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From: buzzard@TheWorld.com (Sean T Barrett)
Subject: Re: Default parser responses: how do they affect the gaming / authorship experience?
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In article <a1d760$p08$1@news.lth.se>, Magnus Olsson <mol@df.lth.se> wrote:
>The problem is of course that *any* jargon, whatever its origins, is
>bound ot frighten or confuse outsiders, since it will contain some
>very non-standard usages.

Has anyone ever actually proposed BETTER metaphors to use?
It seems to me these "violent" metaphors get used because
there is a central metaphor of a process as a "living
creature". *That* seems like a pretty obvious, coherent,
and not-complaint-worthy metaphor. Being that we human
beings are built around primary drives of survival and
procreation, somehow it seems unsurprising to me that
the computer metaphors are "parent", "child", "insert
synonym for bring-about-the-end-of-a-living-thing here"
(no coincidence that there are so many words to choose
from, either).

What are we supposed to replace "illegal operation" with?
"Improper act"? "Inappropriate action"? "Flawed attempt"?
"Bad idea"? "Impossible suggestion"? "Impermissable try"?
"The program encountered an instruction it was unable to
perform; the program will now stop running"? "I'm sorry,
Dave, I can't do that"?

SeanB
