In my mind, the set of actions that make up the human experience can, with few exceptions, be split into two seperate camps: the world of games and the world of stories. For the topic at hand, games will suffice.
The definition of a "game" is malleable, but I will describe it thus:
A negotiated formal set of constraints, whose outcome is arbitrated by a set of finite decisions interacting with other similarly constrained agents.
In this way, one could say that all of life is a game - school, writing, love, Mortal Kombat, climbing the corporate ladder, Chutes & Ladders, harvesting honey RUNNING FROM BEES et al.
Why yes, I am white bread. What tipped you off?
The Management has looked upon Bea & Honey's kerfuffle about cheating in the world's worst game, and thus he spoke:
Bea and Honey aren't playing the same game at all. Sure you've got the same overlay of row upon dreadful row of WHY ARE YOU PLAYING SOLITAIRE but when we look at the structure of a game, we can see that the rules (however strict or loose) are always negotiated - the first rule of any game is that all players agree to play by the communally understood rules. Because solitaire is A HORRIBLE GAME that is only played by a single agent, the rules are essentially whimsy. QED Bea is not cheating, she's just playing Beataire.
Which is still a terrible fucking game.
I *told* Bea that I was willing to concede, that sure semantically, I was no longer playing solitaire. But as anyone who is any knows, semantics is a discipline for philosophers and jack asses (same thing, right!) But that pragmatically it makes no sense to change the name a thing due to slight variations. Doesn't English have enough vocabulary already?
ReplyDeleteFor those of you who haven't ready any Noam Chomksy, I'll fill you in. Yes, English does have too many words.
PS pragmatics is also a discipline for jack asses who aren't good at math.
i agree with everything both of you said and yet, somehow, you're both still wrong. But mostly just Honey. You know how much I hate philosophers, so I take it very personally every time you bring this up. It almost upsets me.
ReplyDeleteIf we are really talking only about solitaire then go ahead and still call it solitaire. But if we are talking about evolution then you're wrong again.
I see your Chomsky point and maybe knowing more words is lazier BUT omfg all I said in the first place is that you're playing a different game, essentially. And The Management and your mom agree with me.
God did it.
Also if everything is games and stories, and all of the things you listed are games, where do the stories come in?
ReplyDeleteStories come in when I'm less drunk and care to elaborate more. SCENE.
ReplyDelete