Subject: Re: So, where's the "Javadoc" for COMMON Lisp?
From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.net>
Date: Thu, 02 Aug 2001 10:56:58 GMT
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <3205738606676216@naggum.net>

* laprice@garcia.efn.org (larry a price)
> Erik, if you think that i had or have by now made a permanent judgment
> of your mental capacities or your tact, you are wrong.

  Please.  I am not dead, yet.  Some people believe a reaction to an
  observed action, like "idiot!", is just that, which puzzles me, because
  all anyone can ever see and actually judge is people's actions and all
  anyone ever reacts to is observed action.  That, however, does not mean
  some people refuse to accept the existence of counter-evidence to their
  conclusions, but it is not the judgment that is the problem, it is the
  lack of new judgment in the face of new data.

> Of the two alternatives i mentioned (genius|loudmouth) it is an
> unfortunate fact that evidence of the latter has overwhelmed evidence of
> the former at least in the time that i have been reading this newsgroup.

  Yeah, I know.  A lot of people would _prefer_ I were a loudmouth.

> Kent Pitman mentioned a book that i also recommend  Deborah Tannen's "You
> Just Don't Understand" ISBN:0345372050 which explores the multifarious
> ways that language as often interferes with understanding as it enables.

  Another useful book in this regard is David Kerisey: Please Understand Me
  II (ISBN 1-885705-02-6), which explores how people differ in what they
  wish to understand and how they go about it, due to personality types.
  Some people insist on telling people how the world should be, others are
  much more interested in learning what it is like.  Some people introspect
  and think most, others sense and feel most, and some are introverted
  about what they most, while others are extraverted about it.  This makes
  for an interesting blend of personality types.  (There are other models.)

> To which I might add another book recommendation Suzette Haden Elgin's
> "The Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense" ISBN:0688137865 which provides
> practical insight on as she puts it "disagreeing without being
> disagreeable" -- a worthy goal we should probably all strive for.

  Some people see agremeent on one or more levels as a primary value.
  Others consider the focus on agreement to be a disaster.  Simply put:
  Some people want to be liked.  Others want to understand.  When a person
  who wants to be liked is confronted with a person who wants to
  understand, the former is likely to feel under serious pressure, and
  indeed often feel physically threatened, because many people do not think
  people like eachother because they understand each other, but because
  they simply make an effort to be polite to all the people they do not
  like, but that would stop if they understood them.

> Oddly enough these books touch upon one of the main reasons i am seeking
> to learn lisp, the fact that though we each carry around multiple, often
> conflicting definitions of words and everyone's mental dictionary is
> different, we still manage, occasionally, to communicate.

  You will find that a lot of people who like Lisp have a philosophical
  bent and appreciate such fundamental puzzles.  You did not exactly look
  like one who would from your extremely judgmental, anti-introspective,
  extraverted feelings.

> I'm interested in what for lack of a better term might be called
> 'negotiated semantics', that is the process by which relevant definitions
> are adjusted by the participant's in a conversation, during that
> conversation.

  Looks like Habermas has thought up something you could benefit from.

> I'm actually somewhat ideologically opposed to the concept of always
> editing one's reality to suit one's prejudices.

  In regard to the person you quoted, he is a _typical_ judgmental type.
  It is the mark of the judgmental type to want to edit reality.   ///