I was trying to find some grammars (for many languages that I shall not name) half as good as anything here, but alas! there were no lovely .pdf old books with great grammar! No exercises, vocabulary in each book! No! None whatsoever!
If any one know where there are some like textkit, do tell.
But I fear that textkit is unfourtunately unique and alone great.
Yes, I have done a lot of searching on the internet and there doesn’t seem to be anything much with textbooks reproduced like there are on Textkit. It’s a real pity as there is so much knowledge that just gets lost. If there are any stray billionaires out there wanting to finance a worthwhile project - this could be it! Get all this stuff on-line before it vanishes!
I recently spent some time wondering whom I would ask, and what sort of procedural gyrations I would have to undertake, to get a grant to do some Old Occitan (a.k.a. Old Provencal, language of the Troubadors) work up like Perseus. I’m not an academic institution, so it’s not bloody likely, but I can dream.
Yes Wiiliam - when you think of the billions wasted on producing ghastly sit-coms on TV, useless adverts, wars and political campaigns you wonder why we can’t spend a bit more increasing the world’s knowledge. In fact we could probably feed and clothe AND educate most of the world with the money wasted on making useless trashy TV shows! I just read in the paper about $20million AUS being spent on a “talent quest” show here. I mean, who cares? $20million would provide enough to give a musical education to every child in this state, but I guess it doesn’t sell soap powder!
And this is where Marxis Theory comes in… lol hope Lex doesn’t read this.
Today’s economics have worked out that with Marxist theory (not what those east block dictators made of his economic theory, but the real thing, which is like nearly the opposite!) everyone would only have to work 3 hours a day and then could spend the rest of the time doing things like learning musical instruments, reading literature and going to the theatre. And this is the only point in which Marxist theory is flawed, because he thinks that everyone is nice, would go to work, help others and everyone wants culture. In reality, though, people would be bored and long for soap operas. So the question is do we really want no luxury goods at all, just the basics and culture, or soap operas and luxury goods, which just don’t make us happy? It seems most people want the soap operas…
Why don’t we ask James Morwood guy to ask his Oxford to do something like this? He loves languages. We want to learn them too. Aha Jurassic park
It may have cost $20 million to make, but I’m sure it made a lot more than that, and, for good or bad, gave enjoyment to many people. (Certainly not to me! 
)
Do you want an internet connection? Mobile phones? Computers?
Marxist theory is flawed on many grounds. It is a purely imaginary economic system, which in many respects is more a religion than a means of economy. Personally I find it a little offensive when people say that communism or marxism is a “good idea”
Hope springs eternal, my dear. Bwahahahaha!!!
Teeheehee… once we get those robot slaves up and running, that might become a possibility. Until then, doesn’t the word “Utopia” come from a play on Greek words εὐτόπια (good place) and οὐτόπια (no place), implying that no place is perfectly good?
Not by a long shot.
Imagine that! People care more about themselves and their own families than they do about other people! Human nature rears its ugly head, but there’s no point in denying it. Better to accept it, and make the best of it. This is what is so wrongheaded about socialist theory; it tries to convert mankind into the “New Socialist Man”(TM, Patent Pending), instead of accepting the nature of man as it is.
And if they don’t want culture, damn it, it’s for their own good if it’s rammed down their throats anyway!
The question is, should this question be decided centrally, or in the more organic distributed fashion that the market allows? I say let people make up their own minds, and buy the entertainment they desire.
Alas, 'tis true. I suppose this means that the soap operas make most people more happy than high culture, eh?
Face it, Emma, you’re part of the intellectual elite (except in economics 
). You have more rarefied tastes than the average Joe Sixpack (or Sechsstein, in German?). But since your rarefied tastes are expensive, you would like everybody else to share your tastes so that you can enjoy the economies of scale that the lovers of soap operas enjoy. And if the market doesn’t provide this, then you would rather the government do it.
In other words, you’re a snob, who resents the οἱ πολλοί because they don’t like what you like, thus making it affordable for you. I don’t really have anything against the snob thing; I’m a snob too. Discrimination (not as in racial, but as in dicriminating tastes) is a good thing. But pushing your tastes on others so you can get what you want without paying for it is not a good thing.
Instead, think of the expense of your tastes as part of the penance you pay for being born more equal than most other people.
Awesome! A voice of sanity!
Ai ai ai!
Normally I stay out of these sorts of arguments, but I feel compelled to make just a few quick points.
This is an appalling line of argument. It is an assertion of the ability to read minds, and even has a nice technical name: ad hominem circumstantial. Rather than engage the ideas, the person’s purported motivation is attacked. Unfortunately, this sort of logical error is incredibly common, quite independent of political leaning, and must I admit in shame to still making it myself from time to time.
We cannot really know another person’s true motivation with certainty.
In other words, you’re a snob, who resents the > οἱ πολλοί > because they don’t like what you like, thus making it affordable for you.
I would argue that all politics represents this sort of conflict of interests being worked out, so, drop the snob language and we’re left with a simple statement that politics is about resolving conflicts of interest.
Also, there’s a world of difference between endorsing cultural fascism on the one hand and wishing people made different choices on the other. It seems the latter is the main point of both Emma and Carola’s comments.
I’m sorry if you misunderstood me, Lex, but I don’t actually want to push my tastes on to others (it would be terrible for me if everyone stumbled around drunk on vodka, because then there would be none left for me 
), I just think it’s sort of sad the way we are, that this perfect place that does not exist just can’t exist, because of the way humans are (which is… uh… human ). But that doesn’t mean we should resign and not try to do what we can to make this world better. If all I did was to do as nature tells me to do… well there would be killings! No really, you can’t say that because nature… we have to do this and that. Then we would have no morals at all, as moral is something we humans have made, that goes against our nature really, telling us what not to do (of course morals do not totally ignore human nature totally, that is what communism and Christianity do).
Expensive? Hmm.. Well I suppose vodka is sort of expensive, certainly more so than a certain brand of Rum, which is drunk here a lot, too. Otherwise, well I don’t do much that is expensive, everything I do is inexpensive actually, others in my year spend more than 10 times the amount of money I do on uh… illegal substances.
Lying in the sun on a hot day doesn’t cost you anything, neither does sitting in a dirty alleyway…
I suppose books and pizzas cost something, but nowhere near what others spend on fags or clubs.
I could have done without Latin, it’s a terrible subject (yes, yes, only for me it is… you all think it’s great…) instead I would rather see the money spent on a central heating system, some chemicals (our teacher buys them out of his own money), or some wires in the physics lab (we don’t have any electricity, only an old car battery, so guess how many really interesting experiments we do), some loos (we have 2 girls loos in the school and 300 girls, and the loos are ‘bloody’ awful, so I only use the public loos which are like miles away) and… Uh … did I mention some proper sports grounds and the repair of the sports hall and some new History maps (well, ok, they are very historic, but no use for modern history or geography).
Uhh.. computers might not be a bad idea either.
and so on…
I believe you need money to be happy, but not that being very rich makes you happy, once you have the basics, all the rest is just …uhh… rubbish. That’s the really strange thing… of course the DDR was terrible because of the Stasi and the people there had no voice, don’t think I wanted to live there… but the thing is that quite a few Germans (over half of East Berlin voted for their old dictatorship in the last election, so we now have a Red- Dark Red coalition in Berlin trying to clear up the mess, which I don’t think they’ll be able to do) feel that they were in fact happier back in East Germany. I’ve been to east Berlin and talked to the people there, and seen the documentaries on TV, it’s strange that these luxuries we enjoy would make such little difference isn’t it? All I’m trying to say is that this expensive luxury rubbish just doesn’t seem to make people happy, but they believer it will make them happy, which has something to do with adverts and films for sure. Just telling people from time to time that money isn’t everything may help them to lead happier lives.
Hope this strange rambling made some sense at least… not sure I can see any sense in it
haha ludus suus tantum sugit! magis quam meus!
No, politics is about forcing people to do what you want. There’s no real resolution of conflict, except in the sense that one side wins and the other side loses. Emma wants the government to force everybody to pay (through taxes) for all the things she thinks are good (like classical programs on TV), even though most of those people, if given a free choice, would rather spend their money on other things (like Harlequin romance thrillers and soap operas). I don’t see that I’m trying to use psychic powers to guess what she means, either. After all, she’s told us that she favors Marxism, and that’s what Marxists favor; redistributing other peoples’ wealth.
actually I want them to spend the money on tv programmes on Johnny Depp (which I suppose ZDF sort of do, by showing the films he is in without any adverts).
just something I’m interested in here, do you think grass should be leagalised, Lex? Cause if they had the choice I think people would spend their money one something else than TV , well most do anyway (it’s sort of legal for me where I live, but the laws very strange, you’re allowed to own it, but not allowed to buy it ).
the government should then spend no money on any anti drugs campains or anything else like that, because no one wants to watch their stupid ads (they used to be quite good, but since the EU have started making them, everyone just laughs their head off when they see one).
I don’t disagree with that sentiment. I just disagree rather severely with what you think would make things better, i.e. socialism. For me, the world would be a lot better if people would just let other people be, let them live their own lives, make their own decisions, and do what they think best with their own lives and property. Unfortunately, social democracy is against that. Social democrats are busy bodies who think that “we” should decide how “we” should spend “our” “resources” (which sometimes include the lives of young men) “collectively”. Ugh! It’s amazing how generous people can be with other peoples’ money, isn’t it? And how patriotic people can be with other peoples’ sons?
That should be up to the individual to decide, though, shouldn’t it? One man’s rubbish is another man’s treasure.
Sure. Once you get used to a life where you don’t have to think or be responsible for your own life, I imagine it would be hard to adjust to freedom.
I have some friends who came here from Russia. Every once in a while, when we go out drinking, the husband will tell me about how terrible everything is here, and how much better it really is in Russia. But strangely, he never goes back there. I wonder why that is.
It’s not that I disagree with you that much about the state of our “culture”, if you can call it that. McDonald’s, soap operas, reality TV shows, talking heads on FOX News selling the war, Pamela Anderson-Lee and Paris Hilton catfighting for the limelight… most of it’s trash. But when given freedom to choose, that’s what most people will choose. Get used to it. I just think that, considering the alternative, which is some committee choosing what we get to read, eat, listen to, watch on TV, all that trash is a small price to pay.
Well, I suppose there are plenty of worse actors out there. Actually, he was quite good in Ed Wood.
Yes. In fact, I think all drugs should be legalized.
People should be able to choose their own path, even if it leads to hell, as long as they are not violating the rights of another.
That would allow you to grow it yourself, I suppose. It’s still a silly law, though.
Correct.
Well, I’m sure there are some busy bodies and prudes who enjoy them, but they could always contribute towards them with their own money. (This assumes a privately owned TV system, where you can buy advertising time, though. )
Yikes. Since I’ve lived all my life in the U.S., for me getting your own way in the political sphere usually means you have to convince a bunch of other people to agree with you, usually by argumentation of some sort, compromise, give and take (or, for the cynical, by means of crass, propagandistic PR). I have been offered violence in the past to encourage me to change my stance on a few matters but that approach to domestic politics is frowned on most of the time.
After all, she’s told us that she favors Marxism, and that’s what Marxists favor; redistributing other peoples’ wealth.
I guess it’s hard for me to see a bald statement of the deepest flaw of Marxism - the simplistic understanding of people’s motivation - as an endorsement of Marxism, regardless of fond feelings about the Utopian world that was supposed to come out the other end of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Regardless, I still don’t see how an accusation of resentment or snobbery makes any useful point. The quick answer, “no, I’m not” ends that line of argument pretty solidly. To misquote Gertrude “a bad idea is a bad idea is a bad idea,” and how you came by the bad idea doesn’t matter at all in a debate.
(I’m not saying motivation is irrelevent: suspicions of motivation might might make you focus on some questions in useful ways.)
So have I.
Really? We take a different view of government, then. I take the view of George Washington and John Adams; “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence. It is force.” and “Fear is the foundation of most governments”.
Specifically, domestic government is a pack of alpha male dogs skirmishing over how the bones that have been taken by force from lesser dogs are to be divvied up amongst their supporters. It’s just that these dogs have the curious ability that they are able to conveniently forget that the bones were stolen in the first place.
Never mind that I qualified that I don’t think that her snobbery is necessarily a bad thing, or that I disagree with it…
She was going on about how bankrupt our fast food culture is, and how most people would be better off if they would do without a lot of the crap it produces. That’s snobbism, in my mind, although I happen to share the sentiment. It’s just that I, unlike Emma, think that socialism is a cure worse than the disease.
Lex, I admire your fervent believes in the individual rights of man. But unfortunately I fail to understand your passionate plea without encountering some slightly contradictory points. I was wondering if you could clear up the following issues, for me to increase my understanding of your statements:
[quote]In fact, I think all drugs should be legalized.
Emma_85 wrote:
Cause if they had the choice I think people would spend their money one something else than TV
People should be able to choose their own path, even if it leads to hell, as long as they are not violating the rights of another.
[/quote]
So all people should be able to do what they want, without invading other peoples rights. You will have to excuse my ignorance, for I do not know what specific rights you mean, but who is to stop them? Perhaps it is a Theban blindness, but I do not see how we can without a government that makes laws, that enforces laws and sets retribution on breaking these laws.
But what rights do people have? I assume that if I feel like bashing in someone’s windshield you would consider that a violation of another persons right to the safety of his or her property. The same for bashing up a person, just because I feel like it. Just to prevent these things from happening, could we say it might be convenient to make a written law for these rights?
I have the right to property, as I again assume you will agree.
How about the right to drive a car? I do need a road. Do I have the right to a road? It’s hard to build a road, to tell you the honest truth I don’t know how to, and even if I did, I couldn’t afford it. Perhaps it would be good, if we would get some organisation together to build and, oh, maintain roads. With lights! Sure, we could get a private organisation to do this, they could have toll-roads and make money, and people could use it when they wish, supply and demand, right? But Lex, I don’t make a lot of money, I’m just a junior assistant, I cannot afford to drive on toll roads. Yet I do have the right to a road right? How will we solve this?
I could walk! I’ll need a pavement. Do I have the right to a pavement Lex, for free? Who will pay for the pavement? And when I walk on this pavement right, do I have the right not step in some drunk’s vomit? I mean, I know he has the right to be drunk or stoned, or whatever, who doesn’t? But do I have the right not to be confronted with the results of his drug or alcohol use? Yet, who can affirm these rights? and, it’s silly question I’m sure, but do I have the right not to have sigaret smoke blown into my face?
And where shall I walk to? How about school? I have the right to education right? afterall, if we don’t get educated, how will we make the internet and mobile phones? Yet again, who will provide this education Lex? and at what price? private organisations again. educatin for who can afford it? but don’t i have the right to it, regardless of what my parents make, for am I not human, with all my human rights Lex?
and if I do have the right to education and um.. health care, clean water, electricity, roads, protection of myself and my property, but I cannot afford it, doesn’t this conflict? I mean I have the right to these things, but I cannot afford them, how can we solve this? perhaps, call me crazy, by… redistributing wealth?
I realise this would almost be on the brink of the root of all evil, socialism, but don’t I have the right to it Lex?
I’m just a bit confused…
Well, it’s possible I’m naive. Some days I’d agree completely with these sentiments.
I like to read history, and this influences my worldview in three ways:
First, reading about, say, the Albigensian crusade or Stalin’s terror really makes one cynical. The ability of humans to bring together masses of organized unfriendliness - some crossing generations - is really amazing and depressing. Even Herodotus has horrors. The stupidity that lead to WWI is breathtaking. This does not lead to a happy assessment of long term human capabilities.
Second, at the same time I know there is no previous time in history that I would want to live in, even if I could guarantee I didn’t end up a slave or a serf. And so…
Third, when I can calm down I can take a very long view of history. Over a several hundred year span I can see what I would consider real progress in ethics (slavery is not something most people would support in the U.S. today, though it was commonplace not too long ago). I don’t believe in perfection in human affairs, so I also see politics and economics as a long term project. Obviously I want improvement now, in my own lifetime, but I think at this point history has clear things to say about totalizing, all-or-nothing political and economic revolutions.
There’s a danger in this of seeing every step into the future as progress - clearly this is not the case - but it’s hard not to see how not dying in the mid-30s by freezing, a wracking disease or an absessed tooth isn’t progress of some sort. I raise bonsai, and have had to deal with a few people who think it’s cruel. Now, I consider this a little bizarre - I’m trying to keep the tree alive; any salad the questioners have had is not alive after dinner - but at the same time I think the question is important in that it shows an ethical concern outside our most narrow interests (my Stoic study comes out here). I consider this improvement, though I think we can conclude that hacking limbs off a tree isn’t cruel, unless perhaps if I end up with an ugly tree.
So now I’m rambling!
Er. Anyway. Long term! Perhaps politics is nothing but force. Yet somehow I’m not being stoned for not being a Christian (or a theist of any sort), nor am I being taken away in the night for making rude comments about Bush’s IQ, I was given an excellent education thanks to taxpayers and the government guaranteeing a shocking number of loans. There are all sorts of things very wrong about politics. But more is right than was a few 100 years ago, so I’m willing to keep at it, naive though that may be.
Never mind that I qualified that I don’t think that her snobbery is necessarily a bad thing, or that I disagree with it…
I’m a huge fan of elitism! Everyone should be! The resentment charge I objected to; it comes up a lot in political debate.
It’s just that I, unlike Emma, think that socialism is a cure worse than the disease.
And what cure do you recommend?
(Oy. George Lakoff says that one of the problems with liberals is that since they seem to think if you keep trying to reason with people you will ultimately prevail, they talk too much! Alas, I am an example sometime.)