Reading Exercise

Reading Exercise: Sehtolc Gnihsaw

Reading Exercise: Sehtolc Gnihsaw

The procedure is actually quite simple. First, you arrange the items into different groups. Of course one pile may be sufficient depending on how much there is to do. If you have to go somewhere else due to lack of facilities that is the next step; otherwise, you are pretty well set. It is important not to overdo things. That is, it is better to do too few things at once than too many. In the short run this may not seem important but complications can easily arise. A mistake can be expensive as well. At first, the whole procedure will seem complicated. Soon, however, it will become just another facet of life. It is difficult to foresee any end to the necessity for this task in the immediate future, but then, one never can tell. After the procedure is completed one arranges the materials into different groups again. Then they can be put into their appropriate places. Eventually they will be used once more and the whole cycle will then have to be repeated. However, that is part of life.

Connotations

In addition to literal, dictionary meanings, words often have implied, emotional meanings known as connotations. These connotations play a big role in the search for the "right word" because they sometimes clash with a writer's intended meaning or view.
For example, in the following sentence, the word pushy conflicts with the meaning in the rest of the sentence:


The pushy citizen patiently waited for his turn at the microphone before confidently expressing his concerns about the city council's recent decision to staff the fire station with volunteers.A pushy individual probably wouldn't have waited patiently for his turn to speak, but rather would have barged in whenever he felt emotionally led to do so. Perhaps, a more appropriate descriptive word for an individual who "patiently waited" before "confidently expressing his concerns" might be assertive.
Words with similar dictionary meanings often have different connotations, so it is very important for a writer to choose words carefully. Consider the following table. Each row contains a list of words with similar dictionary meanings but different shades of feeling.

	Favorable	Neutral	Unfavorable
1.	relaxed	inactive	lazy
2.	prudent	timid	cowardly
3.	modest	shy	mousy
4.	time-tested	old	out-of-date
5.	dignified	reserved	stiff-necked
6.	persevering	persistent	stubborn
7.	up-to-date	new	newfangled
8.	thrifty	conservative	miserly
9.	self-confident	proud	conceited
10.	inquisitive	curious	nosy

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More on connotations...

Each of the following sentences includes a pair of words with similar dictionary definitions but different connotations. One of the words is more appropriate based on the context of the sentence. That word appears in the right-hand column.

Sentence Examples	Appropriate Word Choice
As snakes continue to grow, they (junk, shed) the protective keratinous layer on the surface of their bodies because it does not expand.	shed
Oblivious to those around him, the father tenderly (smiled, smirked) at his newborn baby through the window of the hospital nursery.	smiled
During rush hour traffic in a metropolis, cars creep along at agonizingly slow (velocities, speeds).	speeds
Even the coolest star in the night skies is unbelievably (sultry, hot) according to astronomers.	hot
The local newspaper's front-page story indicated that $50,000 was (stolen, pilfered) from the town's largest bank during the night.	stolen
The pack of wild horses (loped, sprinted) alongside the train at top speed for more than 200 yards.	sprinted
Although many Americans purchase meat at their local grocery stores, some farmers still (butcher, execute) livestock to feed their families.	butcher
The French are (noted, notorious) for their fine food.	notorious

From:

LEO: Literacy Education Online Connotations

Critical Thinking -- What is It? -- Video

Bloom's Taxonomy of Skills (Revised)

Bloom's Taxonomy of Skills (Revised)

What Do You See?

Assumptions Web Links

DEFINITION OF ASSUMPTION

This entry at wordreference.com explains the many meanings of the word assumption.

http://www.wordreference.com/definition/assumption

HYPOTHESIS DEFINED - American Heritage Dictionary

Compare the definitions of the word hypothesis given at the Merriam-Webster and American Heritage dictionaries.

http://www.bartleby.com/61/3/H0370300.html

HYPOTHESIS DEFINED - Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Compare the definitions of the word hypothesis given at the Merriam-Webster and American Heritage dictionaries.

http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/hypothesis

JEAN PIAGET

This site is available for learning more about Jean Piaget and his theories on cognitive development.

http://www.ship.edu/~cgboeree/piaget.html

THESIS

"How to Write a Thesis Statement." A useful discussion prepared at Indiana University.

http://www.indiana.edu/~wts/pamphlets/thesis_statement.shtml

E-Prime

TOWARD UNDERSTANDING E -PRIME
Robert Anton Wilson

E-PRIME, abolishing all forms of the verb "to be," has its roots in the field of general semantics, as presented by Alfred Korzybski in his 1933 book, Science and Sanity. Korzybski pointed out the pitfalls associated with, and produced by, two usages of "to be": identity and predication. His student D. David Bourland, Jr., observed that even linguistically sensitive people do not seem able to avoid identity and predication uses of "to be" if they continue to use the verb at all.

Bourland pioneered in demonstrating that one can indeed write and speak without using any form of "to be," calling this subset of the English language "E-Prime." Many have urged the use of E-Prime in writing scientific and technical papers.

Korzybski felt that all humans should receive training in general semantics from grade school on, as "semantic hygiene" against the most prevalent forms of logical error, emotional distortion, and "demonological thinking." E-Prime provides a straightforward training technique for acquiring such semantic hygiene.

To understand E-Prime, consider the human brain as a computer. (Note that I did not say the brain "is" a computer.) As the Prime Law of Computers tells us, GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT (GIGO, for short). The wrong software guarantees wrong answers. Conversely, finding the right software can "miraculously" solve problems that previously appeared intractable.
It seems likely that the principal software used in the human brain consists of words, metaphors, disguised metaphors, and linguistic structures in general.

The Sapir-Whorf-Korzybski Hypothesis, in anthropology, holds that a change in language can alter our perception of the cosmos. A revision of language structure, in particular, can alter the brain as dramatically as a psychedelic. In our metaphor, if we change the software, the computer operates in a new way.

Consider the following paired sets of propositions, in which Standard English alternates with English-Prime (E-Prime):

lA. The electron is a wave.
lB. The electron appears as a wave when measured with instrument-l.

2A. The electron is a particle.
2B. The electron appears as a particle when measured with instrument-2.

3A. John is lethargic and unhappy.
3B. John appears lethargic and unhappy in the office.

4A. John is bright and cheerful.
4B. John appears bright and cheerful on holiday at the beach.

5A. This is the knife the first man used to stab the second man.
5B. The first man appeared to stab the second man with what looked like a knife to me.

6A. The car involved in the hit-and-run accident was a blue Ford.
6B. In memory, I think I recall the car involved in the hit-and-run accident as a blue Ford.

7A. This is a fascist idea.
7B. This seems like a fascist idea to me.

8A. Beethoven is better than Mozart.
8B. In my present mixed state of musical education and ignorance, Beethoven seems better to me than Mozart.

9A. That is a sexist movie.
9B. That seems like a sexist movie to me.

10A. The fetus is a person.
10B. In my system of metaphysics, I classify the fetus as a person.

The "A"-type statements (Standard English) all implicitly or explicitly assume the medieval view called "Aristotelian essentialism" or "naive realism." In other words, they assume a world made up of block-like entities with indwelling "essences" or spooks- "ghosts in the machine."

The "B"-type statements (E-Prime) recast these sentences into a form isomorphic to modern science by first abolishing the "is" of Aristotelian essence and then reformulating each observation in terms of signals received and interpreted by a body (or instrument) moving in space-time.

Relativity, quantum mechanics, large sections of general physics, perception psychology, sociology, linguistics, modern math, anthropology, ethology, and several other sciences make perfect sense when put into the software of E-Prime. Each of these sciences generates paradoxes, some bordering on "nonsense" or "gibberish," if you try to translate them back into the software of Standard English.

Concretely, "The electron is a wave" employs the Aristotelian "is" and thereby introduces us to the false-to-experience notion that we can know the indwelling "essence" of the electron. "The electron appears as a wave when measured by instrument-1" reports what actually occurred in space-time, namely that the electron when constrained by a certain instrument behaved in a certain way.

Similarly, "The electron is a particle" contains medieval Aristotelian software, but "The electron appears as a particle when measured by instrument-2" contains modern scientific software. Once again, the software determines whether we impose a medieval or modern grid upon our reality-tunnel.

Note that "the electron is a wave" and "the electron is a particle" contradict each other and begin the insidious process by which we move gradually from paradox to nonsense to total gibberish. On the other hand, the modern scientific statements "the electron appears as a wave when measured one way" and "the electron appears as a particle measured another way" do not contradict, but rather complement each other. (Bohr's Principle of Complementarity, which explained this and revolutionized physics, would have appeared obvious to all, and not just to a person of his genius, if physicists had written in E-Prime all along. . . .)

Looking at our next pair, "John is lethargic and unhappy" vs. "John is bright and cheerful,' we see again how medieval software creates metaphysical puzzles and totally imaginary contradictions. Operationalizing the statements, as physicists since Bohr have learned to operationalize, we find that the E-Prime translations do not contain any contradiction, and even give us a clue as to causes of John's changing moods. (Look back if you forgot the translations.)

"The first man stabbed the second man with a knife" lacks the overt "is" of identity but contains Aristotelian software nonetheless. The E-Prime translation not only operationalizes the data, but may fit the facts better-if the incident occurred in a psychology class, which often conduct this experiment. (The first man "stabs," or makes stabbing gestures at, the second man, with a banana, but many students, conditioned by Aristotelian software, nonetheless "see" a knife. You don't need to take drugs to hallucinate; improper language can fill your world with phantoms and spooks of many kinds.)

The reader may employ his or her own ingenuity in analyzing how "is-ness" creates false-to-facts reality-tunnels in the remaining examples, and how E-Prime brings us back to the scientific, the operational, the existential, the phenomenological--to what humans and their instruments actually do in space-time as they create observations, perceptions, thoughts, deductions, and General Theories.

I have found repeatedly that when baffled by a problem in science, in "philosophy," or in daily life, I gain immediate insight by writing down what I know about the enigma in strict E-Prime. Often, solutions appear immediately-just as happens when you throw out the "wrong" software and put the "right" software into your PC. In other cases, I at least get an insight into why the problem remains intractable and where and how future science might go about finding an answer.


This text comes from:
D. David Bourland, Jr. & Paul Dennithorne Johnston, "To Be or Not: An E-Prime Anthology," International Society for General Semantics, 1991, pp. 23-26