Subject: acka-games-digest V3 #238
From: [email-masked] (acka-games-digest)
To: [email-masked]

acka-games-digest       Monday, October 12 1998       Volume 03 : Number 238

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Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 00:03:11 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Frederic Mc Coy <[email-masked]>
Subject: Acka: Fictionary Round 1 results

Here are the results of Fictionary Round 1, a round I fear will be mared
by much controversy (more to follow).

The correct definition is 10: Behead. JT submitted the correct definiton,
and recieves 4 points (I recieve none).

The definitions submited by risE (6. Chinese interior design.), Studge
(1. A revealing blouse), Altra the Firecat (2. To be sad to an extreme),
and Slakko (4. To seperate a group of objects) all recieved no votes at
all. Not a single one. Cooincidentally, none of the players involved
recieve any points. Perhaps not so cooincidentally, risE's and Stidge's
definitions were not the correct part of speech.

Rambo R. Minuteman's definition, 6. Of low quality, poor, is also the
wrong part of speech, but two-star voted for it so Rambo gets 1 point.

Robin Hood's definition (8. To mix up, opposite of collate) was voted for
by Rambo R. Minuteman. As Robin Hood also voted for the correct
definition, he recieves a total of 3 points.

A Mean Hat's definition (12. Randomize) was voted for by /dev/joe. He
recieves 1 point. two-star likewise recieves 1 point, as Alfvaen voted for
definition 5: To deconstitute and seperate into fractions, as with whale
oil. K 2's definition (9. To remove bark from a tree) gets 1 point for
Studge's vote.

/dev/joe's definition (3. To seperate groups of sequentially ordered
items into another order, such as sorting them into groups of like items,
or arranging them randomly.) recieved the votes of Altra the Firecat, K 2,
and risE. So /dev/joe gets 3 points.

Alfvaen's definition (11. To remove the neck, as of a bird before
cooking.) was voted for by Anathema and Slakko. So Alfvaen recieves 2
points.

Sigh. That is, these are the scores if I've done my job correctly. I
really did believe that I was being fair when judging "similarity," but
the more I've thought about it the more doubts I have. Of course, that's
usually what heppens to me when I think about my decisions.  Still, let me
go ahead and voice my doubts, and see if we can come to some consensus
about what should be done.

While I can certainly see what people were talking about, I don't think
that the assorted "randomization" or "mix up" definitions were truly
similar. The similarites were there, but were overwhelmed in my opinion by
the differences.

What bothers me now are the similarities between Alfvaen's "To remove the
neck, as of a bird before cooking," and the correct definition, "Behead."
I can't honestly recall what I thought when I decided that these were
different from each other. I have a vague sense that I was thinking of
Behead as implying guillotines and all that, and the references to cooking
threw me off. For all I know, Alfvaen's definition was exactly right. I
picked this word because I figured it would confuse people (I was
right:)), not because I knew anything bout the context in which it
is normally used.

So, I'm not sure what to do now. I would say our options are to go ahead
and proceed to the next round with the scores I've just reported, or to
say that I've been wrong since the end of the second step of this round,
and that everyone (but me) has a score of 3 as I picked and easy
definition.  I leve it to the rest of you folks to decide which course is
best.

Vynd, somewhat disappointed with himself.

[email-masked]

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Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 00:19:35 -0400 (EDT)
From: JT <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Fictionary Round 1 results

On Mon, 12 Oct 1998, John Frederic Mc Coy wrote:
>What bothers me now are the similarities between Alfvaen's "To remove the
>neck, as of a bird before cooking," and the correct definition, "Behead."

My personal opinion is that were I brainiac, I would have probably judged
them to be identical.  However, all uses of decollate that I've ever seen
referred to a human, and thus the use of applying it to a bird might be
sufficient to invalidate it.

- --JT

[-------------------------------------------------------------------------]
[ Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.                  ]
[ It's hard to seize the day when you must first grapple with the morning ]
[-------------------------------------------------------------------------]

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Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 00:25:32 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gabe Drummond-Cole <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Fictionary Round 1 results

At 12:19 AM 10/12/98 -0400, you wrote:
>On Mon, 12 Oct 1998, John Frederic Mc Coy wrote:
>>What bothers me now are the similarities between Alfvaen's "To remove the
>>neck, as of a bird before cooking," and the correct definition, "Behead."
>
>My personal opinion is that were I brainiac, I would have probably judged
>them to be identical.  

I agree here.

>However, all uses of decollate that I've ever seen
>referred to a human, and thus the use of applying it to a bird might be
>sufficient to invalidate it.
>

I dont think this is necessarily true unless the word *must* apply to a
human.  The definition does not *require* a bird, but rather gives the
example of a bird.  Furthermore, I would say that the spirit of the game
mandates that this definition is the same... Alfvaen obviously had a pretty
good idea of what the word meant.
- --A Mean Hat.
  Dungeon Master - Warrior Caste - Crazy French Scotsman - Really Weird

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Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 12:02:00 -0400 (EDT)
From: [email-masked] (Aaron V. Humphrey)
Subject: Re: Acka: Fictionary Round 1 results

> On Mon, 12 Oct 1998, John Frederic Mc Coy wrote:
> >What bothers me now are the similarities between Alfvaen's "To remove the
> >neck, as of a bird before cooking," and the correct definition, "Behead."

> My personal opinion is that were I brainiac, I would have probably judged
> them to be identical.  However, all uses of decollate that I've ever seen
> referred to a human, and thus the use of applying it to a bird might be
> sufficient to invalidate it.

I don't think I would have considered "beheading" and "removing the neck"
to be sufficiently similar myself.  The latter implies, to me, the prior
lack of a head, because otherwise you _would_ call it beheading--otherwise
you can't remove _just_ the neck.

That's why I didn't believe in "behead", because I figured that that was
"decapitate", from Latin caput,capitis "head", whereas "coll-" is the root
meaning "neck", IIRC, and "decollate" would thus be analogous but not, I
thought, synonymous.

- --
- --Alfvaen(Web page: http://www.connect.ab.ca/~alfvaen/ )
Current Album--30 Hour Famine
Current Book--Stephen King:Night Journe
Chipmunks roasting on an open fire...

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Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 17:50:49 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Frederic Mc Coy <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Acka: Fictionary Round 1 results

On Mon, 12 Oct 1998, Aaron V. Humphrey wrote:

> 
> > On Mon, 12 Oct 1998, John Frederic Mc Coy wrote:
> > >What bothers me now are the similarities between Alfvaen's "To remove the
> > >neck, as of a bird before cooking," and the correct definition, "Behead."
> 
> > My personal opinion is that were I brainiac, I would have probably judged
> > them to be identical.  However, all uses of decollate that I've ever seen
> > referred to a human, and thus the use of applying it to a bird might be
> > sufficient to invalidate it.
> 
> I don't think I would have considered "beheading" and "removing the neck"
> to be sufficiently similar myself.  The latter implies, to me, the prior
> lack of a head, because otherwise you _would_ call it beheading--otherwise
> you can't remove _just_ the neck.
> 
> That's why I didn't believe in "behead", because I figured that that was
> "decapitate", from Latin caput,capitis "head", whereas "coll-" is the root
> meaning "neck", IIRC, and "decollate" would thus be analogous but not, I
> thought, synonymous.
> 

Well the early opinions seem to be leaning towards my orginial decision,
which is heartening. I find the opinions of JT and Alfvaen particularly
valueable since Alfvaen wrote the definition in question, and JT is
(apparently) the only person who really knew what the word really meant.
But thats not why I'm writing this. No, I'm writing this message because I
forgot to point out in my earlier message that, irregularities in the last
rounds scoring notwithstanding, Round 2 has begun. Our Brainiac is now
Slakko.

Vynd, feeling overly officious.

[email-masked]

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End of acka-games-digest V3 #238
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