we're flaming about the word "like" now!

[Julian.West@mac.dartmouth.edu]

Steve Williams writes:

> I don't think tracy stated outright that "Rocket's Tail" was *like* "The
Fog"...  
> Perhaps the word "like" should be read "such as" to more accurately 
> convey the sense of the paragraph.

Sure she did. She used the word "like". If she meant "men prefer the two
songs _RT_ and _TFog_" she should have said so. Using "like" suggests that
these two examples are _typical_ of a wider class of songs, which I
personally don't see. Changing "like" to "such as" doesn't change this
in the least. 

It is one thing to say that, broadly speaking, men and women have different
preferences among the songs.  It is a much stronger statement to suggest
that there is something that unifies one set of songs and that this something
makes the songs more attractive to (say) females.  Tracy draws no connection
between _RT_ and _TFog_ _except_ that they both fall high on her male list.
I was objecting to the tacit and baseless assertion of this stronger
statement.

> By the bye, my own current favorites are the interlocked pair of
> "Between a Man and a Woman" and "Never Be Mine".  So what does that make me?

That makes you something "between a man and a woman", I guess.  :-)

------------------------------------------------------------------- julian ---