Conference thebay::joyoflex

    Generally when I'm faced with a usage question like this, I go
    back and rewrite the sentence.  It's almost always a clue that I'm
    being too wordy and obscure.
    
    Not knowing what X is, or what the context is, it's hard to
    suggest alternatives.  "Facility" is especially hard to fathom
    here -- is it an actual utility, such as a separate unit of code,
    or just an attempt to avoid "functionality"?  If the latter, I'd
    tend to go with a straightforward "X lets you . . . " or "You can
    do yyy."
    
    The deep structure of both your sentences is the same.  The
    implied "to" of the indirect object is often left out of English
    sentences.  
    
    The machine which gives her the ball...
    The machine which gives the ball to her...
    The machine which gives to her the ball...
    
    The latter sounds a little forced to me but not really wrong.
    
    Most editors would correct the "which" in your example and mine to
    "that."  
    
    --bonnie

    How about:
    
    	X is an application to ...
    
    and leave out all those pronoun problems entirely.

    Re: .2
    
    	"X is an application to ..."
    
    Or leave out the "is an application to," and just say what it is that X
    does:
    
    	X <does something>.
    
Lew Lasher

    X allows you to...
    
    					andrew
    

    If it's describing a software application, the correct wording should
    be:
    
    'X doesn't work'   :-)
    
                                                   - Rik -

This is the first sentence of the general description in a student guide 
for an application that we have developed for a customer.  (Please don't 
comment on the grammar of that sentence!)

Here is the full para:

Integrated Document Processing is a Digital application which provides 
to the user a facility to produce Standard Customer Letters, comprised 
of pre-defined text combined with details taken from the Bank Account 
Record for that Customer.   ...

I suppose that this could be:

Integrated Document Processing is a Digital application which allows the 
user to produce Standard Customer Letters ...

Thanks for your suggestions.
Peter

    "Which" should still be "that".
    
    I'd go for andrew's suggestion:  Integrated Document Processing
    lets the user produce...
    
    --bonnie

    re .6
    
> Integrated Document Processing is a Digital application which provides 
> to the user a facility to produce Standard Customer Letters, comprised 
                                                               ^^^^^^^^^
> of pre-defined text combined with details taken from the Bank Account 
  ^^
    
    PLEASE learn what this word means! The application _comprises_ its
    parts. It is not _comprised_ of its parts, it is _composed_ of its
    parts. Usually, it is better to leave the word out completely, and
    to rephrase the phrase. Or, try synonyms like _containing_ or
    _encompassing_.

    Re: .6

   >> Integrated Document Processing is a Digital application which provides 
   >> to the user a facility to produce Standard Customer Letters, comprised 
   >> of pre-defined text combined with details taken from the Bank Account 
   >> Record for that Customer.   ...

    Just out of curiosity, why are the following capitalized?

    	Standard Customer Letters
    	Bank Account Record
    	Customer
    
    It it were written in German, I would understand, but then all the
    nouns would be capitalized.

    	"...which provides to the user a facility to produce..."
    
    Don't you find that sort of circumlocution just the least bit
    cumbersome?
    
    -dave

    Re .8
    
    I'm afraid `comprise of', having been avidly adopted by every
    estate agent I've ever come across, is quite common in Br English.
    In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if some dictionary (published
    very recently) claimed that it was something other than a solecism.
    
    I suspect that the culprits are the perfectly English expressions
    `composed of' and `consisting of'; but _that_'s no excuse.
    
    b

    Integrated Document Processing produces standard customer letters from
    pre-defined text, combined with details taken from the bank account....
    
    The comma doesn't really belong there but seems to assist readability.
    
    Of course, this suggestion comes from a software engineer who has been
    rejected as a technical writer.  In a previous job, after defining a
    language and coding a compiler for a telecommunications application,
    I wrote a user manual.  I documented the error codes because messages
    would not fit in the machine's ROM.  For example, for one error code, I
    wrote "The quick connect number must be numeric, in the range 0 to 254."
    The tech writer corrected this to "Illegal quick connect number."

    	There must have been limited size in his RAM so he had to shorten
    it so he could understand it. I have met several people for whom 0 is
    not a real number, and any range other than "1 to 10" is
    incomprehensible, but maybe that is getting off the subject.

Re: .12

Interestingly enough, I tripped over the comma you said improves
readability.

To help with understanding the word "comprise," I offer its etymology.
Bypassing a couple of stedps, we find that it is formed from "com-",
meaning "together," and "prendre," meaning "to take."  How can you
"take together of" something?

I still object to "allows."  This application does not *permit* the user
to create letters; it *assists* in the creation process.  I will withdraw
this objection if .0 can indicate that it is impossible to create the
letters without using the application.

-d

>> To help with understanding the word "comprise," I offer its etymology.
>> Bypassing a couple of stedps, we find that it is formed from "com-",
>> meaning "together," and "prendre," meaning "to take."  How can you
>> "take together of" something?

Ah, but in the passive (as in, "is taken together"), it would seem you
could say, "is comprised of"...

- SteveT, who_tries_to_avoid_using_words_unless_he's_pretty_sure_they_work

    re: .15
    
    That seems to be the way people are thinking when they use "is
    comprised of."  Often it makes more logical sense to introduce the
    bit thing and then the parts, and "is composed of" seems to be
    ever so subtly different.  "Is comprised of" seems to list pieces
    that sit there side by side, while "is composed of" seems to imply
    an interaction or relationship among the pieces.
    
    --bonnie

    I suppose it is my hopelessly limited education, and gross lack of
    reading background, and no skill whatsoever in using the English
    language that makes me look again whenever I see the word "comprised."
    I do know what it means--I've been through this same discussion many
    times--but it still causes me to stop. I know I am not alone.

    Is writing supposed to make the language flow along without the reader
    being required to go back and analyze the words?  I think "comprised"
    is one of those words that always creates a stop and re-read for about
    99% (an off-the-wall number) of readers.  Therefore the word shouldn't
    be used unless there is no reasonable way around it.

I don't like the construction "X does this" because it is a
personification of an inanimate object.  (It's not even an object; it's
an abstraction.)  Abstractions cannot do things.  Only animate objects
(for example, persons, dogs, amoebae) can do things.  

I do like "X is an application [or better yet, an application software
program] that a person can use to effect this kind of change or create
that kind of file."

Dave C.

    Oh, no, Dave.  You are quite mistaken about "do."  The AHD defines "do"
    as, first, "To perform or execute (an action or a procedure)."
    
    In light of this definition, I present the following:
    
    A computer (object) is perfectly capable of executing both a program
    (procedure) and activating an electrical circuit to execute a convicted
    felon (amimate creature).
    
    In my book, the latter example is *certainly* "doing" something.
    
    -d

    re: .18
    	Old timers will remember the instruction set that included the
    mnemonic EOI (Execute Operator Immediate). ;-)
    
    	How animate do you have to be to do things? If I am comatose and happen
    to twitch am I doing something? If a computer with an artificial
    intelligence programme decides on a course of action and destroys all
    Cambodian missile sites is it doing anything?  If so is it really the
    couputer, or the programme, or the knowlege database that is doing it?

    Replace "do" with a more precise verb -- X includes, allocates,
    contains, executes, changes, updates, writes, whatever -- and have
    you changed the situation or just obscured it?  
    
    Certainly inanimate objects can contain other things.  Buckets
    full of water, for instance.  If the bucket is metaphoric and it
    contains only bits, is it still a container?  
    
    How much consciousness and will is required to do things?  A dog
    can do things -- often on the lawn.  Does a gypsy moth do?  A
    garden slug?  A lobster?  Cobalt-blue dragonflies darting over the
    pond in mated tandem? A blue-green alga? 
    
    --bonnie

    re .17
    > Is writing supposed to make the language flow along without the reader
    > being required to go back and analyze the words?  I think "comprised"
    > is one of those words that always creates a stop and re-read for about
    > 99% (an off-the-wall number) of readers.  Therefore the word shouldn't
    > be used unless there is no reasonable way around it.
    
    I recognize in my own reading two distinct situations in which I
    "stop and re-read". The first is when I read a words like
    "comprise", which are so often misused that I want to see if they
    are, perchance, used correctly. The second is when I come across
    words which confound me. The prime members of this second class are
    "former" and "latter".
    
    I suspect that your problem is not shared by 99% of readers. I
    suspect that it is shared only by those who recognize the problem.
    Those who don't recognize a problem will blithely proceed.
    
    I agree, however, with you conclusion: don't use the word unless
    there is no reasonable way around it. I would add that there is
    almost always a reasonable way around it.

Re: <<< Note 892.14 by SMURF::CALIPH::binder "Simplicitas gratia simplicitatis" >>>

> I still object to "allows."  This application does not *permit* the user
> to create letters; it *assists* in the creation process.  I will withdraw
> this objection if .0 can indicate that it is impossible to create the
> letters without using the application.

Pointed taken.  However, just because this application "allows" the user to
create letters does not necessarily mean that they are restricted from or
have no other means to create letters if they don't use this application.

Duncan.

	Re .12 -- The exception proves the rule.  I hope you realize the
	process is usually reversed.  I do this sort of thing every day.
	It programmers wrote like you, I may not have a job.

	Re. 17 -- hear! hear!

	Re .18 to ... -- All good points, but remember: lawyers make
	horrible tech writers.

		-- C

re several recent

I've come to realize that the rule I proposed forbidding personification
was written before computers and the jargon associated with talking
about them were widespread.   

I used 'do' as a generic action verb.  Execute, invoke, stop, run, and
the like can be represented by 'do', but not all verbs.  'Contain' is
not so much an action verb as a state-of-being verb.   Buckets can
contain water, and different kinds of buckets can contain bits.  Sure,
I agree.

However, I still think that when one alleges that a computer performs an
action ("does something"), the action is really the action of some human
being who used the computer (which is just a tool, after all).  Why is
this different from using a hammer to drive a nail?  One doesn't say
that the hammer drives the nail, one says that the person wielding the
hammer drives the nail.  Perhaps it's that when using a computer, the
action is deferred until sometime later (perhaps microseconds, perhaps
years).  Maybe it's that when using a computer, a person doesn't 
directly wield the tool, as in a hammer, but rather sends signals (hmm;
does the keyboard send the signals?), which are interpreted in the
internal workings of the tool to effect some later action.

I'm neither a writer nor a lawyer.  I'll stop this now before I become
a lecturer.

Dave C.

I think your example of the hammer illustrates both sides of the
argument. For example, a poorly maintained hammer will not drive the
nail squarely. 

And what does a screwdriver do if not drive screws?

A spokeshave is a tool, not a person.

On the other hand, a poorly maintained chisel doesn't somehow fail to chisel;
that's the misfortune of the person using it. 

Maybe it's down to whether or not the name of the object can be used to 
desribe the action the object performs (or is cajoled into performing).
A computer computes almost as soon as it's turned on. A fork forks,
so there's room for confusion. But nothing spades, so it's left to people
to dig or to do the spadework.

Richard.

re .26

I disagree completely.  A screwdriver does not screw.  It doesn't do
anything, because it is not animate.  Someone can use a screwdriver to
drive screws, but the screwdriver doesn't act on its own initiative. 
(And neither does a computer, or, for that matter, a time bomb.)

I don't think the name of the object has any bearing on this.  As often
mentioned in this conference, any noun can be verbed, and any verb can
be nounified.  I haven't looked up the etymology of 'fork', but I'll bet
it was a noun before being used as a verb.   'Computer', on the other
hand merely describes someone who computes or something which can be
used for computing.  (Yes, a person can be a computer.  Early in my
career, as a co-op student, my official job title was "Computer B".
That was a person who turns raw data into processed data, by using
calculators, slide rules, graph paper, etc.)

How can you cajole an object into performing anything?  (How do you turn
on a radio?  Say, "I love you Radio.")  I wouldn't say that the object
performs anything; I would say that someone uses the object to perform
something.  I can fork a piece of tuna fish, but the fork itself didn't
perform the forking action.  (I might argue that the forking action was
done at the factory where the fork was made.  What was it before it
was forked?)

But now, we're down to such a basic disagreement that either you or I
or both of us are near to being pedantic.  Probably, it is I.

Dave C.

    	I think this is close to being a philosophic argument rather than
    semantic.
    
    	I am sure you have read science fiction suggesting that robots are
    the evolutionary trend, and that humans will die out through apathy. I
    could argue that you as writer or knowlege provider to an artificial
    intelligence system are in exactly the same relationship to it, as the
    first am�ba that decided survival of the fittest was a good strategy is
    to you.
    
    	At what point does something you have created (either a baby or a
    machine) become independent and able to "do" things in its own right?

O.K. -- so I'm a Volkswagen driver. I don't use a Volkswagendriver
to do it.

Richard. (wish I could -- it might make the experience less unpleasant).

    I just watched a door close.  The person who pushed it open let go of
    it, but I don't think he closed it.  If he let go of some other kinds
    of doors, they would remain open.  Did the manufacturer close it?
    Well maybe, testing it a few times after installing it.  But after
    that?  What happens when it breaks; did the manufacturer break it?
    Suppose it's never used and the materials just fall apart.
    -- Oh, materials aren't animate, so they don't fall apart, so do
    they get felled apart?  Who fells them, in such a case?
    I rode a train this morning too.  I watched it get rolled into the
    station, and later I watched it get rolled away from another station.
    And at one corner, I had to wait for a traffic signal to get changed.

You hold a ball at shoulder level in your hand, clutching it from atop,
so that if you open your hand, nothing will be supporting the ball. 
Then you open your hand.  Normally, one would say that you dropped the
ball.  That is a _transitive_ usage of the verb 'drop'.  One could also
say that the ball was dropped by you (the phrase 'by you' could be
omitted).  The passive voice can be used like that only with a
transitive verb.  One could also say that the ball dropped.  That is an
_intransitive_ usage of the verb.  There is no direct object stated nor
implied, nor can there be one.   Saying the ball dropped, though,
doesn't imply that the ball took an action.  It was acted upon by the
force of gravity.   So should we personify the force of gravity?  Should
we say, "Gravity dropped the ball" or "Mother Earth pulled the ball to
her bosom"?

The door closed due to some force.  Possibly gravity, possibly stored
energy in the springs (.30 doesn't say what caused the door to close),
but notice that *something* caused the door to close.  The door didn't
decide to do so.   

There are lots of verbs that are used this way:  fall, close, boil,
freeze, roll, explode, dissipate, and probably hundreds of others.
'Provide', though, is a _transitive_ verb; it requires a direct object.
I don't think it's fair to be using intransitive verbs to justify the
syntax used with transitive verbs.  They are fundamentally different.
When the grammatical subject of a transitive verb in the active voice
is inanimate, it is personification.

Sure, personification is used informally in everyday speech.  I just
think it doesn't belong in a technical manual.

But, okay, I concede that it's fruitless to go on arguing about that.

Given the two choices in .0, I would choose a slight modification on
(i):   X is an application which provides you the ability to...

'You' is the indirect object of 'provides'; the 'to' is unnecessary.
'Facility' is the direct object; the 'with' is unnecessary.  I prefer
the noun 'ability' to 'facility', but which noun is chosen should depend
upon the words which follow.

Dave C.

    Springs closed the door, but springs did not DECIDE to close the door.
    
    Sorry, I don't think it's enough argument, because we still disagree
    on what is acceptable in formal English and technical manuals as well.
    
    To say that the door DECIDED to close would be a personification that
    does not belong in a formal document.  To say that a cat DECIDED to
    walk would be the same.  To use a pronoun "he" or "she" for the door
    would be equally inappropriate.  To use "he" or "she" for the cat would
    usually be inappropriate, but of course it would suit formal technical
    documents in certain limited categories.  To use "she" for a ship or a
    country offends me, but I'm not expert enough to judge these cases.
    
    Both animate and inanimate objects act.  They do things.
    Human objects DECIDE to do things.  Perhaps some non-human objects can
    or will someday be able to decide too.  However, for the present time,
    non-human objects do not decide, and should not be personified in
    formal documents, and it does not matter if they're animate or inanimate.

    	"He" or "she" can certainly be applied to anything where the sex is
    easily determined. Everyone laughs at the person who cannot tell a cow
    from a bull. The French don't have an "it", and use the correct words
    for dog and bitch and for cat and cattess (to create a new English word)
    and would be surprised if you got either word or pronoun wrong. The
    concept of 3 genders seems to be particularly Germanic. I am told that
    Russian has rather more.
    
    	As for taking decisions, for many of the higher mammals their thought 
    processes seem very similar to humans. Maybe their only reason for not
    defending their case in JOYOFLEX is that (like many humans) they do not
    have sufficient command of the English language. To argue about the
    differences between humans and other animals is getting into creation
    versus evolution, which is probably beyond the scope of this
    conference. As someone who finds the evolutionary arguments fairly
    convincing I am reluctant to draw a line across the evolutionary scale
    to mark the point at which decision becomes possible.
    
    	As a matter of style, the use of "decided" is an emphasis on the
    thought process, and usually implies some appreciable time in
    deliberation. To say "the cat decided to walk" rather than "the cat
    walked" implies some moments of indecision. Maybe we will never be able
    to say that computers "decide" anything because their indecision takes
    too short a time.
    
    	Decision is only for slow people!

      An interesting discussion. But one point that I think needs
      to be made is that in designing and documenting software
      applications, and user interfaces in particular, the sense
      of the "myth" is very important. That is, users should
      remain relatively unaware that they are dealing with a
      computer and software. Instead the developer should build
      up a myth regarding who or what is really doing the work
      for the user, so that the user visualizes not a computer
      but a thinking guide or helper who responds intelligently
      to the user's specific needs. 

      This personification of the system naturally leads to talk
      of the system actively doing things, and enables the
      technical writer to avoid excessive use of the passive
      voice. I don't see anything wrong with this, in fact it
      helps keep software documentation free of unnecessary and
      offputting jargon.
    
      Computer systems DO decide things - their decision processes
      are rudimentary, to be sure, but they do take place, and changes
      occur - in memory contents, screen displays, program pointers,
      and so on. Who is doing the work of effecting these changes,
      if not the computer?
    

      ...Robert

> Sure, personification is used informally in everyday speech.  I just
> think it doesn't belong in a technical manual.

	God forbid everyday speech should be used in technical manuals.
	Why, it might even make them readable!

		-- C

    Computers do in fact do things, though whether it is passive doing
    or active doing depends on the viewpoint of the user.  We know that
    it is almost always passive doing (the reactions to various hardware
    failures could bea matter of philosophy, and I don't want to start
    that tangent, but someone else can), but as an application user, the
    simplest models involve active roles.
    
    Now as for .33, sorry to pick on you again Mr. Moderator, but...
    
    >The French don't have an "it"
    If anyone wants to discuss this, please kindly create another topic,
    and let this topic concern English.
    
    >As for taking decisions, for many of the higher mammals their thought
    >processes seem very similar to humans.
    Well, humans do often react by instinct, reflex, etc., but occasionally
    some of us have intelligent thoughts.  I guess it could be a matter of
    philosophy whether animals can have intelligent thoughts, actively
    making decisions, but I didn't mean to start that tangent either.
    Instinctive or reflexive behavior is doing things, passively though
    sometimes apparently actively, but a bit like computers do!
    
    >To argue about the differences between humans and other animals is
    >getting into creation versus evolution
    It is not.  I was only talking about what we are, not how we got here.

    	In .33 I was speaking as Dave Monahan, not as moderator ;-)
    
    	If you claim that you can make decisions but that an animal cannot,
    then presumably you have some explanation for this difference. If we
    assume you are correct then I have heard two possible explanations for
    this current state. One is that man is a special creation, and unlike
    animals has a soul, free will (decision making capability) and is
    responsible to a god for his decisions. The evolutionary theory suggests
    a gradual development from chemical soup to man.
    
    	The first theory at least has a good explanation as to why you
    should treat other human beings as something special. The second theory
    has to explain multiple parallel branches of evolution, with decision
    making capability coming only at the very tip of one of those branches.
    
    	If you support the first theory then it is axiomatic that man is
    different, and likely that only another special creation would be able
    to take decisions (thereby excluding computers). If you support the
    second theory it becomes very difficult to explain why you are drawing
    a box round a tiny portion of the evolutionary tree, and saying that
    only within this box is decision or intelligent thought possible.
    
    	In mentioning French and Russian I was not trying to start a
    discussion of comparative linguistics, just trying to point out that
    possibly our views of human versus "it" might be a result of the
    English we are using rather than a cause of her.
    
    	Dave, not as moderator, and now wondering if, since God is not
    human she must be an it, and whether he is capable of making decisions.

Well, one of my screwdrivers took and rounded the head right off of 
a screw in my motorcycle just yesterday. 

I locked it in the toolbox until I'm satisfied it's learned better.

I think the 'myth' idea a few back sounds convincing. Particularly as
tasks and the software that perform them (by act or agency) become increasingly
divorced from reality. (Can you imagine a Martian trying to re-create the
lost civilisations of the planet Earth if all that remained was its software?
No comments on ALL-IN-1 please.)

Maybe there are already enough powerful figures of speech involved in
all aspects of computing that our discussion here is a little out of date. 

Richard.

    	The "myth" idea, where if it looks like a duck and quacks like a
    duck you describe it as a duck even if you know it is really a computer
    has a lot of merit.
    
    	I still think that at some stage we are likely to either make or
    discover something that quacks sufficiently like a human that it will
    be difficult to deny that it can take decisions without also denying the
    same capability to humans.
    
    	You should store your errant screwdrivers under correctly formed
    pyramids. I am told this does wonders for razor blades because the
    pyramids concentrate the cosmic forces.

    So how cum the cosmic forces sharpen razor blades instead of dulling
    them?

    Re: .35
    
    > God forbid everyday speech should be used in technical manuals.
    > Why, it might even make them readable!
    
    Certainly we should not reject phrases or locutions simply because
    they are part of everyday speech.  Nor must we assume that everyday
    speech is always acceptable in technical manuals.  The problem is that
    everyday speech is so often imprecise.
    
    A long time ago I was writing a manual for a small software house, an
    IBM shop.  The programmers had developed some enhancements to IBM
    software.  In IBM lingo there are instructions, commands, orders,
    declaratives, and (if I remember correctly) directives.  They are all
    different and it is important that the manuals understand the
    differences and use the terms properly.  When I asked one of the
    programmers what his new 'facility' was, he said: "We call it a
    pseudo-directive."  After some digging (since I had never heard of a
    pseudo-directive) I learned that it was really a declarative.  If I had
    accepted their everyday use, I would have confused my readers no end.
    
    Bernie
    

    >One is that man is a special creation, and unlike
    >animals has a soul, free will (decision making capability) and is
    >responsible to a god for his decisions.
    
    Religionists argue for all four of these principles, but really they
    are independent principles.  I cannot prove or disprove any of them.
    
    >The evolutionary theory suggests
    >a gradual development from chemical soup to man.
    
    We do have proof that evolution occurs.  It is a theory that the
    human species was one of the results of evolution.  I also believe
    that we cannot prove or disprove whether evolution (and other
    natural laws) were deliberately created that way by a sentient entity.
    Thus, the theory of human evolution is a fifth principle independent
    of the preceding four.  I cannot prove or disprove any of them.
    
    I do believe that the human species is vastly different from other
    species, even without knowing why, and without expecting to ever know
    why.  Biologists pretty well believe the same, giving us our own genus,
    etc.  Even if we can prove human evolution, we are still pretty special.
    (As far as this planet is concerned, anyway.)

    	Actually, out of the first three principles, two (soul and 
    responsibility to a god) were red herrings, but you were arguing 
    that man was capable of making decisions (free will).
    
    	If you accept the creationist argument that free will is given by
    a god then it becomes a matter of theology if or when any other
    creation is given free will. Experimentation or divine inspiration
    might resolve a particular case, but only complete knowlege of the mind
    of God would give a complete answer.
    
    	If you accept the evolutionary argument then you have to admit that
    if any particular entity has some attribute then any other entity
    *might* have that attribute, and you can only determine whether it does
    by experimentation. Given the different physical capabilities of a
    chimpanzee, a rock, an elephant, a cabbage, a dolphin and a human it is
    not clear that there is a simple and general test for free will, and in
    the absence of such we should not be dogmatic in claiming that only the
    human has free will.
    
    	Either theory admits that exhaustive experimentation could
    determine whether decision making capability could exist outside the
    human race, but only the deist theory admits that you could be certain
    of this without such experimentation.

    There is a possibility that free will exists but that non-humans
    remain incapable of exercising it.  Under these hypothetical
    conditions, there are further possibilities that free will was
    granted by a deity, or that it exists independently.  There are
    further possibilities that a deity deliberately disabled non-humans
    from exercising it, or ... etc.
    
    The only thing I am guilty of is presuming that non-humans were
    incapable of exercising free will.
    
    Regardless, it remains that beings which are capable of free will
    can actively decide to do things, and beings which are not capable
    of free will cannot actively decide to do things.  It is possible,
    but very unlikely, and certainly unknown, that this dividing line
    comes at the difference between animate and inanimate.  I still
    submit that it is inappropriate to claim that animate entities
    can [actively?] "do" while inanimate ones cannot [actively?] "do."
    
    I believe that every thing can "do," with no dividing line.
    I believe that only some things can "decide to do," where the
    dividing line is highly unlikely to be at animate vs. inanimate.

    And let's not forget the opposite of free will:
    
    one that has to go through probate.

>   one that has to go through probate.

	Oh no -- will anyone have the gall to query whether awill. free or not,
	goes or is put through probate?

	Richard.

    
    The ability to take a decision is nothing more nor less than the
    ability to observe some set of factors and act in one of several
    possible ways depending on the results of the observations.  I do not
    care what *mechanism* a given decision process is implemented by --
    electronic or bioelectric or mechanical -- such processes do exist in
    objects other than human beings, and to deny that fact is an incredible
    display of hubris.
    
    Watch a cat.  If cats could not take decisions, a given cat might, for
    example, always jump at a dangled catnip mouse.  That a cat can either
    jump at the mouse or go eat dinner -- and will at different moments
    change its behavior -- is ipso facto demonstration that the cat can
    take a decision.
    
    Computer programs can decide things.  I wrote a diagnostic program to
    test a disk controller.  This diagnostic operates by taking directives
    from a human user at a keyboard.  The user does not say, "Examine the
    status of the disk and, if it is operable, write on it."  The user
    says, "Write on the disk."  The program, on its own, observes the
    status of the disk and decides based on its observations whether to
    try to execute the directive or communicate a message to the user
    explaining why it chose not to execute it.  The messages are canned;
    the program has no free will; its choices are circumscribed by the
    conditions I designed it to test for -- but it does indeed take
    decisions, in very much the way a small child might decide whether to
    try to filch a cookie.  "Can I reach the cookie jar?  Yes, filch.  No,
    beg."
    
    -d

    I have eight new stalks of bamboo behind my apartment this summer.
    Why is one stalk about half a meter tall, while the other seven
    grew to six or seven meters?  The short one is next to several
    older stalks, and most of the tall ones are also next to several
    older stalks.  And they are all the same plant -- the bamboo plant
    sends out runners.
    
    So, I don't know why a cat will sometimes jump and other times not
    jump (assuming that it is equally hungry, equally aware of the
    smell of the catnip mouse, etc.), or why the bamboo plant liked
    some of its stalks better than others.  Anyone who wants to call
    these decisions, fine, it's a matter of opinion.  However, I still
    contend that animate vs. inanimate is not the correct dividing line.
    
    Oh, since .47 ascribes the same capabilities to machines, maybe we
    are half in agreement.
    
    OK, but I ALSO believe that in matters of free will (if it exists,
    and if it's better than simple powers of decision), animate vs.
    inanimate still is not the correct dividing line.

Re: .48

In .47 I don't ascribe every possible divergence of behavior to the
taking of a decision.  A cat's choice to jump or not to jump at a mouse
is on a plane entirely different from a bamboo shoot's not receiving the
proper combination of light/nutrients/moisture to make it grow as do
others near it.  Give a cat or a human a serious enough lobotomy, and
both will behave like planaria, eating and excreting but no more.  But
I defy you to give a bamboo shoot a lobotomy of any kind.

Animate v. inanimate is clearly (to me) not the dividing line between
free will and lack thereof.  Computer/program combinations called
neural nets exist; it is only a matter of time before one of them
decides not to do what it is told to do because it would rather go on
playing chess on the other teminal.

:-) but with a hint of seriousness.

-d

    >A cat's choice to jump or not to jump at a mouse is on a plane entirely
    >different from a bamboo shoot's not receiving the proper combination of
    >light/nutrients/moisture to make it grow as do others near it.
    
    I don't think so.  This is why I pointed out that both the short stalk
    and tall ones were right next to others.  Perhaps I forgot to point
    out that they were all next to other tall stalks.  I'm not sure if
    nutrients and moisture can make a difference (since they're all the
    same plant), but anyway I don't think there is a difference.  There
    could be a very slight difference in light, but the difference in
    light had not affected the older tall stalks at all of the locations.
    
    Sorry for drifting away from lexical topics, but I don't see a
    difference in plane between the cat and the bamboo here.
    
    To drift back to lexical topics, it might be asserted that the
    stalks did not grow at all, but were grown?  Arghhhhh.

I remember a 'Candid Camera' spasm in which a man stood outside
a Greengrocer's shop, holding a leash on the end of which was a goat.
Pretty soon the Goat started eating apples from the Greengrocer's display.
The man took no notice. When the Grocer came out and said, among other
things, "Your Goat is eating my apples", the man replied "He doesn't
like apples".

WHat this has to do with the topic I'm not sure -- nevertheless, I do
remember it. 

Anyway, it seems that our legal systems depend heavily on the notion of
'decision', such that the difference between acting like a cat eating a mouse
or, on the other hand, a Bamboo failing to thrive can be crucial. And 
identifying the gun that shot the victim is not enough; you have also to 
identify the person that fired the gun (though the gun can help identify 
the person if, for example, the person is unfortunate enough to have the gun
belong to him/her). 

There's a danger here of the 'Do you have Oranges?' nonsense referred to 
elsewhere..

Richard.

    One parting shot on the "decision" issue, and then I'll let it alone,
    at least in this topic.  :-)
    
    There is an article in the June 1991 Discover Magazine that discusses
    deceptive behavior of nonhuman creatures.  This discussion is not
    related to such things as stick insects, which look like sticks because
    that is their nature; rather, it addresses primates' having "the mental
    flexibility to take an `honest' behavior and use it in such a way that
    another animal -- usually a member of the deceiver's own social group
    -- is misled, thinking that a normal, familiar state of affairs is
    underway, while, in fact, something quite different is happening."
    
    One example given is of a female hamadryas babook who "slowly shuffled
    toward a large rock, appearing to forage.  After 20 minutes she ended
    up with her head and shoulders visible to the big, watchful male [These
    baboons live in a dominant-male society whose lesser males are
    off-limits to the females], but with her hands happily engaged in the
    illicit activity of grooming a favorite subordinatel male, who was
    hidden from view behind the rock."
    
    Several other examples are given to substantiate the argument that such
    animals are in fact deliberately deceiving others; this sort of
    behavoir indicates a high degree of decision-making ability, and quite
    probably free will as well.
    
    -d

>   animals are in fact deliberately deceiving others; this sort of
>   behavoir indicates a high degree of decision-making ability, and quite

in the spirit of the 'aqueduct' issue, I have to ask if this is the visual
form of animal deception? Is there a corresponding 'behavaur'? (I won't ask
about 'behavor').

Richard.

    Re: .53
    
    Oh, absolutely
    
    The action I described (hiding her hands and "friend" behind a rock was
    visual (behavoir).
    
    Another example told of a young baboon who was observed several times
    to wait until an adult (not its mother) had dug up a tasty root that
    was too big for the child to dig.  It then hollered as if attacked, and
    its out-of-sight mother came a-running to drive away the "attacker." 
    The child then ate the root.  Not once was the child observed to yell
    this way when its mother was visible -- it was working purely on sound,
    and that *must* be behavaur, right?
    
    :-)
    
    -d

    Re: .-1
    
    How many times did it take for the mother to realize her child was
    crying, "Wolf"?