On Fri, 05 Nov 2004 07:38:01 -0500, Harry Krause
wrote:

~~ snippity snip ~~

You have lots of problems with nuance. Life while you're living it is
conditional at best, with lots of "If-Thens." Well, at least it is if
you are driven by intellect. If you are Pavlovian, then I suppose you
don't have to concern yourself with nuance.

I don't see it that way. In my world, everything is pretty much black
and white. And I don't see that as Pavlovian as much as I see it as a
rational look at how the world works. I think it comes from being a
mathematician by education and a engineer by profession.

Remember the French language wars of the early '70s? French good,
English bad? Then they discovered that the France French they'd been
speaking for the past 200 or so years isn't French at all but an
amalgation of Basque, Spanish and English leading to purifying the
language by, and I loved this bit, sending French teachers to rural
Louisiana to learn "true" French.

Now that's pretty black and white in terms of culture isn't it? :)

Anything that "defiles" the language is purged in favor of
non-inclusion of terms from other languages and cultures. That's not
nuance - that's pure simple arrogance and, if you wanted to use the
term, bigotry.

I think way to much emphasis is placed on nuance as being an
intellectual trait. Nuance certainly does have it's place in
philosophy, psychiatry/psychology and other medical professions that
are not based on pure science, but as a practical trait, a factor in
daily decision making, it's counter productive.

Later,

Tom