On 29/01/2008, Kurt Maxwell Weber <kmw(a)kurtweber.us> wrote:
> On Tuesday 29 January 2008 02:41, you wrote:
> > Consistency is the something-or-other of foolish minds, as the saying
> > goes. We make these rules for ourselves; they don't have to be
> > consistent
>
> Way to completely misinterpret Thoreau's dictum.
>
> He wasn't referring to logical consistency--in fact, he understood that
> LOGICAL consistency was essential.
>
> Rather, he was talking about "consistency" in the sense of a stubborn refusal
> to change one's mind in the face of superior evidence or arguments.
>
> Please, from now on make sure you actually understand what people mean when
> they say something before you invoke it to support your own arguments.
Well, I was invoking it as a handy bon mot, because, you know, that's
what we do with nice flip phrases from the common cultural heritage
when we are debating unrelated things. It's not being "invoked as
support"; if it was, I'd have actually explained why I was invoking
it, and probably named the grand authority, rather than saying "as the
saying goes" and moving on.
Anyhow, I hate to be snotty in response to a snotty email, but I think
you might find you seem a lot more erudite if you attribute it to
Emerson, not to Thoreau...
Regardless, It seems to me perfectly reasonable to invoke that as an
argument against the slavish worship of Everything Must Be Just So,
Just Because (and god knows we have enough trouble with people trying
to insist on precedent as a guiding principle anyway...) Deviate from
our "past act" when it suits us to? That's just the issue here.
--
- Andrew Gray
andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk