Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 00:08:57 -0800 (PST)
From: Michael Rooney <rooney-AT-tiger.cc.oxy.edu>
Subject: Re:  God help us, back to tropes




On Mon, 25 Jan 1999, TMB wrote:

> I don't see why I'm on a high horse. 

Because the generality of your ethics entails
unending hand-wringing; and, as you are its
sole layman and pontifex maximus, you can wring
everyone else's hands ad nauseam.


> Nor do I understand why, suddenly,
> "ordinary usage" is the meaning de regeur. 

It is not required, but a default assumption.
Equivocation should be avoided simply out of
practical economy, and coinage should fulfill 
some end -- logical, pragmatic or aesthetic.  
As far as I can tell, your usage serves only
as self-indulgence.


> I thin my conception is fine. I
> don't see ethics as "fulfllling moral rules", but see that conception as a
> typical misunderstanding. 

Uh-huh.  What is the correct understanding of
ethics?  Please be clear and concise; your
previous disquisitions have inflicted an
undue gravity upon the eyelids of your readers.
In particular, what does your ethics prescribe
and how does it justify that?


> If you're going to have at me (and why is
> "having at" about your only way of interacting?) 

Again: parrhesia.


> about divergent
> conceptions qua simply not the usual, I don't know how you expect to read
> D and G.

Oh, I manage.  A purely idiosyncratic approach
to language, were it possible, would be even 
less constructive.  How do you read them?


Cordially,

M.