The discussion quoted above, between jadelennox and me, started when someone objected to the term "original work" since RPF doesn't respond to "original works." I pointed out that "source text" is better but too academic-y when OTW already has a reputation as being too acafannish.
But it's an example. In the conversations going on more recently in which I've seen (several) people making "If everything is X, then X is meaningless" arguments, the X has been "queer." Those portions of the conversations I have stayed out of myself, as I mention below, (although I've engaged in other portions) because they are made in the context of other arguments about appropriation which demand respectful listening in my opinion, and to make this argument there would, IMHO, derail the discussion.
One of the things I like about having you as a flister is that when I talk about an issue in the abstract like this, divorcing it from context on the assumption that the people who know the context will understand what prompted it, you'll tackle it in the abstract head-on and we're start talking about the actual underlying meaty issues that everyone else was talking around by focusing on the specifics. Because I think the underlying disagreements tend to be not so much political as philosophical.
It is only a meaningful statement if it is really true that everything can be analysed in that way. That is what I was saying in my comment above. Now I'm not what you call an academic, I have no idea what the tools X, Y and Z are or if they are indeed universally applicable. I rather doubt they are universally applicable, but if you say they are then I will take your word for it.
Talk to a Freudian, and she'll be convinced that you want to sleep with your mother. (Not really, but capturing the nuances of Freud isn't the point here.) Whatever you say, she'll be able to create an explanation how all that is motivated by her initial premise. So in a sense she has tools universally applicable to analyze all of human behavior. (Hell, there's really nothing to stop from applying Freud to gods or astrological bodies, either.)
That's not quite an empirical fact about the universe or human behavior.
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Date: 2008-02-23 06:14 pm (UTC)But it's an example. In the conversations going on more recently in which I've seen (several) people making "If everything is X, then X is meaningless" arguments, the X has been "queer." Those portions of the conversations I have stayed out of myself, as I mention below, (although I've engaged in other portions) because they are made in the context of other arguments about appropriation which demand respectful listening in my opinion, and to make this argument there would, IMHO, derail the discussion.
One of the things I like about having you as a flister is that when I talk about an issue in the abstract like this, divorcing it from context on the assumption that the people who know the context will understand what prompted it, you'll tackle it in the abstract head-on and we're start talking about the actual underlying meaty issues that everyone else was talking around by focusing on the specifics. Because I think the underlying disagreements tend to be not so much political as philosophical.
It is only a meaningful statement if it is really true that everything can be analysed in that way. That is what I was saying in my comment above. Now I'm not what you call an academic, I have no idea what the tools X, Y and Z are or if they are indeed universally applicable. I rather doubt they are universally applicable, but if you say they are then I will take your word for it.
Talk to a Freudian, and she'll be convinced that you want to sleep with your mother. (Not really, but capturing the nuances of Freud isn't the point here.) Whatever you say, she'll be able to create an explanation how all that is motivated by her initial premise. So in a sense she has tools universally applicable to analyze all of human behavior. (Hell, there's really nothing to stop from applying Freud to gods or astrological bodies, either.)
That's not quite an empirical fact about the universe or human behavior.