[lit-ideas] Re: A Fine Distinction

We are discussing:
 
 
 
 1974 Current Anthropol. 15 134 
         "There is a nice distinction between suicide, self-sacrifice, and  
martyrdom."
 
                         from Current Anthropol. 1974, vol. 15, p. 134.
 
I wrote: 
 
>>I would need credentials as to origin of  author to see what she means!

 
McCreery replies as per ps., slightly offended that I would even _need_  that 
(I learned the word 'credentials' in the US, and I realise it _is_ an  
irritating word!). But I meant:
 
     -- my irritation at the OED practice of sometimes,  yes, but sometimes, 
no,
        quoting the author at all. Here  we have a case of sometimes _no_. The
        implicature being: the  credentials -- not even Christian name and 
patronymic
        surname -- should MATTER!  Imagine being _her_ and _not_ quoted.
        Enough for a martyrdom, I would  think.
 
    -- Women tend to use 'nice' differently from men. I  notice in America. 
In America
       they also use 'cute', but that's  almost totally _female_. It's also 
an age thing.
       In England, 'nice' (as G. Mikes notes)  was _over-used_ in post-war 
years for
       _anything_ (a 'nice explosion',  'a nice cuppa', a 'nice apartment', a 
'nice palace',
       etc. I was thinking of the credential  of the author to check with 
other of her
       idioms to see if she's using 'nice' in  the original anti-scholastic 
sense of
       'not necessary' and eventually  'disrespectful' (ne-scio', I do not 
know, 'nice').
 
     -- Note the nice distinction she fails to  make in not recognising the 
root 
        'two' in 'twee', as in  'between'. "Between" means between the two. 
It's like
        'twin'. Between the twins. To  use is instead of 'among' is to blur 
this
        nice distinction. Self  sacrifice, in her scale, may be between 
sucide and
        martyrdom; but the  distinction, if it's so nice, should be among 
suicide,
        self-sacrifice, and martyrdom.  But check the Current Anthropology to 
be
        too current (ah! the progress of  science and scholarly research -- a 
typical
        case of publish or perish) to  sweep a time-honoured distinction 
generations
        of gentlemen felt worth making  like _that_. The ethics of the 
professional!
 
     -- The good distinctions are (in philosophy)  mainly dichotomic. 
analytic-synthetic,
         primary-secondary  (quality), a priori-a posteriori, 
implication-implicature, 
         implicatures being  conventional-nonconventional. imperatives being
          hypothetical-categorial.
         The human brain  understands perfectly well a _dieresis_ as Plato 
called it,
         a bifurcation of a field  following some clear criterion.
         To justify a 'nice'  distinction among three items imports a 
different sort
         of criterion. And which is  that here? 
 
     -- It's not enough to offer a chestnut of cases.  You should provide the 
analysis
        in necessary and sufficient  clauses for each; and see how each case 
        shares with the other two some  of the clauses yet add one that 
distinguishes
        from the rest.
 
     -- In my PhD dissertation (deposited in the  University of Buenos Aires, 
Department
        of Philosophy, on  pragmatics and Grice), I offer (ch. 7) a 
justification of rationale
        for a tetrachotomic  distinction among four Kantian categories (used 
by Grice):
 
                                                       CATEGORY
                                                              I
                                                       QUALITITAS
                                                       (Aristotle, poion)
 
                        CATEGORY                                              
CATEGORY
                             III                                              
                 IV
                         RELATIO    MODUS
                         (Aristotle)                                          
           (after Aristotle)
 
 
 
                                                         CATEGORY
II
                                                        QUANTITAS
                                                       (Aristotle, poson)
 
 
         I had noticed that Grice  uses them as sort of philosopher's 
philosopher's joke ('echoing Kant')
         in his consideration of  the grouping of the conversational maxims; 
and it had been a matter 
         of debate whether Kant  (and ultimately Aristotle) should be given 
so much credit at all.
         -- Grice and I like the  symmetry of the Kantian approach; but 
realise the truth of the
         matter is in Aristotle's  original _ten_ categories. As it happens, 
the maxims themselves
         turned out to be "10" (and  Grice would compare them to the 10 
commandments -- and thus
         in a publication I was  able to refer to it as the "Conversational 
Decalogue". In any case
         my grounding of the  four-fold division was complex and relied on 
material from semiotics
         so that each category had  to be defined in such terms that the 
totality of four would cover
         the central aspects in the  transmission of meaningful content. 
 
          The larger the  number of divisions, the more (byzantine, and) 
oriental we get. Recall Borges 
          and the Chinese  encyclopedia -- cited by Foucault in "Les mots et 
les choses".
 
          Note also that a  dichotomic distinction is usually enough for 
philosophical purposes
          seing that the  lumpers are usually irritating the splitters in 
finding the splitting a  chasm
          to be avoided in  their monopanorama metaphysical landscape. "No 
need for distinguishing
          -- or nicely  distinguishing, since we _know_ -- between the 
alleged 'x' and 'y'. It's all 
          ultimately _x_ or  else the criterion for the distinction is too 
fine (and thus a  metaphysical
          excrescence) to  bother
 
I hope you also shed some light on my previous, say, 6 posts on valid/true,  
and the eels and the ditch, and the Moore paradox, etc. What's the point of  
bringing in a topic if not considering its replies. I can see that Andreas will 
 ignore my posts, but he is the mere moderator; you are a _lister_! (Just 
joking  -- feel free when you have the time!)
 
    Only stop insulting Oxford philosophers -- it's _nice_  but not nice. 
 
J. L. Speranza
   Buenos Aires, Argentina


"The anthropologist in me is curious how many of us are persuaded of the  
need for the author's credentials to see what she means. I would have to 
consult  
the article in which the sentence appears to check the accuracy of my 
reading.  But, as a plausible first stab, I offer 


Suicide= to escape one's own pain or despair
Self-sacrifice= for the sake of others, e.g., women, children, family,  
members of the same fire brigade or military unit 
Martyrdom=for the sake of a transcendent, religious or ideological,  cause


As a prototypical case where which of the three is the most likely  
explanation, I offer an anthropological chestnut, the Indian custom of suttee  
(or 
sati), in which a widow is burned alive on the funeral pyre of her husband.  If 
she willingly participates in this event, is the widow in question (1)  
escaping 
despair at the state in which the loss of her husband leaves her; (2)  
sacrificing herself for the sake of her family's reputation; or (3) fulfilling 
a  
religious obligation in an extreme form for which the label "martyrdom" is  
appropriate? 


The author's credentials strike me as a red herring."
 
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