Abstract / Concrete

[Donald M Lance]

on 6/30/02 4:12 PM, Thomas Paikeday at t.paikeday at SYMPATICO.CA wrote:

> To answer a couple of questions raised by Mark and Dennis:
>
> Mark: "How is this set of rules, abstracted and *regularized* from
> English
> orthography, not also a "key" to be learned?"
>
> Good question. Answer: A literate person is
> supposed to have already learned the common English spellings.

Not true for speakers of Spanish, Russian, Chinese pinyin, etc.

(snip)

> TOM PAIKEDAY (pointing to the spelling of his name, the first syllable
> of which is not good orthography, but I didn't do it! Anyone who cares
> please say PYE- not PAY-).

PYE- as in Pierre?

Sorry, Tom.  I don't buy your rebuttal as stated.  The orthographic
representations you prefer may be more accessible to better-than-moderately
literate speakers of English, but they're still abstract.  They're concrete
only as marks on paper.  You're overstating your case.

DMLance