Maverick Philosopher

Word of the Day: Obvelation

A concealing, concealment, hiding, veiling. Antonym: revelation.

My example: Her selective self-revelation was as much an intended obvelation.

Example from Stewart Umphrey, Complexity and Analysis, Lexington Books, 2002, 140:

Since divine revelation is never without obvelation, those bound back to God in inquiry need a hermeneutics to distinguish what belongs to Him from what belongs to the medium of His self-presentation.

The Meaning of 'Asshole'

The author offers a cognitivist as opposed to expressivist analysis of 'asshole' and other foul words.  But the guy is a 'liberal,' as witness the following bit of squeamishness:

(2) pejorative terms, which assume false normative or moral claims about certain independently identifiable groups of people (e.g., "honkey”, "wop”, "kike”, “limey”, "chink”, "n----r");

He refuses to write out 'nigger' as he does in the other cases. Why not?  The author is well aware of the use-mention distinction. He knows that to talk about a word is not thereby to apply it to someone or something. Why is 'nigger' more offensive than 'kike'? Why the double standard?

The author appears to be 'p.c.-whipped.'

Grievance, Demand, and Supply

The elimination of the causes of grievance does little to dampen demand for the need to feel aggrieved, a demand the Left is ever eager to supply, especially in matters racial.

(My formulation of a Larry Elders riff.)

Human Relations

In human relations an excess of past often insures an absence of future. Newly-minted friendships, however, are pregnant with future but at risk in an age of abortion.