I. What do you think Ludwig Wittgenstein meant when he said, ""If a lion could speak, we could not understand him"? Write a 200 word musing in response to this question.
II. Identify problems of vagueness, overgenerality, and ambiguity in the following passages. You'll notice that many of the examples are comical, whether or not the writer intended them to be so. See if you can determine which of the comical passages contain some clever and deliberate use of imprecision and which are unintentionally funny.
1. College harassment policy: Harassment "includes language to physical acts which degrades, insults, taunts, or challenges another person by any means of communication, verbal, so as to provoke a violent response, communication of threat, defamation of character, use of profanity, verbal assaults, derogatory comments or remarks, sexist remarks, racists remarks or any behavior that places another member of the University community in a state of fear or anxiety." (From a student handbook (quote is verbatim))
2. As a member of Parliament, Anglo-Irish playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816) had been asked to apologize for insulting a fellow member of Parliament."Mr. Speaker," replied Sheridan, "I said the honorable member was a liar it is true and I am sorry for it. The honorable member may place the punctuation where he pleases."
3. Headline: Need Plain Clothes Security: Must Have Shoplifting Experience.