John Gilmore wrote "I remember going astray, ætat 4 or 5" in a later post on this now seriously OT thread.
You're right about the OP's questions being "radically naïf." I suffered a multi-bit memory check. My email editor inserts diaereses often without my knowing it, which is not always to my liking. The two-edged vorpal blade of pedantry has once again snacked me after snickering towards its intended target. BTW, I finally found an online definition of Rob Scott's words "cromulent" and "embiggins". Bill Fairchild Rocket Software -----Original Message----- From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Steve Comstock Sent: Monday, November 01, 2010 5:56 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: ATTACH On 11/1/2010 2:35 PM, Bill Fairchild wrote: > Many repliers have emphasized clarity and precision. > Although Mr. Gilmore's word choice is sometimes arcane > and obscure, nevertheless his words under attack were > not "big" or "complex" words; e.g., "ætat", having only > five letters, cannot possibly be characterized as "big", > and its meaning is instantly obvious given a knowledge > of Latin roots, as was "lacunae", also not a "big" word. John's post did not include ætat, that I can see. > Nor did he describe the OP as "naïve." He said that the OP was > "a naïf." No. He said: "They are radically naif.", speaking of the OP's questions. > These two words are not synonymous. Naïve is an adjective > and naïf is a noun, as he used it. No. He used "naif" as an adjective, and did not include the diaeresis. The Merriam-Webster online dictionary says: Definition of NAÏF: naive Variants of NAÏF na·ïf na·if > If you take Mr. Gilmoreto task for lack of clarity and > precision, then please be sure that your post is just as > clear and precise as you wish his had been. A two-edged sword, indeed. > Were it not for Mr. Gilmore's predilection for precise meanings, > I would still be ignorant of the words "antipode" and "boustrophedon" > (the latter of which is big, complex, and arcane, but amazingly precise). > As I also do not have an OED on my shelf, he often drives me happily > to an online English dictionary, into a word's etymology, and from thence > to further French, Greek, Italian, or even Icelandic dabbling. I agree with you there. But for people looking for some technical information, or even a pointer to a document or other source, the digression is not necessarily the path they want to follow. > > Bill Fairchild > Rocket Software > > -----Original Message----- > From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf > Of Ted MacNEIL > Sent: Monday, November 01, 2010 2:32 PM > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: ATTACH > >> There's a lot to be said for vocabulary enhancement. > > Yes, but there is a lot to be said for communicating. > >> I'm tired of hearing that everything must be written for a 5th grade level >> audience. > > There's a reason for that. Most people are lucky if they can read at that high > of a level. > >> What ever happened to 'look it up'? > > That's fine in the classroom;difficult in real life. > > The whole purpose of communicating is to communicate! > If your reader doesn't understand you, through the uses/abuse of large/obscure > words or complex phraseology, it is not the reader's fault. > It is the fault of the writer. > > And, using those big words to answer the OP, did not solve the problem. > The calling of him naive was also insulting. > Just because somebody is a novice, is no reason to talk down to him. > If I had answers, I would have responded. -- Kind regards, -Steve Comstock The Trainer's Friend, Inc. 303-393-8716 http://www.trainersfriend.com * To get a good Return on your Investment, first make an investment! + Training your people is an excellent investment ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
