Date: Tue, 27 Jul 1999 05:53:54 -0600 (MDT)
Subject: BHA: test



Formulated pointedly, I would answer Howard's question this
way: the state of raining is so shot through with negativity
that it is always correct to say: "it is raining and it is
not raining."

Think about it this way: standing in the rain is different
from standing under a waterfall or standing at the bottom of
the ocean.  When it rains, an area which is normally dry is
made wet but not immersed in water.  The spaces between the
raindrops are as essential for the rain as the raindrops
themselves.  But one raindrop is not rain either, it is only
rain when there are enough raindrops so that Colin's laundry
and the plants get wet.  Different generative mechanisms are
at work when it is dry outside than when it rains, and again
different mechanisms are at work when there is a torrent
outside, when it pours and floods, and when everyone would
laugh if you tried to characterize the spectacle outside
with the words: "it is raining" (assuming you still have a
roof over your head).  This transition between regimes is
something analytical reasoning cannot handle.


RB brings a similar example when he says that a library is
as much dependent on the fact that people are not reading
books (so that the books are in fact available when you
walk into the stacks) than on the fact that people are
reading them.


Hans E.




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