[Sigia-l] card sorting

[Boniface Lau]

> From: eric.scheid at ironclad.net.au
> [mailto:eric.scheid at ironclad.net.au]
> Eric Scheid
>  
> On 5/6/03 9:28 AM, "Boniface Lau" <boniface_lau at compuserve.com>
> wrote:
> > I am not sure what you are trying to say. Could you refer us to a
> > dictionary containing the "{order = not chaos}" definition of
> > "order"?
> 
> Sheesh. Are you trying to be deliberately obtuse?
> 
>     http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=obtuse
> 
> 
> Try this: 
> 
>     http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=chaos
>         A condition or place of great disorder or confusion.
> 
>     http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=disorder
>         A lack of order or regular arrangement; confusion.
> 
> Therefore "order = not chaos".

Are you confusing antonym with definition?


> Now that you've "clarified" your earlier position of order(sequence)
> ==> order(arrangement), this whole discussion is becoming quite
> pointless and pedantic. If all you are saying is that users will
> arrange the cards in a manner that makes sense to them then you are
> really not saying anything new or interesting.

Mind you, the "observing order" discussion was an answer to your
question:

http://www.info-arch.org/hypermail/sigia-l/0305/0376print.html


The discussion also drives home the point that card sort is indeed an
ordering tool. Despite some people's claim of having done card sort
hundreds of time, their card sort involvement did not go much beyond
the point of instructing participants, "your task is to sort the stack
of cards into like groups":

http://www.info-arch.org/hypermail/sigia-l/0306/0021print.html


Thus, their understanding of card sort were too shallow to recognize
that they were indeed using an ordering tool for categorizing things:

http://www.info-arch.org/hypermail/sigia-l/0305/0342print.html


Recognizing that card sort is an ordering tool will help people to
spot situations in which that tool may deceive them.


> Where you are stretching is when you try to suggest that these
> "arrangements" are guided by "sorting" in some manner.

I am not sure what you mean by that. Please elaborate.


> > First, when I saw "'order' as in 'chaos'", I said to myself that
> > is a contradiction in meaning very good for a paradoxical
> > discussion about discovering order within chaos.
> 
> Then you've made a grave error of understanding. It's a simple idiom
> of communication. Another example: with "dog as in cat, or dog as in
> to track" I'm sure most people would infer that in the first I am
> making reference to the meaning "A domesticated carnivorous mammal
> (Canis familiaris) related to the foxes and wolves and raised in a
> wide variety of breeds", and far from making some paradoxical
> philosophic statement of dog-nature being imbued within cat-nature.
> Another example: "dry as in wet, or dry as in wit".

I am not an English language expert. Could you cite authoritative
source indicating that such use of "as in" is indeed a proper usage?

BTW, how does such usage lead to "'order' as in 'chaos'" meaning 
"order = not chaos"?


Boniface