>protagonist for a moment I thought you wrote "Protagoras".

>Blaise PascalWell I have an avatar but its 22k so therefore impossible to upload given the all too meager size limit that has been set.Ah well.

I have an avatar of Albert Einstein. It passes the size test but fails the modesty test. Narrowly

I was spared any of these difficult decisions. I found an avatar on the forum menu which is already a photographic likeness of me.You can only imagine my consternation when I see other forum members using it - it seems as though I am surrounded by doppelgangers ...

Hamilton, you could of course choose to have a blank file for your avatar. I think that will have a certain Zen-like quality - allowing you to take the form that is fit for the forum.QuoteIt will save me a few $$$ on razor blades as well.The only razor you will then need is Occam's.

That is OcKam -- as in William of Ockham. Ockham was a nominalist, Aquinas a universalist. I come down on the Aquinas side. And Ockham's Razor was actually called The Principle of Economy. Ockham's Razor was 14th century slang. He was born between 1290 and 1300 entered the Franciscan Order and did his studies at Oxford, where he studied theology in 1310.William Jefferson Clinton and William of Ockham did not know each other, even though they both went to Oxford. William Hamilton did not attend Oxford.

QuoteOriginally posted by: HamiltonI cannot help but notice that an overwhelming number of regular Wilmott posters eschew photographic realismwhen selecting an avatar. Unlike yours truly.Peoples' 'avatars' conceal, reveal and identify them. Symbolic 'avatars' can represent as much as photographically realistic ones. Maybe I shouldnt read so much into the meaning of icons, they could after all be limited by the choice available. To start with, there isnt a wide choice of icons on this site, unless you take some trouble to search the internet/make up your own icon.By the way, your earlier 'Spock' icon was just great, your icons seem to be getting more complicated by the day, moving from a single characters to scenes of action... time for your next icon to be a photographically realistic shot of yourself ?

>By the way, your earlier 'Spock' icon was just greatI certainly very much liked it, particularly the way that it looked directly at the camera, which gave the very surreal impression, especially if I said "fascinating" in a deadpan manner, that Spock was actually speaking.However, there several quadruple entendres at work in the particular avatar that I have settled on.1) The Mirror, Mirror episode portrays a parallel universe where Spock sports a goethe, the Federation is organized like the Roman Empire, and Spock is plotting to assassinate Captain Kirk and assume command.2) Roman Spock has just trounced 5 of the transplanted Federation crew in physical combat, and is forcibly mind melding with Dr McCoy against his will to extract information. Not sure if that is really Socratic, but its the closest thing to it in the mind meld world.3) The closing scene of the episode and the speech about one man changing an empire. Change beginning with one man etcetera.4) I had a Goethe like beard during my holidays and actually bore a passing resemblance.5) I've been reading a little more military history, and am about to move onto Roman Military History from the Greeks [and am reading Augustine's Confessions] so the tie in is appropo.Photo of myself? Perhaps I am actually someone quite famous and wish to mask my identity.

QuoteThat is OcKam -- as in William of Ockham.Sorry Hamilton, but "misspellings" of this name in current late modern English should be perfectly acceptable. Ockham is near Ripley, Surrey, and William of Ockum lived in Muchen and Pariis for most of his life (1285 - 1347). After all, the alphabets he used for the vulgar tounge were still borrowed from what latter became Germany, and France. We have a hard and soft "c." They had a hard, soft, and silent "k" (knight). Alphabets weren't standardized yet, often differed from town to town. Variation was rife, especially on sibilants and hard consenants, k and c and t often were interchangable. Spellings, vowels, ditto.....and even less the language (try looking at Gawyain and the Grewn Knyght). Doubling letters often turned them from soft to hard, so "cc" as in "Occum" would likely be recognized as a hard "kuh" sound. A remnant of this is the double "ss" seeeset in German (Deutsche) that looks like a big f in early norte americano colonial documents....where we were writting English with letters from German alphabets for a lot longer tahn the practice survived in Europe.To put Billy Achum and language and spelling trends in perspective: 1300 - standard italian finally defined by Dante's Divine Comedie; 1360 a version of "English" widely circulates with publication of Langland's Piers Plowman; 1347 GGK? 1392 Chaucer's Canturbury tales. French stumbled along during this time. Hoch Deustche awaited the arrival of the bible translation of dissident monk for a lot longer.If we tried to write "Ockham" in a form venerable Willy might recognize I am afraid we'd have some problems with our current alphabet, however much the Surrey Chamber of Commerce may wish you to conform to spelling it "Ockham" now that they have paid for all those road signs. I daresay he may recognize the "Occam" of JackRyan and think something along the lines of "probably a guy from the next town over from me."This, as you have alluded to earlier, was why latin was so useful.Anyone may have at my spellings now.

Thanks for the spirited defense of the spelling, James.As far as I'm concerned I'll stick with the essential "Occam" and avoid the plurality of spelling as it really should not be posited without necessity. More on Occam available here. The site itself is quite interesting for the lunchtime read...Of course, Hamilton may choose to at least cut Scotty out of the picture (if not Spock's beard off his chin). Personally I prefer my Vulcans shaven not stirred.

>I prefer my Vulcans shaven not stirred.I really wish that I had said that.Work long and prespire.

>This, as you have alluded to earlier, was why latin was so useful.You are very correct. The lawlessness of English and its evolution from the Normans/Angles and Saxons in the 10th century forward make philology a perilous sport for the amateur, which I most certainly am.>More on Occam available here. The site itself is quite interesting for the lunchtime read...And seriously misleading as to the significance of Ockham [ahem!] -- Volume 3 of Copleston devotes no fewer than 6 chapters to Ockham. The website referred to above glosses over the nominalism vs universals. This is a mistake. Universals vs Nominalism was THE major battle line of medieval philosophy. All of Volume 2 of Copleston is devoted to the patristic philosophers/theologians [Augustine] through St Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus.www.radicalacademy.com is another decent site for information;

Regarding forum polls, I am not sure if its been already mentioned or done but I think it would be better if poll results were posted somewhere on the site and a new poll icon appeared for anyone who has not yet answered.rgds,Dimitris