Xref: utzoo soc.college:2133 comp.edu:1763
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-ncis!helios.ee.lbl.gov!pasteur!ames!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!njin!princeton!phoenix!dykimber
From: dykimber@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Daniel Yaron Kimberg)
Newsgroups: soc.college,comp.edu
Subject: Re: Student and Course Integrity
Message-ID: <5170@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 5 Jan 89 23:10:14 GMT
References: <1217.23C35B05@rubbs.FIDONET.ORG> <13206@bellcore.bellcore.com> <9264@ut-emx.UUCP>
Reply-To: dykimber@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Daniel Yaron Kimberg)
Organization: Princeton University, NJ
Lines: 41

[i hope i have the attributions correct, but it was somewhat unclear]
In article <9264@ut-emx.UUCP> nather@ut-emx.UUCP (Ed Nather) writes:
>In article <13206@bellcore.bellcore.com>, duncan@geppetto.ctt.bellcore.com (Scott Duncan) writes:
>> I think good communication skills are VERY IMPORTANT anymore. 
>[...]
>You can say "... NOT very important any more"; is that what you meant, and
>just left out the "not?"  Or you can say "...are very important these days"
>or "...now" but not as you phrased it.

Or you can just write "...VERY IMPORTANT anymore" in the secure realization
that people will pay at least some attention to the thought you were
expressing, and not focus on your typographical errors.  Oops, my mistake.
The message from Nather proves that not everyone is that adept at reading
through typos.  Well, most books have a typo or two in them, and most
people get through them just fine.  I therefore suggest that he is in the
minority.  And if it wasn't a typo, it was in any case still entirely clear
what was intended.

>I agree it's useful to be able to communicate.  But in this day and age
>of "reading skills" and "writing skills" and "thinking skills" I would
>phrase the thought without the use of the idiotword "skills."
>
>Try expunging it -- and the shallow thoughts it represents -- from your
>vocabulary.  You'll like it.

Well, I for one object to this.  I find that my writing skills are best
supplemented by my vocabulary skills when I am able to use my access skills
on as much of the English language as I know.  The meaning of the original
poster, I suspect, was clear to nearly everyone else who read the message.
If you have a problem with certain words, I suggest you put them in a kill
file, so that you won't have to read messages with them anymore.  In the
meantime, you are demonstrating astoundingly shallow sentiments yourself in
accusing someone you've never met of having shallow thoughts.  Who was the one
who was unable to understand an extremely simple sentence?  Who was the one who
read a sentence and responded not to the meaning and intention of the sentence,
but to its surface form?  [a prototypical instance of shallowness]  And who was
the poster who decided that the word "skills" has no place in the English
language, is an "idiotword" and a sign of shallow thoughts?  My reading of this
message chain identifies that individual as Ed Nather.

                                                      -Dan