Both gossip and joking are intrinsically valuable activities. Both are essentially social activities that strengthen interpersonal... bonds--we do not tell jokes and gossip to ourselves. As popular activities that evade social restrictions, they often refer to topics that are inaccessible to serious public discussion. Gossip and joking often appear together: when we gossip we usually tell jokes and when we are joking we often gossip as well.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
If doubtful whether to end with "yours faithfully," or "yours truly," or "yours most truly," &c. (there are at least a dozen varie...ties, before you reach "yours affectionately"), refer to your correspondent's last letter, and make your winding-up at least as friendly as his: in fact, even if a shade more friendly, it will do no harm!LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
We do not go to bed in single pairs; even if we choose not to refer to them, we still drag there with us the cultural impedimenta ...of our social class, our parents' lives, our bank balances, our sexual and emotional expectations, our whole biographies--all the bits and pieces of our unique existences.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Now that Stevenson is dead I can think of but one English- speaking author who is really keeping his self-respect and sticking for... perfection. Of course I refer to that mighty master of language and keen student of human actions and motives, Henry James.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Mr. Christian, it is about time for many people to begin to come to the White House to discuss different phases of the coal strike.... When anybody comes, if his special problem concerns the state, refer him to the governor of Pennsylvania. If his problem has a national phase, refer him to the United States Coal Commission. In no event bring him to me.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Strange goings on! Jones did it slowly, deliberately, in the bathroom, with a knife, at midnight. What he did was butter a piece o...f toast. We are too familiar with the language of action to notice at first an anomaly: the 'it' of 'Jones did it slowly, deliberately,...' seems to refer to some entity, presumably an action, that is then characterized in a number of ways.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to rea...lity.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Let us say, then, that both the realist and the antirealist accept the results of scientific investigations as "true," on a par wi...th more homely truths.... And call this acceptance of scientific truths the "core position." What distinguishes realists from antirealists, then, is what they add onto this core position ... a third alternative emerges--and an attractive one at that. It is the core position itself, and all by itself.... Let me introduce the acronym NOA (pronounced as in "Noah"), for natural ontological attitude, and, henceforth, refer to the core position under that designation.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »