you keep going completely on your own, here.
Does this also imply that you react positively to anything that is
just aped back at you? Would you at all understand that what you do
with this mirror game is moronic no matter what you "throw back"?
If I have not gotten through to you that I don't like people who
choose to act like morons, it must be because you are one, instead.
| > Thank you for continuing to waste your time here. At least I
| > keep you off the street and out of other kinds of trouble.
|
| More nonsense.
Yes, but it's called a "joke". Lighten up any time you want.
| > Suppose you interpret hostility where it wasn't, and you are at
| > fault for first attack with that justification.
|
| Unless hostility is so deeply embedded in your psyche that you don't
| have to intend it to be clearly present in your writing.
You know, when a sentence starts with "suppose", it is customary to
read it as "for the sake of argument, suppose", and it is usually an
attempt to cause you to reexamine your conclusions by altering one
or more of its premises, at least hypothetically. If you just cling
to your conclusion and attack the altered premise, you provide some
evidence of how you think, or, in this case, don't. Being able to
deal with the hypothetical is quite important. When you can't, but
have to defend _yourself_ against the slightest possibility that the
hypothetical might be true (by attacking in response), you prove
that the hypothetical would be dangerous to you if actually true.
If that was all I wanted to know, I'd be very content right now, but
there's more to it: You don't seem to be able to recognize the fact
that _you_ might have started (in your terminology) all this.
Unless you are able to hold that possibility at least slightly open,
you cannot possibly be _justified_ in your hostilities, either,
because you have just made up your mind by rejecting facts before
you came to your conclusion, which means your selectivity denies the
validity of your justification more than anything else, as that is
what you have chosen to act upon. By making up your mind outside of
the facts, you commit the "crime" of over-extending your assumptions.
Some day, you will realize that every communication is a process of
trying to understand what the sender had in mind. If you are dead
certain of the outcome before you even start, you are not really
engaged in the process of communication, but in mindless prejudice,
and hence in starting hostilities _each_ time, because the other
party may have ceased, or never started.
| > How do you expect that whoever _you_ attack should respond to you?
|
| Yet a completely different standard applies when you interpret my
| writing as hostile.
Huh? Do you _have_ to raise the deflector shield to avoid getting a
_single_ clue? Whatever gave you _any_ indication of different
standards? Why are _your_ actions so dependent on what you imagine
that I think or do?
See, this is one of those cases where your comprehension is fueled
by your prejudice so much that you can't even read what I write.
I'm asking you how your "because you started it" defense for _your_
hostility will ever see a cease-fire. What does it take for you to
stop being a hostile moron? Since you're on the verge of being
obsessed about me, which you share with some committed cases: I know
what causes my cease-fires: I don't respond in kind, I don't play
mirror games, and I don't pretend that I'm not fully responsible for
my own actions. My justification is not that you continue, but that
I want to see how long it takes for you to realize that you are no
longer dealing with a hostile partner. Hence, no direct insults of
your intelligence, as you manage that very well on your own, no need
to broaden the context, as you drag in so much that I don't have to.
| Basically it comes down to you preaching about things that you don't
| practice.
That could have been true if you understood what I was preaching,
but since you don't, yet, it's only a stupid insult. Quit that.
| So comparing my intelligence to that of an animal is not exhibiting
| pure hostility, when no such comparison was reasonable.
It's hostile to the role you have chosen to play, but that's your
choice. If you make another choice, there may be no, less, or more
hostility depending on fairly well-understood parameters. As long
as you do not snap out of your role, you provide evidence that you
can only play one role, of the "be yourself" kind, which never has
been true of anyone, incidentally.
| Which is to try and piss them off using time-honored techniques and
| then when they get mad and probably use some of the techniques that
| you yourself employed to piss you off, then you point at that as
| though it proves your previous insults.
No. You miss the point completely. I tend to say things that
pisses _some_ people off whether I intend it or not, whether other
people find it offensive or not, whether any other person would be
pissed off, usually because it's true and they want it untold.
There's always _someone_ out there who can't handle contrary
experiences, information, or opinions, no matter _how_ it is
expressed. The only way to learn, which is what all this started
with, is to actively seek experience, information, and opinions that
runs counter to your own. Some people are completely inept at this
task and never actually _learn_, they _repeat_ and they live in a
cut-and-paste reality, essentially the same from day to day, where
change means threat. I have a _very_ low opinion of that mode of
living.
However, when someone who reacts with hostility to something I say
go out of their way to talk about stuff they have no possible way to
know even if it were true, solely for the purpose of venting spleen
and hostility, _then_ I have proof of their lack of mental acuity
and then I say just that, which pisses some people off tremendously
instead of recognizing that they did something that caused someone
to draw that conclusion and do something else so they could conclude
something else, too. Considering that it is impossible to judge
anyone on the Net except from what they write, and considering that
writing is a supremely _conscious_ effort, all I do is make people
fully aware that if they _choose_ to act like morons who prove that
they can't do anything else, it's their own responsibility. Most
people don't like to take responsibility for their actions at all.
Growing up past childhood is so hard in a society that is obsessing
about the merits of youth and which denigrates age and experience.
However, these few paragraphs where you seem to try to grapple with
what you think I do is at least a step in the right direction.
| Of course your entire strategy relies on trying to keep the focus on
| the others by implying that you are somehow above them.
No. Again you miss the point. Just because you feel inferior
doesn't mean that anyone else feels superior or wants to. I don't
believe in being "above" people. I believe in being "above" both
acts and situations. People don't come in rankable qualities. What
they choose to act like and otherwise do, does, of course.
| When criticism is received, you preach self-introspection, with the
| pretense that what you do is not subject to criticism.
No. There is nothing in what I say that defends this conclusion.
It is, however, quite common for people who think _themselves_
exempt from statements they make about others in general to believe
that others suffer from the same extremely unintelligent attitude.
Since this is quite common in Christian cultures, and nowhere else
to my knowledge, it ought to be broken down because it's _wrong_.
| That's the amusing part: that you now decided to post nonsense about
| my introspective ability while calling what I did "mirror games."
| Hell, the irony probably escapes you.
Not at all, but I'm not sure you see that there is more than one
target for that irony.
| Of course Erik continues his nonsensical tirade about how he is
| perceived as hostile or otherwise bad by only those lacking mental
| aptitude. The logic is of course essentially circular.
Really? _Circular_? You have to explain that one. I may well piss
off people who have a reasonable mental aptitude, but they have the
smarts not to start _quarreling_ over some petty details. It is
quite possible to respond to what you find valuable, not only to
what you find objectionable. When you ignore the signal and latch
onto the noise, that's a sign of low intelligence and inability to
cope. When you can filter out the noise and pay attention to the
signal, that's a sign of high intelligence and ability to cope. You
have made your choice _quite_ exceptionally clear.
| > Look, if I said the weather was nice, you would be insulted.
|
| More sloppy guesswork continues.
No, just more jokes at your expense. Here's a hint for you: If you
think you can use irony and accuse me of not getting it, would it
not be _very_ smart of you to actually _get_ my jokes at you, too?
| Oh my god. This self-righteous idiot now acts though he were both a
| player and a referee.
"Choose some less moronic role!" "No, I _want_ to be a moron!"
You prove my earlier point, excellently: That you cannot learn from
someone who isn't _nice_ to you. Hell, I don't think you learn, I
think you parrot and repeat what you've heard, just like the mirror
game that shows zero creativity. Just because I say it doesn't mean
it isn't true, you know. Just because it hurts like hell doesn't
mean you shouldn't take it seriously and adjust your act accordingly.
However, _some_ people get into this role where they have only one
thought: That the other guy must stop hurting them. Many criminals
get into that role relative to the justice system and police.
Note the important distinction between reactions based on action and
reactions based on person: If you realize that you could change your
actions and the reactions would stop, you'd have to be pretty damn
stupid not to change your actions, but if the reation is based on
person, there is nothing you could do to make the "reactions" stop,
like false accusations, racism ("driving while colored" comes to
mind), etc, there is grounds to fault the other party exclusively.
| ... but that's the only thing that you've shown any competence in.
Well, not quite. But it serves my purpose to have retards like you
post such broad statements. I find it very instructive to watch
people who _prove_ that they are extremely one-dimensional. I don't
yet understand what makes people who are so one-dimensional able to
work in such a complex society as ours, but it is obviously possible
to be devoid of essential mental abilities and still survive in a
high technology society where people of all kinds and habits will
have to work together and meet.
One would have thought that the new modes of communication would let
people realize that they don't have to deal with the _entire_ person,
but some people really are so people-oriented that they cannot even
deal with electronic text without imagining and fighting a complete
person entirely of their own creation, instead of a very limited
role that does not have to get into their lives or on their nerves.
FM
> Is that really your preferred level of abstraction? Is the converse
> true, that no matter what you do in response to a real or perceived
> aggression, you are excused? Do you _really_ think this way?
A strawman.
> I'm also working to break down what I consider the most incredibly
> moronic aspect of some cultures: The belief that one loses face or
> honor by embracing truth that is obtained from a very reliable,
> trustworthy source that is in some other respects disagreeable, for
> whatever irrelevant reason to the truth involved.
Whenever one's beliefs or thoughts are not accepted,
it is often the case that he attributes the rejection
to something outside their own merit.
> In fact, I consider someone who has to make up stories about someone
> based on _one_ facet he doesn't like, who tries to discredit the
> works of someone based on some facet _completely_ irrelevant to the
> work, etc, as a person who is even more despicable than a racist,
> because the racist at least understands that society rejects his
> moronic views. Nothing is worse than such a moron who feels that he
> is _justified_ to make broad and sweeping claims about properties of
> the person or group irrelevant to the role or work at hand, because
> there is nothing that person can learn or even adjust as long as he
> feels morally justified to commit the errors he commits.
Only a moron would criticize broad and sweeping claims
about properties of the person or group and then go on
to make sweeping claims about human nature in general.
> The false accusation based in such inability to deal with people who
> show some unusual, unexpected, or disagreeable aspect or another, is
> the ultimate evil expression of the core properties of racism.
Another analogy that not only is completely out of
touch with reality but completely irrelevant to the
issue at hand. What makes racism bad? Is it because
the thought process that causes it or its
consequences?
> But what do people learn? "It's wrong to discriminate based on the
> color of a person's skin, but anything else is perfectly legitimate"
> describes how a large number of people think, but they haven't
> grasped the core idea that produce racism and similar ills, and go
> on with their lives, hating whole _persons_ based on some _aspect_
> they don't like.
More nonsense continues. It is quite ironic when one
who takes a public discussion into personal realms
then proceeds to complain about hatred of people as
opposed to their certain aspects.
>| This idiot doesn't even know what introspection means. There is no
>| way you can be qualified to talk about my introspective ability when
>| you cannot possibly look beyond yourself.
> Introspection, like any other active thought process, has results
> that are fairly easy to observe.
If one allows so. It's not too hard to grasp the fact
that one with a superior introspective ability needs not
show his own introspection at all.
> It is very, very unlikely that a
> person who engages in introspection will continue to act as if he
> deals with other people's hostility when there _is_ no hostility.
If one is pretentious enough to judge other people's
perception of himself, while holding his own pereception
as objective.
>| Of course by this "mirror game" you refer to the cycle where you
>| babble some nonsense and I point out the hypocrisy in that nonsense
>| by feeding it back to you.
> And this is an argument for what? Cut-and-paste-debates? You
> really don't believe in the utility of this activity for any other
> purpose than to quarrel for the sake of quarreling, do you? If so,
> please let me know. It would be illuminating. So far, it looks
> like a person at mental age 5 who wants to beat someone, but misses.
You miss the connection or near identity between the
two flaming strategies.
> Are _you_ exempt from statements _you_ make about "everybody else"?
> Is that why you failed to grasp the universality of what I said?
Those with exuberance to speak but without intelligence
to back up often think their beliefs apply further than
their merit warrants. In their zeal they forget that
those are mere conclusions from the particulars or
cliched proverbs.
>| It's funny how you consistently direct insults at people, and when
>| those insults are thrown back at you, then you cry about "mirror"
>| game and that "wars start with the party that answers fire with
>| fire" nonsense.
> Does this imply that you think wars can have only one fighting
> party?
It is nevertheless nonsensical to suggest that the first
party to fire is less responsible for the damage.
> Some day, you will realize that every communication is a process of
> trying to understand what the sender had in mind. If you are dead
> certain of the outcome before you even start, you are not really
> engaged in the process of communication, but in mindless prejudice,
> and hence in starting hostilities _each_ time, because the other
> party may have ceased, or never started.
Some people are obssessed about other people's bias and
their own objectivity to a great extent.
> No. You miss the point completely. I tend to say things that
> pisses _some_ people off whether I intend it or not, whether other
> people find it offensive or not, whether any other person would be
> pissed off, usually because it's true and they want it untold.
One's convinction in his belief doesn't equal truth.
> There's always _someone_ out there who can't handle contrary
> experiences, information, or opinions, no matter _how_ it is
> expressed.
There are also people who reply all disagreements with
personal attacks, some portion of whom are actually
able to learn from these disagreements.
> The only way to learn, which is what all this started
> with, is to actively seek experience, information, and opinions that
> runs counter to your own.
Your definition of learning needs more work or some
clarification.
> Some people are completely inept at this
> task and never actually _learn_, they _repeat_ and they live in a
> cut-and-paste reality, essentially the same from day to day, where
> change means threat. I have a _very_ low opinion of that mode of
> living.
I'm about as far away from that as one can be, but
in any case, one's low opinion of a certain mode of
living doesn't make it undesirable to others.
> However, when someone who reacts with hostility to something I say
> go out of their way to talk about stuff they have no possible way to
> know even if it were true, solely for the purpose of venting spleen
> and hostility, _then_ I have proof of their lack of mental acuity
> and then I say just that, which pisses some people off tremendously
> instead of recognizing that they did something that caused someone
> to draw that conclusion and do something else so they could conclude
> something else, too. Considering that it is impossible to judge
> anyone on the Net except from what they write, and considering that
> writing is a supremely _conscious_ effort, all I do is make people
> fully aware that if they _choose_ to act like morons who prove that
> they can't do anything else, it's their own responsibility. Most
> people don't like to take responsibility for their actions at all.
Unfortunately, no one is free from biases that could
cloud their judgements. With that in mind, it is
extremely pretentious to declare your own biased
judgements and not expect them to be taken with offense.
It is also foolhardy to judge other people's reactions
as "hostile" while at the same time arguing that they
are interpreting "hostility" where there isn't.
> Growing up past childhood is so hard in a society that is obsessing
> about the merits of youth and which denigrates age and experience.
What "society" do you speak of here? I see the above
as a quite broad and sweeping generalization that is
unwarranted from your level of experience, especially
if you intended that I be part of that generalization.
> Since this is quite common in Christian cultures, and nowhere else
> to my knowledge, it ought to be broken down because it's _wrong_.
Christian cultures? Considering your entire philosophy
(Enlightment - Neo-classicism - Rationalism) seems to have
grown out of places where Christianity was the dominant
religion, I'm not sure what your quibbles are. And I
highly doubt your ability to judge "Christian cultures"
outside of the Western world.
>| Of course Erik continues his nonsensical tirade about how he is
>| perceived as hostile or otherwise bad by only those lacking mental
>| aptitude. The logic is of course essentially circular.
> Really? _Circular_? You have to explain that one. I may well piss
> off people who have a reasonable mental aptitude, but they have the
> smarts not to start _quarreling_ over some petty details.
The "circular" aspect of this logic that if one defines
"mental inaptitude" as "not having enough intelligence
to ignore my insults and remain calm" then your claim
is self-serving.
>| > Look, if I said the weather was nice, you would be insulted.
>| More sloppy guesswork continues.
> No, just more jokes at your expense. Here's a hint for you: If you
> think you can use irony and accuse me of not getting it, would it
> not be _very_ smart of you to actually _get_ my jokes at you, too?
Jokes are intended to be funny. There is nothing in the
above so-called "joke" that is particularly insightful
or funny. Besides, you have elaborated the point enough
that any possible surprises had already been lost.
> "Choose some less moronic role!" "No, I _want_ to be a moron!"
Your role-playing game is probably amusing to you.
> You prove my earlier point, excellently: That you cannot learn from
> someone who isn't _nice_ to you. Hell, I don't think you learn, I
> think you parrot and repeat what you've heard, just like the mirror
> game that shows zero creativity.
Your definition of "learn" needs serious revision.
> Just because I say it doesn't mean
> it isn't true, you know.
Though for some people, that the statement came from themselves
is sufficient enough proof of it truthfulness.
> Note the important distinction between reactions based on action and
> reactions based on person: If you realize that you could change your
> actions and the reactions would stop, you'd have to be pretty damn
> stupid not to change your actions, but if the reation is based on
> person, there is nothing you could do to make the "reactions" stop,
> like false accusations, racism ("driving while colored" comes to
> mind), etc, there is grounds to fault the other party exclusively.
Where are you getting the quote from?
> Well, not quite. But it serves my purpose to have retards like you
> post such broad statements. I find it very instructive to watch
> people who _prove_ that they are extremely one-dimensional. I don't
> yet understand what makes people who are so one-dimensional able to
> work in such a complex society as ours, but it is obviously possible
> to be devoid of essential mental abilities and still survive in a
> high technology society where people of all kinds and habits will
> have to work together and meet.
I find it highly amusing that some people apparently
find themselves capable of judging and labeling people
as "retards" and "one-dimensional" while holding others'
perception as apart from the reality. Often to those
people, their own beliefs are somehow self-evident and
need not be explained, whereas anything contrary can
be dismissed on the grounds of absurdity.
> One would have thought that the new modes of communication would let
> people realize that they don't have to deal with the _entire_ person,
> but some people really are so people-oriented that they cannot even
> deal with electronic text without imagining and fighting a complete
> person entirely of their own creation, instead of a very limited
> role that does not have to get into their lives or on their nerves.
Is it any surprise that the more some people complain
about others taking them personally, the more personally
involved they are, often to the point where they feel
compelled to use "personal" communication means?
Barry Margolin
> I don't belittle people, OK? PAY ATTENTION IF YOU WANT TO CRITICIZE!
Accusing someone of having a "dysfunctional brain" isn't belittling them?
Unless the person has a clinical mental deficiency (a fact that I don't
think any of us are privy to about most other posters), this is clearly
intended as an insult.
I haven't read most of the rest of your posting, I skimmed it looking for
key sentences. As I've said, your rants are much too long-winded for me to
bear in full.
Erik Naggum
| Accusing someone of having a "dysfunctional brain" isn't belittling them?
You might as well admit that you belittle people, too, and stop
being so hypocritical about it. If you have an argument, it's one
of different styles or different quantities, not about the concept.
| I haven't read most of the rest of your posting, I skimmed it
| looking for key sentences. As I've said, your rants are much too
| long-winded for me to bear in full.
What I really don't understand is why you can "bear" just looking
for "key sentences" and base your conclusions on that. Unless, of
course, you really _want_ to remain a prejudicial hateful bigot.
Another option is to relieve yourself of reading my articles at all.
I'm against kill-files as a policy, but I would much prefer it if I
knew that what I wrote would not benefit you, either, because you
have shown that you can't even "bear" to credit me when it does.
Barry Margolin
> What I really don't understand is why you can "bear" just looking
> for "key sentences" and base your conclusions on that.
It's a compromise. I try to read your messages, but sometimes they go on
and on and I give up. I make conclusions based on what I got through, on
the assumption that they're representative.
If I were the only one complaining, I might conclude that I alone am being
unfair. But since other people have had similar reactions to your posts, I
doubt I'm far off the mark, despite only skimming your messages.
Why do I read your messages at all? Because when you're posting on
technical matters, they're usually quite interesting. It's only when you
start insulting the posters to whom you're replying that you become
unreadable. But it's not possible to tell from the headers which type of
message it will be.
Erik Naggum
| It's a compromise. I try to read your messages, but sometimes they go on
| and on and I give up. I make conclusions based on what I got through, on
| the assumption that they're representative.
What would it _take_ for you to figure out that you get it wrong?
We've been through this, what? 5 times? Geez, Barry, if you still
think you get it right after this many ugly fights, I _pity_ you.
| If I were the only one complaining, I might conclude that I alone am
| being unfair. But since other people have had similar reactions to
| your posts, I doubt I'm far off the mark, despite only skimming your
| messages.
Then what does the world in general _need_ your particularly unfair
contribution for? Surely someone else can do the complaining and
your false accusations could be avoided.
| Why do I read your messages at all? Because when you're posting on
| technical matters, they're usually quite interesting.
Well, I appreciate this, but the way you've been harrassing me with
your false accusations, I really wish you didn't have _any_ reason
to say anything about what I post at all, positive __or negative.
| It's only when you start insulting the posters to whom you're
| replying that you become unreadable. But it's not possible to tell
| from the headers which type of message it will be.
Yes, it is. You just need to figure it out. It isn't even hard.
Barry Margolin
>* Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>| replying that you become unreadable. But it's not possible to tell
>| from the headers which type of message it will be.
>
> Yes, it is. You just need to figure it out. It isn't even hard.
I must be a hateful idiot, so please, enlighten me. How can I tell before
reading a message whether it contains an abusive rant or an interesting
technical contribution?
Larry Elmore
news:31764691...@naggum.net...
> * Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>
> | > I don't belittle people, OK? PAY ATTENTION IF YOU WANT TO CRITICIZE!
>
them?
>
> You might as well admit that you belittle people, too, and stop
> being so hypocritical about it. If you have an argument, it's one
> of different styles or different quantities, not about the concept.
Whether or not Barry also does it has absolutely no bearing on the obvious
lack of truth of your statement that he was pointing out. I'm not saying
that you were being disingenuous in claiming that you don't belittle people
because it's very possible (perhaps even likely) that you honestly believe
that. However, I very sincerely doubt that you could find even _one_ other
reader of this newsgroup that would publicly support that statement (except
perhaps as a troll).
Larry
Erik Naggum
| I must be a hateful idiot, so please, enlighten me. How can I tell
| before reading a message whether it contains an abusive rant or an
| interesting technical contribution?
Look at what I'm responding to. I'm being accused of being too
predictable by a few people who also _really_ hate me, so if you
can't figure it out, I can at least beat _them_ over the head with
that fact.
Christopher Browne
>* Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net>
>| technical matters, they're usually quite interesting.
>
> Well, I appreciate this, but the way you've been harrassing me with
> your false accusations, I really wish you didn't have _any_ reason
> to say anything about what I post at all, positive __or negative.
>
>| replying that you become unreadable. But it's not possible to tell
>| from the headers which type of message it will be.
>
> Yes, it is. You just need to figure it out. It isn't even hard.
It doesn't seem to be obvious based solely on _headers_.
It tends to be pretty clear which posts are "hostile" based on
_message contents_. The words "psychotic", "prejudice," "hatred," and
just about any terminology relating to psychology are seem to
represent reasonable indication of an #Erik "flamefest."
Were the flaming cathartic, such that things would settle down with
everyone feeling a bit better, this would be well and fine, but that
is clearly _NOT_ the case, as the sequence seems to [according to
Deja.com] have resulted in a goodly 15-20 followups as you and Barry
continue to bash at one another.
Heading back to the original _start_ of the seriously "flaming" part
of this thread, Barry Margolin <bar...@genuity.net> provided catalyst
to your "hostility" using the following:
Whatever is officially correct, Usenet is not the appropriate place
to worry about it. This is not a writing class, where we're graded
on our proper use of the language. It's an informal discussion
group, where people can write as they're likely to speak in ordinary
conversation. People don't ordinarily speak with perfect grammar, and
no one but an anal retentive would expect such in casual email or
posts.
BTW, the netiquette guide specifically recommends *against* spelling
and grammar flames. Precisely for the reason that they result in
these off-topic threads that go on and on.
BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't
ordinarily post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that
spelling/grammar correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it
out, you'd better be able to take it.
The critical thing is that I don't see this as any _MAJOR_ "bash" on
you; it seems to me that it did not anywhere _NEAR_ justify your
response of:
Is this your psychotic prejudice running amuck again? Just _where_
did I "dish out" any spelling/grammar corrections? Please feel free
to post as many message-IDs as you can possibly find.
Your hatred blinds you, Barry. Just open your eyes and stop hating.
It'll do any other remaining mental processes of yours a world of
good, too.
It seems to be fairly consistent in the thread that Barry's comments
are merely "suggestive," as with the comment that he _suggests_ that
"Erik proofread his posts better," whilst your comments head straight
into directly hostile language, whether speaking of:
- "psychotic prejudice running amuck"
- being "blinded by hatred"
- "seek professional counselling"
- "You'll kill if you could get away with it"
Based on the language I've seen emitted, I've got a strong idea as to
whom _I_ consider more hostile.
I'm certainly "with Barry" in agreeing that you've got expertise that
makes your technical comments _well_ worthy to "read and heed."
Unfortunately your comments in "softer" areas seem to easily bias
towards hostility, and if people proceed to disagree with you, you can
get _extremely_ hostile.
I can't interpret "You'll kill if you could get away with it" any
other way than "Really, Really Hostile."
--
(concatenate 'string "cbbrowne" "@" "acm.org")
<http://www.ntlug.org/~cbbrowne/lsf.html>
"The only constructive theory connecting neuroscience and psychology
will arise from the study of software."
-- Alan Perlis
[To the endless aggravation of both disciplines. Ed.]
Erik Naggum
| It doesn't seem to be obvious based solely on _headers_.
Yes, it does. Please think.
| Were the flaming cathartic, such that things would settle down with
| everyone feeling a bit better, this would be well and fine, but that
| is clearly _NOT_ the case, as the sequence seems to [according to
| Deja.com] have resulted in a goodly 15-20 followups as you and Barry
| continue to bash at one another.
Oh, they don't settle down? Why can't people who have this urge to
comment _please_ pay at little attention? That way, they could at
least help avoid fueling the flames by some silly non-observation.
I'm sure it's cathartic for you to rip this case open and attempt an
autopsy, but it's rather stupid. If hostility has reasons, and I
suggest you adopt that view, even if foreign to you, _repeating_
something that has caused some hostility is like reopening a wound.
I have to assume that you are either out to hurt more, or are so
stupid that you don't realize what you're doing. You choose.
| BTW, I suggest that Erik proofread his posts better. I don't
| ordinarily post spelling/grammar corrections, but I feel that
| spelling/grammar correction posts are fair game -- if you dish it
| out, you'd better be able to take it.
|
| The critical thing is that I don't see this as any _MAJOR_ "bash" on
| you; it seems to me that it did not anywhere _NEAR_ justify your
| response of:
If you _still_ haven't grasped that I respond to false accusations,
in this case that _I_ dish out spelling/grammar corrections, what
use could we possibly have with your fairly stupid "observations"?
| Based on the language I've seen emitted, I've got a strong idea as to
| whom _I_ consider more hostile.
I'm glad you share this with the world. Will you please explain how
it _helps_? Thank you.
| Unfortunately your comments in "softer" areas seem to easily bias
| towards hostility, and if people proceed to disagree with you, you
| can get _extremely_ hostile.
Sigh. It is simply _not_ disagreement. _Moronic_ remarks like that
are good "triggers" for my reactions: Say something that is so
utterly untrue, so utterly unsupported by facts, and so completely
insane that it _has_ to be corrected, and not only that, I have
stated what I think about agreement and disagreement so often to you
agreement-based retards that if you don't get it, it's because it
serves an evil purpose to pretend you don't. You'd actually _have_
to be seriously braindamaged and devoid of good observational skills
to even think about disagreement as a primary.
A similarly moronic comment is if you were black and all you could
manage to come up with if someone criticized you for anythying at
all were "it's because of my skin". Yes, you would have been black
and you can't avoid that. Yes, disagrement is a common symptom, but
if you weren't quite so retarded and judgmental based on surface
properties, you would have observed strong disagreement _not_
leading to any of your "hostilities", just like people can make
mistakes and get criticized for them regardless of skin color.
Judgmental retards is the problem: People who think only long enough
to form a judgment and don't ever examine the rest of the evidence.
Thinking takes effort, but less than having to defend yourself
because you haven't. At least that's my policy when I flame the
fucking idiots who are too sloppy to engage their _brains_ before
they post some judgmental bullshit, like you, Christopher Browne,
and Barry Margolin.
Erik Naggum
| I'm not saying that you were being disingenuous in claiming that you
| don't belittle people because it's very possible (perhaps even
| likely) that you honestly believe that. However, I very sincerely
| doubt that you could find even _one_ other reader of this newsgroup
| that would publicly support that statement (except perhaps as a
| troll).
Oh, this is so great! If someone should come out and agree with me,
he's a troll!
In other words, there is no way your statement could be falsified,
because you dismiss contrary views outright. I'm amazed that it is
possible to think so little just because you feel belittled, but I'm
beginning to think it's a feeling that happens mostly to those who
deserve it, and the more they have to prove it, too.
Any trolls here?
Larry Elmore
> * "Larry Elmore" <lj.e...@gte.net>
> | I'm not saying that you were being disingenuous in claiming that you
> | don't belittle people because it's very possible (perhaps even
> | likely) that you honestly believe that. However, I very sincerely
> | doubt that you could find even _one_ other reader of this newsgroup
> | that would publicly support that statement (except perhaps as a
> | troll).
>
> Oh, this is so great! If someone should come out and agree with me,
> he's a troll!
Only about your claim that you don't belittle people.
> In other words, there is no way your statement could be falsified,
> because you dismiss contrary views outright.
That's because even the most casual perusal of your posts in Deja
conclusively proves the falsity of your claim that you don't belittle
people. That is as _obviously_ false as the neo-Nazi claims that the Nazis
didn't try to exterminate the Jews in World War II, and I think it's equally
obvious that anyone who publicly supported those claims in a newsgroup is
either a troll seeking to start a flame war for his own twisted sense of
amusement, or has an ideological axe to grind and/or is seriously deluded,
or possibly just very ignorant.
Now if you had said that you don't belittle anybody except those that
deserved it, that wouldn't have been a false statement. I think many people
would disagree with you on who deserves to be flamed since you seem to have
your flamethrower equipped with a hair-trigger (i.e. it goes off with the
slightest touch), but that is a highly subjective decision.
> I'm amazed that it is
> possible to think so little just because you feel belittled, but I'm
> beginning to think it's a feeling that happens mostly to those who
> deserve it, and the more they have to prove it, too.
On the contrary, I've given it a good deal of thought, if only because I
wasn't sure it was worth the snide remarks and personal insults that were
sure to descend on me from your direction. I certainly don't feel belittled.
Frustrated with your frequently abrasive and obnoxious on-line personality,
yes! Belittled? Not at all.
> Any trolls here?
I'm sure there will be at least one or two, probably just to be smartasses
and to keep a flamewar stirred up. Certainly it won't be because they really
think that you don't belittle people since a quick check with Deja will show
that _many_ of your posts contain such comments. It's a pity, really,
because your knowledge of Lisp and related topics is truly superior and the
on-topic parts of your posts are well worth reading. If it wasn't for that,
I'd seriously consider kill-filing you, something I haven't done with
anybody else yet.
> If this is not what you expected, please alter your expectations.
Oh, I truly know what to expect from you, Eric. I really would like to alter
my expectations in that regard, but any regular reader of this newsgroup
knows what to expect when you find something to disagree with in their
posts, no matter how trivial. Then, after verbally assaulting them, you seem
amazed and outraged when most people reply in kind! I wonder why?
Larry
Coby Beck
Erik Naggum <er...@naggum.net> wrote in message news:31765382...@naggum.net...
|
| Thinking takes effort, but less than having to defend yourself
| because you haven't. At least that's my policy when I flame the
| fucking idiots who are too sloppy to engage their _brains_ before
| they post some judgmental bullshit, like you, Christopher Browne,
| and Barry Margolin.
|
| #:Erik
I think FM hit the nail on the head when he suggested that hostility may be so
ingrained in Erik that he truly believes he is normal! I would not be surprised to see
him say even the above is not aggressive or abusive....
Coby
William Deakin
Johan Kullstam wrote:
> i think this is just a british style. any group is considered plural
> even if the name looks singular. thus brits will say "pink floyd are
> on tour," and such.
In common usage both `pink floyd is great' and `pink floyd are on tour'
are fine. (apart from the inherent oxymoron in the first statment, of
course).
:) will
FM
I'm actually pretty sure that both are perfectly valid,
even in formal usage, though they aren't equivalent
(can't be substituted for the other without changing
the meaning).
Pink Floyd is great
-> this means Pink Floyd, as an entity, is great
Pink Floyd are great
-> this means individual members of Pink Floyd are great.
On the other hand, even when you're referring to it
as an entity, "they" is the most often used pronoun,
suggesting that the plural form can be used to refer
to it as a group or individuals.
William Deakin
> aside from misspelling -ize as -ise
Both of these are correct in UK english. The american/british split on
-ize and -ise is a common misconception.
This difference dates back to the the introduction of latin and greek
into english. IIRC the Latin form was favoured at Oxford whilst the the
Greek form was used at `the other place' ;) In the UK the Oxford form
(-ise) then found greater popularity.
:)will
Dorai Sitaram
With -ise there are fewer (!) exceptions to keep track
of and they are all monosyllables I think: size,
prize, and may that's all.
-ize requires you to remember a lot more exceptions:
advertise, advise, apprise, circumcise, excise,
merchandise, supervise, surprise, and scads more.
--d
William Deakin
would take this as being ambigous and to mean either Pink Floyd, as an
entity and/or the individual members of Pink Floyd are great -- however
much I disagree with the meaning of this statement,
:)will
William Deakin
> With -ise there are fewer (!) exceptions to keep track
> of and they are all monosyllables I think: size,
> prize, and may that's all.
>
> -ize requires you to remember a lot more exceptions:
> advertise, advise, apprise, circumcise, excise,
> merchandise, supervise, surprise, and scads more.
True. (To state the obvious) English is not a phonetic language. (When I
was given an italian/english dictionary a couple of years back, I was
bemused to discover that the basic rules of Italian pronunication could
be described in a few pages; Whilst that of english required five or six
times as much space -- using a unique set of bizarre anotations to
boot.)
:)will