GS Chandy
Posts:
4,348
From:
Hyderabad, Mumbai/Bangalore, India
Registered:
9/29/05
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Re: Technology In Education
Posted:
Dec 3, 2007 6:41 AM
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> MPG Posted: Nov 30, 2007 11:31 AM
>
> >Isn't that special? Of course he believes his data
> >(even his non- data) are best.
>
> It is an idiom, Michael. "The best there is" does
> es not mean "the best". It does not even mean
> "good", necessarily. It means, "it's all we have".
> Paradoxically (as all human languages are), in
> n English, "the best there is" is an admission of
> weaknesses not a boast about quality. Gosh, I hope
> you are not criticizing Wayne for his honesty.
>
> For instance, if I look into the food sack and
> and tell you that moldy bread is "the best there is",
> I am not telling you that moldy bread is haute
> cuisine, or even that it is particularly good. I am
> telling you only there is nothing else. But, if you
> have been starving for a week, you might just
> consider eating it.
>
<snip>
>
> Haim
> Je me souviens
>
As my mother-tongue is something quite different from English, I should obviously defer to those whose mother-tongue IS English. However, Haim (whether or not his mother-tongue is English) seems to be in error in at least some of his assertions quoted above.
I believe there ARE times when the statement "it's the best there is" can mean quite literally that the thing under discussion is indeed very good. The following assertion might, I believe, have been more accurate than the one he made:
+++
"The best there is" does not NECESSARILY mean "the best".
+++
For instance, if I were to look into the food sack and then, withdrawing an evidently excellent loaf of bread, were to say triumphantly: "Yeah!!! This is the BEST there is!", that would have to mean the loaf IS literally the very best. (i.e. HOW one says something often makes it mean what it is meant to mean. Yes? No?)
GSC
Nous nous souvenions??
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