Thanks belladonna, that was fun. His conspiracy theories are more coherent than his philosophy.
I like how Hitler and Napolean were groomed since birth by followers of Baal. I never knew that.
I believe you are thinking of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Dogmas of Impiricism.
“Its was the best of meta-symbols, it was the worst of meta-symbols.”
Kant we just forget about those old philosophers already? 
hansel: I don’t think Quine is making any claims about the relative memory capacity or intelligence of people who would use either form, do you? Quine’s idea has merit, but if Justhink is using it to defend his peculiar brand of speech, he needs to recognize that communication, not confusion, is the purpose of language. He might also the consider the possibility if 99.9…% of people happen to think he’s being dense, there is a chance that it’s not simply because of the way he talks.
Well, Quine was making an observation in principle that has been borne out in fact in Computer Science: you can say the same thing with a small vocabulary as you can with a large vocabulary if you’re willing to tolerate an absence of periods for several pages (or you have a lot of RAM).
God help me, I actually read the thread in which Justhink’s bit appears. The OP was about “nonstandard” English; Steve Wright equated a larger vocabulary with a larger toolbox, enabling him to articulate himself more precisely by using “just the right word”. Justhink countered with the paragraph we’re pulling apart now: He argues that a smaller vocabulary leads to more transparent, precise communication because it’s less vague (i.e., simple, straightforward terms combined in simple, straightforward ways). He acknowledges that there’s a limit in the shrinking of vocabulary, which is the mind’s capacity to process the necessarily longer sentences that would result; however, within that limit, a dearth of vocabulary is preferable for clarity’s sake, even though the simple speaker will be perceived as stupid.
He’s full of shit, of course. But that seems to be what he’s saying.
The great irony of his post is the sentence that was elided from the beginning of the paragraph, where he writes "Points taken; though I’d still be compelled to rebutt with another observation. " He could have just said “Sure, but…”
Wasn’t justthink the one who said he doesn’t have to follow any laws, because parts of our governmental system are prone to corruption?
My head hurts.