[B-Greek] Excluded Middle (was B-Greek Year End Awards)
George F Somsel
gfsomsel at yahoo.com
Wed Jan 6 12:05:24 EST 2010
WHAT !!!! You want us to be logical ?
george
gfsomsel
… search for truth, hear truth,
learn truth, love truth, speak the truth, hold the truth,
defend the truth till death.
- Jan Hus
_________
----- Original Message ----
From: John Owlett <owl at postmaster.co.uk>
To: John Sanders <john.franklin.sanders at gmail.com>
Cc: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
Sent: Wed, January 6, 2010 9:54:22 AM
Subject: [B-Greek] Excluded Middle (was B-Greek Year End Awards)
One of the slightly mindbending things you have to learn in the
early stages of logic is that something's being untrue does not
make it false.
There are many cases where a two-valued logic (true/false,
black/white, zero/one, or whatever) is adequate.
There are also many cases where a three-valued logic is necessary.
John's engineering list case (is/not is/not assigned) is a good
example. Others include (black/white/grey) and the lawyers'
(proved to be true/proved to be false/not proven).
And, life being what it is, there are many-valued logics, where
even three values are not enough.
A two-valued logic, with no shades of grey, is said to have an
"excluded middle".
Do we need a middle breathing?
If you're writing Greek for someone to read, I would say No.
The reader either aspirates the start of the word or doesn't.
So I think that Hawkeye can keep her award.
If you're writing a Greek minuscule for a future generation
of textual critics, then it could be helpful to show that you
have clearly decided not to aspirate.
But who wants to help textual critics? :-)
Later,
Dr Owl
----------------------------
John Owlett, Southampton, UK
Yesterday, John Sanders wrote:
> In reference to THE HAWKEYE PIERCE AWARD FOR THE
> ORTHOGRAPHIC REFORM LEAST LIKELY TO
> TAKE PLACE BECAUSE IT MAKES TOO MUCH SENSE:
>
> Sarah Madden, for suggesting that we retain rough breathings
> but get rid of smooth readings.
>
> If I may, I would like to come to the support of Aristophanes
> of Byzantium. I fear many may not understand the significance
> of using two symbols for the aspirate (one for smooth breathing
> and one for rough breathing). At one time, many years ago, I
> also thought along similar lines as they who wish to eliminate
> the redundant symbol, but my work requirements changed that
> for me.
---
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