Date: Tue, 20 Jul 1999 16:08:31 -0700
From: Lois Shawver <rathbone-AT-california.com>
Subject: Re: Trusting liars to lie


Colin,

I can see why you don't want to abandon the word "ruse." It is central
to your appreciation of Lyotard.  And I think you give it the vernacular
meaning, too, which means cunning, deceptive, sly ways of ____ doing
what?  What is the success of the ruse?  Not consensus surely with the
one that succumbed to the cunning of the person performing the ruse.  

In my interpretation, Lyotard was inspired with another notion and the
connotation of slyness is incidental.  He says that the ruse is a new
langauge game.  It is what dissolves a differend.  It is the paradigm
shift.

As you describe "ruse" it sounds the preferred game of the embezzler or
thief.  How would you differentiate it from that kind of game?

..Lois Shawver