[Peace-discuss] AWARE

Thu Sep 3 18:59:17 CDT 2009

"...clever people like me who talk loudly in restaurants see this as a 
deliberate ambiguity, a plea for understanding in a mechanised mansion. The 
points are frozen, the beast is dead. What is the difference? What indeed is the 
point? The point is frozen, the beast is late out of Paddington. The point is 
taken. If La Fontaine's elk would spurn Tom Jones the engine must be our head, 
the dining car our oesophagus, the guards van our left lung, the cattle truck 
our shins, the first class compartment the piece of skin at the nape of the neck 
and the level crossing an electric elk called Simon. The clarity is devastating. 
But where is the ambiguity? Over there in a box. Shunt is saying the 8.15 from 
Gillingham when in reality he means the 8.13 from Gillingham. The train is the 
same, only the time is altered. Ecce homo, ergo elk. La Fontaine knew its sister 
and knew her bloody well. The point is taken, the beast is moulting, the fluff 
gets up your nose. The illusion is complete; it is reality, the reality is 
illusion and the ambiguity is the only truth. But is the truth, as Hitchcock 
observes, in the box? No, there isn't room, the ambiguity has put on weight. The 
point is taken, the elk is dead, the beast stops at Swindon, Chabrol stops at 
nothing, I'm having treatment and La Fontaine can get knotted."

E. Wayne Johnson wrote:
> the merry-go-round is not a ferrous wheel, the perception of irony  is lost
> and the derivation of irony is unrelated.
> 
> Irony (from the Ancient Greek εἰρωνεία eirōneía, meaning hypocrisy, 
> deception, or feigned ignorance) is a literary or rhetorical device, in which
> there is an incongruity or discordance between what one says or does and what
> one means or what is generally understood. Irony is a mode of expression that
> calls attention to the character's knowledge and that of the audience.
> 
> There is argument about what qualifies as ironic, but all senses of irony
> revolve around the perceived notion of an incongruity between what is
> expressed and what is intended, or between an understanding or expectation of
> a reality and what actually happens: the literal truth is in direct
> discordance to the perceived truth.
> 
> 
> On 9/3/2009 1:11 PM, jgeo61 at comcast.net wrote:
>> Webster 9th Edition Collegiate Dictionary pg.914 "Pontificate":  "to speak
>> or express opinions in a pompous or dogmatic way"
>> 
>> I stand by my usage of this word.  Again, if the small group of people who
>> want to use this list serve exclusively really need to consider creating
>> their own venue.
>> 
>> Joy George
>> 
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "C. G. Estabrook"
>> <galliher at illinois.edu> To: "John W." <jbw292002 at gmail.com> Cc:
>> peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net Sent: Thursday, September 3, 2009 9:01:41
>> AM GMT -06:00 US/Canada Central Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] AWARE
>> 
>> Here's the OED pontificating, as it were--
>> 
>> [< classical Latin pontific-, pontifex Roman high priest, in post-classical
>>  Latin also pope (4th cent.), bishop (5th cent.; frequently from 7th cent.
>> in British sources), archbishop (frequently from 8th cent. in British 
>> sources), apparently (following ancient etymologists) < ponti-, alternative
>> stem of pons bridge (see PONS n.) + -fic-, -fex, combining form of facere
>> to do, make (see FACT n.), though this may represent merely a folk
>> etymology ... In sense 4 chiefly used punningly or allusively with
>> reference to the supposed etymology.] [...] 4. A bridge-maker. Also fig. 
>> 1686 J. F. G. CARERI Let. 6 Apr. in Coll. Voy. & Trav. (1732) 88/1 Jucundus
>> on the Seyne two bridges laid, For which he well may Pontifex be said. 
>> Pontifex has here a double meaning, as signifying a bridge-maker; whereas
>> the true acceptation of it is a bishop. 1834 T. CARLYLE Sartor Resartus I.
>> xi. 28/2 Never perhaps since our first Bridge-builders, Sin and Death,
>> built that stupendous Arch from Hell-gate to the Earth, did any Pontifex,
>> or Pontiff, undertake such a task. 1877 Outl. Hist. Relig. 237 No special
>> deity claimed the services of the Pontifices, the bridge- or road-makers.
>> 1927 Jrnl. Royal Anthropol. Instit. 57 248 Moses was a Pontifex indeed. His
>> device, whatever it may have been, perhaps the choice of an interval
>> between the floods, became a miracle. 1999 Hinduism Today (Nexis) 30 Apr.
>> 25 He was a Pontifex..a man throwing bridges over different rivers. Vedic
>> heritage and Greek Pagan thought, Hindu worldview and Germanic tradition.
>> 
>> John W. wrote:
>>> ... Incidentally, in my own dictionary perusings and musings - to say 
>>> nothing of my life experience - I'm not seeing anything about a person 
>>> who pontificates as being a "bridge builder":
>>> 
>>> *pon·tif·i·cate * (pŏn-tĭf'ĭ-kĭt, -kāt') n.  The office or term of office
>>> of a pontiff. intr.v.   (-kāt') *pon·tif·i·cat·ed*, *pon·tif·i·cat·ing*,
>>> 
>> *pon·tif·i·cates*
>>> 
>>> 1. To express opinions or judgments in a dogmatic way. 2. To administer
>>> the office of a pontiff.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> [Latin pontificātus, from pontifex, pontific-, /pontifex/; see * 
>>> pontifex*. V., from Medieval Latin pontificāre, pontificāt-, /to act as 
>>> an ecclesiastic/, from Latin pontifex.] *pon·tif'i·ca'tion*/ n./,
>>> *pon·tif'i·ca'tor*/ n.
>>> 
>>> /
>>> 
>>> The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth
>> Edition
>>> Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton
>>> Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
>>> 
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