A sentence that is grammatically and syntactically perfect can be utterly devoid of meaning – utter nonsense, in other words.
Take the old classic ‘The colourless green ideas sleep furiously’; then take ‘music in the soul can be heard by the universe’, recently printed in The Echo.
Meaningless is patent in both in both sentences, I wonder if Echo readers may come across others.
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If you think the articles are bad, try the comments section. I get a reply – I know it’s meant as a counter argument – I show others to see if they can divine any meaning – They declare it word salad – I just write something I was wanting to say.
I see my father is still at it . He appears deeply stuck in the Macnamara fallacy. For those unfamiliar with it, the process is roughly:
1) Only measure or pay attention to easily quantifiable things
2) Stop paying attention to things that can’t be easily quantified
3) Decide that the things you’re ignoring don’t make a difference to the world
4) Decide that the things you’ve ignored don’t actually exist anyway
Young Jimmy appears to have decided long ago that only the things he could wrap in simple logic were valid and now sees the world in simplistic terms that suit his filters. “If you have a hammer…” I guess (or maybe “None so blind as he who will not see”).
On a side note, it’s great to be able to visit the area on holidays and see family again, although it’s depressing to see the flood damage still unfixed after so long. What the hell is the council doing???
He’s just pointing out a well know precept of both Natural Language Processing (AI science), and Information Theory. Not everything that fits the format/grammatic rules, actually communicates information. Humans can see meaning where there is none, like seeing bunnies in clouds. Sounds like you are complaining about a separate issue, ‘Boomerism’, the bane of Gen X. We all get that.
Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
So your theory is that these people that give replies devoid of meaning to logical arguments are drug addled ‘minor attracted’ people? That would explain a lot in regard to certain recent topics.
No theories, no agenda – just a bit of whimsy inspired by the discussion. Sorry!