[ExI] Bad news for US customers of Intrade

[Rafal Smigrodzki]

On Sat, Dec 1, 2012 at 3:47 PM, Adrian Tymes <atymes at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> But, in case nobody reads it, here is for you Adrian a reference to an
>> English dictionary, explaining the meaning of "rather":
>>
>> http://www.thefreedictionary.com/rather
>
> I see nothing there that disproves the notion that you were presenting
> a contrast between two absolutes, and thus implicitly denying the
> possibility of anything between.
>

### Let me walk you through it: "Rather" is not an absolute qualifier,
it is the quintessential relative qualifier, contrary to what you
claimed. Therefore, my statement did not present a contrast between
two absolutes, since it contained no absolute qualifiers. Clearly, to
a person versed in the English language, I accused you of wanting to
give more, but not necessarily all, control over my life to your
government, compared to the present situation. You erroneously
concluded that I accused you of supporting total government control,
perhaps because of your faulty understanding of the meaning of
"rather".

------------------

>> The last subordinate clause in the sentence you wrote "This is but one
>> example where I have not, in fact, taken the side of more government
>> control than what we have now" (the clause "what we have now") can be
>> modified to refer to either of two  subjects - the government or the
>> people. I would have chosen the former referent, expressing my feeling
>> that the government is an extraneous entity ("what *they* have now").
>> You chose "we" - as if identifying with the government (you +
>> government = we), or merging the government and the people (the people
>> + government = we).
>
> "We", the people, experience (or "have") a level of government
> control.  "They" is only correct in this case if the speaker is not
> part of the population experiencing this control.

### It's interesting how you seem unable to alternatively parse the
sentence in question. You should realize that the word "have " could
mean not only "experience" but also "exert", and in the latter
meaning, I can say "They (government) have control (of me)", i.e. I am
a part of the population experiencing this control.

Now, we are discussing some very basic issues in English usage - is
this perhaps your second language? This could explain the mistakes you
make in reading posts on this list.

Rafal