[Sigia-l] The Value of an IA discussion - from anewbie'sperspective

[Conal Tuohy]

Christopher Fahey wrote:

> Aristotle is the one you're thinking of
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotle). Like Linnaeus, Aristotle
> classified all the animals, too. But like almost everything Aristotle
> dreamed up, his system was fairly ridiculous (IMHO, of 
> course). He had some
> pretty bizzarre hierarchical categories, such as animals with 
> blood vs.
> without blood, animals found on Aristotle's estate vs. not-found on
> Aristotle's estate, and animals that are delicious to eat 
> versus those that
> are not. 

Reminds me of Borges' article "The Analytical Language of John Wilkins" in which he writes of "a certain Chinese encyclopaedia entitled 'Celestial Empire of benevolent Knowledge'. In its remote pages it is written that the animals are divided into: (a) belonging to the emperor, (b) embalmed, (c) tame, (d) sucking pigs, (e) sirens, (f) fabulous, (g) stray dogs, (h) included in the present classification, (i) frenzied, (j) innumerable, (k) drawn with a very fine camelhair brush, (l) et cetera, (m) having just broken the water pitcher, (n) that from a long way off look like flies."

http://www.alamut.com/subj/artiface/language/johnWilkins.html

Con