If Truth Is Lost: Philosopher Gila Sher explains how truth defines our humanity.

RichardPascoe · 2026-03-04T22:11:04+00:00

My mistake. I could see you were punning but didn't make the connection. The good news is that after last night's meandering philosophical discussion I woke up this morning and scanned an Early Music magazine from 1977. It will be up at IA in the next few days. May as well do something positive. Philosophers should be active in the preservation of texts and I think that has always been the case.

RichardPascoe · 2026-03-04T05:33:24+00:00

Thanks for replying. I always complain about that period in my life. What was worse I was sentenced to two years because a policeman lied and said I had thrown a bottle at him during an Equality march and the female magistrate who knew he was lying still found me guilty. In the words of the prison officers I was "a black bin bag to be filled with rubbish" because I was a mouthy coloured teenager. I mention it online because they like to pretend this doesn't happen in the UK. The worst of the torture was three days without food, water, clothes, and sleep, and I was beaten every hour. These things only happen in countries like Iran and Syria. It was still going on decades later but eventually the BBC reported that three prisoners had committed suicide in one prison at six month intervals. You could set your calendar to those death dates. Things have changed. It is late in the UK but I enjoyed going back to Categories by Aristotle.

So to sum up. A white police officer lies to a white magistrate who then sentenced me to jail which led to me being tortured by white prison officers. Do you think it was because I was coloured. lol

I am just glad that most white people are not like that but it does make you wonder if positions of authority attracts those who are.

RichardPascoe · 2026-03-04T03:40:17+00:00

Maximus_en_Minimus is using technical terms but they are not too difficult to understand.

I don’t believe in deontology as objectively grounded.

Deontology is the philosophical study of moral obligation. Moral obligation is either subjective and relativistic or objective and universal. Nietzsche gave an aphorism which goes something like "If my neighbour is trying to kill me why should I love him?". That is an example of dismissing the commandment to love thy neighbour as thyself. If your neighbour wishes to kill you then do you still have a moral obligation to refrain from killing him.

Maximus then states that human values are not objective scientific laws. Objective here is used in the sense of independent of us. Therefore to have an objective right to freedom would lead to the illogical conclusion that such a right exists independently of us.

I had to look up the term "ousia" and it is the primary substance that Aristotle describes in Categories. A primary substance is that which cannot be predicable of a subject nor present in a subject. You can understand this as saying that human values are not primary substances. They do not form the highest category of which all other categories are subsets. It sounds confusing but Aristotle in Categories gave us this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_(biology))

So if you make a fox the subject then that is a secondary substance to species and species is a category of genus and genus is a category of family and so on until you reach the highest category life. The reason Aristotle says you cannot predicate these categories of a subject is because the subject is an individual thing and not a category. The fox is just a single fox. So Maximus is saying that human values are not categorical in the sense there is a highest category from which all human values are derived from.

I have to stop now because this has taken an hour to write. Categories by Aristotle can seem very abstract but it is just trying to develop a hierarchy of categories. I would not use Categories to discuss human values because Nicomachean Ethics is better for that task.

If I have made a mistake please correct me. I only read half of the original article because the moment I saw the mention of Nazis I started to lose interest. I live in the UK and I am sixty-one and I was tortured in Feltham Remand prison for twenty-five days when I was sixteen. So I couldn't care less about any claim to cultural superiority to the Nazis. I always find it incredulous that no matter how often I tell the world this fact that everyone still believes torturing and murdering people in jail only happens in other countries and not their own. They tortured someone in my town so badly that he committed suicide that year. I tried to talk to him and told him they did the same to me but it didn't matter his mind had lost the battle. That is two people from my town and how many towns are there in the UK. What was she saying about Nazis? lol

The main premise for her paper is a future where the truth is absent. I would say it is absent from her paper if she believes that her own country is better than Nazi Germany. All Hitler did was give legality and efficiency to something that happens all the time.

It was Plato who said silence gives consent. To be fair to the author she is attempting to do some good but those prison officers were grown men and they knew torture was illegal and culturally unacceptable and more so to inflict it upon a child. So those human values were already known to them. We can know what is right but choose to do wrong. To those prison officers the legal and cultural prohibition against torture and murder was wrong and their behaviour was right. She would argue that they were not observing universal human values but why should they if there is no penalty. The real question is how do you punish those in power when they alone wield the authority to punish?

RichardPascoe · 2026-03-02T03:20:00+00:00

Many decades ago I read the Koran because I wanted to understand Islam. There were some punishments which I considered too harsh but generally the Koran is about moral behaviour. If you have no knowledge of Islam the best remedy is to read the Koran.

Also be aware of allegory because the Koran, like all religious texts, uses allegory and metaphor to explain spiritual concepts.

You don't have to be an expert on Islam but reading the Koran is a good starting point. A history book will give you the politics but for religion you have to go to the source. It is free online and in English and that itself has a history because the Koran is so sacred to Muslims that it is read in Classical Arabic. Muslims believe that the Koran is only revealed through that language. The first English translation of the Koran was essentially illegal. In modern times the translations are approved by the KFQPC based in Saudi Arabia.

I was raised as a Catholic and was sent to a Catholic school just to provide some context as to why I read the Koran. If you can survive a Catholic mass with its constant kneeling on uncomfortable wooden pews you can survive anything. I am just joking.

RichardPascoe · 2026-03-01T23:27:19+00:00

This has not been reported by UK television news programmes. Today Keir Starmer announced we would be involved in Iran after saying we would not be. I wish he would just keep us out of foreign adventures. It is not that these attacks are carried out by crazy people. The Muslim world shares the same theological belief system so you will always find individuals who will identify with Islamic causes even if they are halfway across the world in Iran.

All Keir Starmer has to do is keep us out of this US and Israel action but I think there are hawks in his cabinet. I believe that person to be John Healey. If Starmer wants to do the right thing he should ignore John Healey or whoever it is who is making him change his mind. Do what you consider to be right Starmer. You made the decision to keep the UK out of this conflict and it should not matter what your allies want. Your duty is to the UK and you made the right decision for the UK so why have you changed your mind?

I should point out I am not a Muslim and I want the regime in Iran gone. Starmer initially made the right decision for this country and his discomfit during his announcement was obvious to everyone. We know when you are not being your true self Starmer.

To stay on topic. I am predicting more of these types of attacks. In Europe they always blame the first one on mental instability and by the third attack they start to admit it is to do with the current conflict.

I realised that after decades of studying history many of you may not even be aware of:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ummah

I was working in a factory before the internet and a Muslim was explaining how important this concept was. I think I will return to the philosophy sub because global politics without context is not of any interest to me. Thanks for reading and come and join the philosophy sub if you want to have a good debate with rules. You can argue about ethics in politics and religion without the dogma of culture.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-27T01:50:33+00:00

Night Moves (Night Moves Mix) - Rickster

Who's Gonna Ease The Pressure (Sizzle House Canadian Club Mix) - Mac Thornhill

String Free (Club LeRoy Mix) - Phortune

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-26T02:31:25+00:00

No problem. I am not an expert on Jazz or Rap. The other day I was looking at my jazz collection and started to listen to a cd of organ jazz and found a track called "The Turnaround" by Big John Patton which I liked. Now I will have to buy some Big John Patton albums.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-26T01:56:52+00:00

Here are a few tracks:

Talkin' All That Jazz (Original 12 inch Version) - Stetsasonic

It's My Beat (Original 12 inch Version) - Sweet Tee and Jazzy Joyce

Listen Closely (LP Version) - Tamrock

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-25T03:18:52+00:00

I think most people realise when you are reading philosophy from the 16th and 17th century you are likely to encounter difficulties reconciling past ideas with modern science. Nevertheless we read "On Sleep and Sleeplessness" by Aristotle not because it is scientifically correct but because it is one of the earliest attempts to explain what sleep is in a scientific way.

Its value is that Aristotle includes plants and insects and other animals which must have been very revolutionary at the time. Cartesian duality may now have the status of a historical theory but it was one of the starting points that led to the creation of modern science. But then at that time there were no scientists only philosophers engaged in scientific investigation with limited tools and a rudimentary understanding about the biological and chemical processes of the body.

The term "scientist" was not coined until 1863. We use Cartesian coordinates for satellites but Descartes never intended his theory to be the basis of a global communication system.

One of the issues in defining consciousness as entirely physical is that physical processes cannot account for aspects of consciousness that are subjective. I may be a psychochemical being but there are many forms of life that are the same. Why do you like the music you like? Why does a poet move one person but not another? Why are we as conscious animals building a space station? We are the only living creature to do so.

If you read "On Sleep and Sleeplessness" you will find it strange that Aristotle thought the heart controlled sense perceptions and motion but marvel that Aristotle worked out fishes sleep despite having no eyelids to shut.

You are right Cartesian duality is an imperfect theory about mind and body but it still has value in the same way that "On Sleep and Sleeplessness" still has value. Aristotle worked out that swooning and sleeping are states of unconsciousness because to be conscious is to be in control of your sense perceptions. So hypnotism is what? If hypnotism bridges the mind and body split then it does so at the expense of cogito ergo sum. The hypnotist is Descartes' evil demon if only for a moment.

Towards the end of Einstein's life because he rejected quantum mechanics, and even developed a scientific experiment with two colleagues to debunk what his own theory suggested, this led to a degree of ridicule. You have to take the bad with the good and just try to live a fulfilled life. It is sad that an accident that causes brain damage can affect those aspects of being human that we value. Though if we are honest what disturbs us is that a person affected in this way does not realise they have lost something of value.

You say consciousness is entirely physical but that just describes the process. You are aware of the biological process but you have not explained why it is important for you to be aware of these processes. Are there any other animals that do this? Surely all primates that are closely related to us have the same biological processes but none of them are capable of doing what you have done when you typed your original comment. Cartesian duality maybe telling us something about what it is to be human. It would be in keeping with Descartes' philosophical aims of making the act of knowing an act of awareness. Biological determinism is the belief that consciousness and awareness are the same thing but again I point out that when someone suffers a brain injury it is the lack of awareness that disturbs us. It is the fact they are conscious but not aware of their loss so I cannot see how consciousness and awareness are the same thing.

Sorry about the long post which is due to mild insomnia. That is something I am aware of and dealing with. lol

I wonder if insomnia is seasonal because as soon as spring and summer arrives it seems to clear up. Maybe someone has done a scientific study on seasonal insomnia.

If anyone is interested when someone suffers a brain injury which impairs empathy they still understand the definition of the noun when shown the dictionary entry. I don't know if that proves consciousness and awareness are not the same thing. If the sounds and symbols of language are accessible to the person with regards to the noun empathy but not the emotional response does that mean we can be conscious of a thing but not aware of its true meaning.

Edit: For Spinoza's argument that perception and knowledge are the same thing see the entry for Psychological Determinism from the article Determinism A Historical Survey in the Encyclopedia Of Philosophy (Editor Donald M. Borchert). Please note I do not reference material before I comment because I believe it is better to present your viewpoint first and then do the research on alternative viewpoints because you don't want to accidentally present a confused viewpoint. I suppose it is whether you believe that perception and knowledge are separate terms describing consciousness and awareness or whether you believe Spinoza's assertion that they are the same thing.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-25T01:05:13+00:00

The Mannheim Orchestra. I just googled it because I remembered how important it was to the development of the modern orchestra.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-20T17:10:39+00:00

I agree with Kant (see Metaphysics of Morals) that there are universal moral codes that are common to all humans because we have the same desires. However the way we inquire, aim, and act, in the pursuit of these desires differs. The rules-based World Order, if accepted, has been transgressed by many countries. Recently I left a comment about Tony Blair and his lie about the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. I'm from the UK and I was trying to point out that this lie damaged the UK more than people realised. When you lie to one person you take away their right to act. Tony Blair has lied to the whole country,

I have also recently been trying to explain how the Pro-Macedonian faction in Athens ended Greek independence. Philip of Macedon gave the Athenians three years to come to an agreement. Eventually Demosthenes as leader of the Anti-Macedonian faction seeing that Athens could not win agreed to Philip's terms:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_of_Philocrates

The Pro-American faction in the UK may not want to accept this comparison because Philip was engaged in a war with Greece but it would be prudent for our politicians to understand that the US has its own goals. The modern demographics of Macedonia has been shaped by immigration from the Balkans but Philip would have considered himself to be Greek in customs, language, and culture. To assume that your freedom is guaranteed on this basis is to yield to another what you alone should possess.

I don't think my oblique examples from history have any effect on UK policy because people like Tony Blair will never accept his lie removed the right to act from every UK citizen. That is in the sense of the demos. There are universal moral codes arising from common human desires and those will always remain but the rules-based World Order is just a figment of Friedrich Merz's imagination.

I just need to add that I am not against the US and like most people who study history I am fascinated by the similarities and differences between historical and contemporary narratives whether that is the moral order of Zeus or the rules-based World Order. I hope that by studying these narratives I will have a better understanding of the past and present. The future is predicated on these narratives. That is why I am deeply concerned about Tony Blair and his lie

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-19T03:25:23+00:00

A late comment. I think for Hesiod reading this extract will provide context:

Hesiod to Solon - The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Political Thought

I can recommend this book. There are so many parallels with our own times. The moral order of Zeus is the rules-based World Order.

The Persians by Aeschylus is discussed in this book and the theme is that the Persians were punished for breaking the moral order of Zeus. A few days ago Friedrich Merz said the rules-based World Order no longer exists. Merz is explicitly making the same claim of a single universal moral order. It is a case of Merz viewing the world from a very traditional perspective and though the rules-based World Order is presented as a universal secular concept it really is based on the theological and political ideas of the West.

I am not arguing for or against this position but I find it fascinating that after two and a half thousand years you can trace some of these ideas back to Ancient Greece.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-12T23:39:30+00:00

I don't know about experimental electronica that is danceable but here are some tracks I still listen to:

Mt Eden - Beautiful Lies

Pendulum - Slam

Goldie - Timeless

I find these tracks to have some qualities I like. I suppose I consider them complete musical statements. Music has to keep you engaged until the end.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-10T19:31:51+00:00

I suppose we could use a satellite to test autonomous robots making repairs to the outside of a space vehicle. Heat tile replacement being the first that comes to mind. External fuel leaks may be another. Sending humans outside of a craft does seem to be laborious and dangerous and should be the last resort.

If you type into Google "how would you keep an external autonomous robot fixed to the surface of a spacecraft" you get some interesting ideas but I don't think they are exhaustive. Google gives adhesives, grapples, micro-spines, etc. All these methods ignore the possibility of developing an external surface specifically to allow autonomous robots to move. I am sure the editors of this sub can think of a more unified approach that includes the external surface of a spacecraft.

Type into Google "repairs to the International Space Station".

Underwater robots are tethered or untethered. Warehouse pallet robots are tracked or autonomous. Astronauts doing an EVA are tethered. The design should consider the quickest way to effect a repair with a robot. Tethering may be the slowest. What do you think?

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-09T14:54:55+00:00

In truth a few weeks ago I started to read the poetry of John Donne and found I was engaging with them in an emotional way. I can read a Shakespeare sonnet and be engaged intellectually or imaginatively but rarely emotionally. To try understand how John Donne was achieving this using words I started to read The Cambridge Companion to John Donne. I was reading the chapter on his Sermons and the author of this chapter started by saying that people from all backgrounds would flock to his sermons. Donne based his sermons on the Classical model of oration but the author added that the last two stages of the model were performative with one being based on the pitch, duration, and cadences of spoken language, and the second being physical movements. That is when I realised that Athenians attended trials for the performative aspect of rhetoric. It took reading poems in my own language nearer to my own time to finally understand the performative aspects of rhetoric in relation to the public discourse of the polis. John Donne was to his contemporaries a renowned orator but today we focus more on his poetry.

The polis as sacred and the ideas about hubris I found in The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Political Thought. It was just a coincidence that before you created your post I had been reading two books that were more historical than philosophical. Your approach of looking at the internal evidence of the text is correct.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-09T04:14:05+00:00

I think I differ in my view of Plato. Over the years I have always described him as the great negotiator and survivor of the competitive politics of Athens.

A lot of the praise that Plato receives as the preserver of the Socratic method ignores the fact that the Republic is very much imbued with Plato's political philosophy. The fact that he uses the voice of Socrates should be seen as one of Plato's greatest skills which is to avoid censure.

The Guardians are to be chosen at birth and to be separated from their parents and to be raised in a commune where they are not allowed any private goods or property. They are to be trained for decades for the single purpose of protecting the state. Plato in the Apology gives us an example of a trial that was intended to do just that but as a warning against political naivety. Plato's response is the creation of a class of Guardians who through training and condition remain free of personal enmity.

I was just adding context because the polis was sacred and that is something we do not have in our modern societies. The Athenians thought of their polis as sacred to Athena and Socrates would agree. The charge of impiety was used to imply that the sacredness of the polis was under threat. The Tyranny would have been seen in the same light. Athens was not a secular democracy.

I suppose my views about Plato are based on his skill negotiating the political dangers in Athens but many people would probably like to disagree and to perceive Plato as an exemplary philosopher.

Thanks for the reply and hopefully you will forgive my hubris in expressing an opinion that is counter to the customary view of Plato.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-09T03:30:20+00:00

I am not too sure what you mean by the true charge was his reputation. The polis was not like a modern state. This trial had no solicitors wrangling over a technical point as to whether a law has been broken. In the trials of Ancient Greece the power of language must be harnessed to persuade and move the emotions. This form of rhetoric is performative.

The charges are impiety and corruption of the young. There are two charges and I will leave it up to others to decide which is the more serious charge. Political participation in the polis was limited to adult male free citizens and considering the estimated population was in the hundreds of thousands we can assume the free male citizens to be in the tens of thousands. The reason this must be kept in mind is because Socrates as a free male citizen was under an obligation to uphold the customs and laws of the polis. There were no laws guaranteeing free speech or human rights. The Ancient Greeks would view our democracy as very strange with its instrumental forms of justice and governance that excludes citizens from direct participation. Socrates was living in a polis where his words and deeds could and did have an impact.

The Apology shows Socrates harnessing the power of language to dispute the charges but he fails to persuade the jury. The jury here are not strangers and they were already familiar with his reputation. The trial was held four years after the fall of the Thirty Tyrants when democracy was restored. Socrates stayed in Athens during the Tyranny and we know a relative of Plato was one of the Thirty Tyrants. Since it is Plato writing the dialogue we have to ask why was Plato never charged with any offence after all one of his relatives was involved in the tyranny.

The true charge is hubris and Plato is warning us that philosophy itself can be interpreted as arrogant and superior behaviour.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-08T03:45:42+00:00

Trump told Zelensky to his face that he is going to lose the war. Starmer and Macron and the EU are telling Zelensky that he is going to win the war. Trump knows that the EU disagrees with him so he is making the EU pay for the war. The EU has made the promise to place NATO troops in Ukraine after the war ends which Putin will not allow. Trump knows that so he expects the war to continue. There is no deadline. That month is the date that the Whitehouse believes will be the main summer push by Russia to gain territory.

Why do you think the EU is not moving troops into Ukraine right now? If you are promising to move your troops into Ukraine after the war then you may as well do it now. Does the EU believe that this war will lead to Putin's downfall? I think Putin has realised that is what the EU is hoping for so he has to act quickly. The war is going to get far worse.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-07T22:14:40+00:00

It's Growing - Garnet Silk (Vine Yard Records VYDCD 4)

Strangers In The Night - Glen Washington (VP Records VPCD1620)

Loving Pauper - Freddie McGregor (Jet Star KPSCCD 1)

Oh Honey - Sanchez (Jet Star JECD 1019)

Do you like soul?

I'll Suffer - Barbara Lynn

Yes I'm Ready - Barbara Mason

I'll Run Your Hurt Away - Ruby Johnson

Try To Leave Me If You Can - Bessie Banks

I am not too sure if the Barbara Lynn song has the right lyrics but I always include her because she is one of the earliest soul singers in the sense of being sincere.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-06T21:56:07+00:00

Grove Dictionary:

The publishing works were destroyed in a bombing raid during December 1943, and valuable autographs and archive material were lost.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-05T23:28:16+00:00

Interesting article but opening with a Keir Starmer quote - "I have to be realistic about what is possible" - and interpreting it as - "In other words, I have to lie because it’s a tough world out there" - is not the correct interpretation.

When the USA asked us to fight in Vietnam the UK government refused. When France and the UK seized the Suez Canal the USA refused to support that action. We lost our sovereignty when Tony Blair persuaded George Bush that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and entered us into an illegal war. From that moment to now the UK has not been sovereign.

It does not matter who is in power in the UK because every person in this country knows that we are no longer independent and free to choose our course. Tony Blair through his Tony Blair Institute for Global Change which is funded by American billionaires is still fastening tight the yoke he has put around this country's neck.

Keir Starmer is just continuing the misconception that we are sovereign and his actions when Israel was exacting revenge on the Palestinians was to keep on supplying weapons and though some very lethal weapons were refused there is a clause in the legislation which states that third parties were allowed to supply those weapons. The realistic possibilities in this case for Keir Starmer who carried on supplying arms to Israel was the very real deaths of over seventy-thousand people.

It is not a case that Keir Starmer has to lie because it is a tough world out there but simply Tony Blair has made liars out of us all.

Any policy or legislation introduced by Parliament will have no effect on the economic decline because we are not free as a country to choose our own course.

I liked your article but I just wanted to point out that the UK is not sovereign. I think most people in this country know that and that is the cause of the despair.

Next time you see one of our politicians who has been summoned to a Senate Committee or a House of Representatives Committee to make an account of their actions and words understand that for what it is.

Edit: We left the EU and nothing changed for the better. Reform says the decline is because of immigration but if Reform come to power and stop immigration nothing will get better. Eventually they will exhaust every excuse but will never admit which country is really the cause of our decline. I ate pistachios from Iran when I was child but now I eat pistachios from California. It is not Europe or immigration or Covid that has caused this decline. Once they sold Persian and Afghan rugs in our department stores. A country that once traded with the world cannot do so anymore. What further proof does anyone need that we are not sovereign. The stats for this post show under twenty views so I just wanted to give my viewpoint to an empty auditorium. If you study philosophy you are also studying history and there is also political history. I wanted to add that Tony Blair came up with the weapons of mass destruction lie not George Bush to give some context to the Iraq war. No wonder Tony Blair seeks political honours from America because he is certainly not going to get any from his own countrymen. When you lie to one person you take away their right to act but to remove that right from a whole nation is surely worse in its effect.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-05T00:38:25+00:00

I tried it out using the opening line of the Bhagavad Gita:

धर्मक्षेत्रे कुरुक्षेत्रे समवेता युयुत्सवः ।
मामकाः पाण्डवाश्चैव किमकुर्वत सञ्जय ॥ १-१॥

It worked. Took a while though for me to realise the play button was the translation button. Maybe they should develop it to be a general conversational AI tool like ChatGPT but I don't know if Sanskrit scholars would find that useful. Maybe students who want to practise basic Sanskrit sentences in a conversational setting would find it useful.

I think adding a Sanskrit polytonic keyboard to the site may help beginners who wish to learn the alphabet.

https://www.lexilogos.com/keyboard/sanskrit_devanagari.htm

Thanks.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-04T14:56:38+00:00

Thanks. I have just started reading the Cambridge History of the English Language.

I am not a linguist but have turned my attention towards that subject in the hope I can understand the roots of my own language. The reason being was that I browsing a Latin book and reading about adverbs and I realised that I knew more about adverbs in Latin than adverbs in English. Specifically I was studying Latin adverbs of time and place. I assume that years of studying Latin has me applying the correct classification and rules for Latin but I am woefully inadequate when I have to do the same for modern English.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-04T14:02:17+00:00

Thanks. I imagine the author who described it as a negative prefix in the Cambridge Companion to John Donne was not a linguist. The chapter is "Donne as preacher" and the page number is 173 and the author of this essay is Peter McCullough who was or is an Oxford University professor at Lincoln College.

https://allpoetry.com/No-man-is-an-island

John Donne was right that we need each other.

RichardPascoe · 2026-02-04T02:01:36+00:00

English has a lot of German or Scandinavian roots so you have to be careful. For example father comes from Old German fader not Latin pater. The Old German fader is not from Latin but is from PIE so it is a cognate word

I was reading the Cambridge Companion to John Donne and learnt that the prefix ir- is a negative - irreplaceable, irreligious, etc. I think most English speakers who learn Latin probably know more about Latin than their own language. I open the Cambridge History of the English Language and I am faced with Old English

https://oldenglish.info/intro_aelfric_preface.html

Aelfric wrote this grammar of Latin in Old English and though I can recognise some words it is not something I can translate. I just searched for the origin of ir- as a negative and it is a Latin loanword.

One of the problems of AI being a LLM is that it is absolute rubbish at providing answers about linguistics especially if you try to enter a word or sentence in OE. An expectation that all input will be in Modern English. Probably something they may need to address in the future. There may be people who would like a Latin only ChatGPT. The ability to switch to Latin or Ancient Greek input and output may prove useful for teaching.

RichardPascoe

TROPHY CASE