Subject: Re: [HM] regula Lesbia
From: Antreas P. Hatzipolakis (xpolakis@otenet.gr)
Date: Tue Mar 21 2000 - 10:45:37 EST
Christian Marinus Taisbak wrote:
> In a letter from the Danish astronomer Olavus Roemer to Reyher
> and Tiede he mentions (perhaps as a joke) a Lesbian Rule (regula
> Lesbia), which seems to be able to prove any thing, e.g. make
> ancient observations suit any opinion as to the lenght of the year.
>
> I have not been able to find any reference to such a rule or its
> name. Would anyone happen to know a bit about it?
Dear Marinus,
In the article: J. R. Lucas: THE LESBIAN RULE
First published in Philosophy, XXX, July 1955, pp.195-213
available online at:
http://users.ox.ac.uk/~jrlucas/lesbrule.html
we read:
<quote>
And there, by a simple reversal in the natural dialectic, we discover that the
most stringent requirements of logic are not to straight-jacket the mind along
unnatural lines, <Greek>tou gar aoristou aoristos kai ho kanwn estin hwsper kai
tes Lesbias oikodomias ho molubdinos kanwn,</Greek>15 finitude cannot measure
what cannot be confined, and limitations of consistency are to be construed not
as a rigid regulus but as a Lesbian rule.
15. Aristotle: Nicomachean Ethics. Bk. V: IO: 7, II37 b20-31.
</quote>
Greetings from Athens
Antreas
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