Re: Dragon NaturallySpeaking and Xy

["Patricia M. Godfrey" priscamg@xxxxxxxx]

M.W. Poirier wrote:
>  Evidently, assuming Cicero is that author of the words you
>  attribute to him Michael, Cicero did not know the truth behind
>  the Taoist parable cited below and attributed to the Taoist
>  scholar Chuang Tzu.

Actually, Cicero and the Greeks before him were all too aware of the
distinction. The Greeks enshrined it in the antithesis of techne and
logos: The smith knows HOW to work metal, but cannot tell why ("you
heat it till it looks like this, then you plunge it in cold water that
feels like this until it makes a noise like this..."); the philosopher
delves into the nature of things, and the essential and inevitable
relations among them. OF course, the rise of real science
(beginning--believe it or not--in the Middle Ages) undid the
distinction in part: technology is indeed both techne and logos, it
knows how and what and why. But techne could be taught. And if the
wheelwright's craft could not, why did it not die with that wheelwright?

>Remember that Socrates and
 Christ wrote nothing,
True, but Christ quoted what had been written before him innumerable
times (going by the only records we have). A given civilization can
get by without writing IF it has a strong tradition of memorization
(as most cultures before the invention of printing did). The Celtic
Druids deliberately did not write down their arcana. But then whatever
that culture or civilization achieved dies with it. Writing is the
bridge across time and disaster. Assuming, that is, that there are
those who know or can decipher the language.
--
Patricia M. Godfrey
PriscaMG@xxxxxxxx