Print

---

 

On 3/8/07, Tom Milner-Gulland <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

The list owner of Philos-L posted this amusing story to Chora, written by
Jonathan Sacks:


"I just love the story of the philosophy professor who was invited to give a
lecture on epistemology to the University of Beijing. He did so and not
being about to speak Mandarin was provided with a Chinese interpreter. He
began his lecture and after a sentence paused to let the interpreter
translate into Chinese but the interpreter said: No, carry on - I'll tell
you when to stop. After 15 minutes and the interpreter said 'stop' and
delivered five words to the audience in Chinese - I will not even attempt to
say what they were - and said 'carry on'. The same thing happened after 30
minutes - five more words, 45 minutes - another five words and at the end of
the lecture - an hour - four words and the audience duly stood up and filed
out. The English philosophy professor went to the interpreter and said: I'm
absolutely astounded. I have given an extremely complicated lecture about
epistemology. How were you able to summarise it in so few words? And the
interpreter said: Easy - after 15 minutes I said 'so far he hasn't said
anything new'; after half an hour 'I said he still hasn't said anything
new'; after 45 minutes I said 'I don't think he's going to say anything new'
and after an hour I said 'I was right - he didn't'. "

http://www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page10556.asp

The rest of the paper, on harmonsing disparate communities, might also be of
interest to a friend of wisdom.

and there's this by Rowan Williams, on atheism:

at http://www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page5480.asp

Tom