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Change, Ken, Ludwig & I
Given Ken's previous writings about Ludwig Wittgenstein (see CEDA
yearbook, 1990) I was a bit surprised by his note on the term 'change.'
While I think the stated intention most noble, the bottom line is that
increase and decrease do not restrict a topic any more or less than change
does. Case in point:
Oceans
On this topic which included the verb phrase increase development, we saw
such cases as stop fishing, install turtle-proof nets, create ocean
sanctuaries, ratify LOS, etc. You see, 'increase' has its passive, active,
qualitative, quantitative, and other meanings to contend with. The
topicality debates were pretty heated on that topic, but they were still
damn hard to win. Had it not been for Gina Ercolini's truly inspired
development of an astoundingly brilliant rework of the effects-T position
(a phenomenal piece of authorship on her part... utterly amazing job of
turning a garbage position into a round winning argument) we would never
have had a chance at negative ballots.
My point is, that if you are telling your novices that "increase" in the
topic somehow preserves a unidirectional plan action for them to debate
and link disads (or critiques) to, or to get mutual exclusivity for the
counterplan, they will be sorely disappointed in practice.
Language won't play that game.
Pat Gehrke
ps- Anyone who wonders what I mean by reinventing topicality in previous
posts should take note of Ercolini's work on effects-T. No definitions,
next to nothing in terms of grammar standards, just two pages on truly
amazing insight as to the relationship between Plan, Fiat, and Ground. It
was a fantastic position to advance and defend.
Archive created by Jonathan Stanton (jonathan@cs.jhu.edu)
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