How the Planets Protect us From the Sun
10 hours ago
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Sensitive
Being sensitive could mean being especially prone to be affected, being vulnerable in a way. But it could also mean being particularly quick to perceive and accommodate. A suggestion that vulnerability leads to empathy, perhaps. Or, from an etymological point of view, that the ability and inclination to sense and feel lie at the root of both ...
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5 comments:
what's with the ellipsis?
It's not really an ellipsis. Closing it with a full stop just felt too final and abrupt, somehow.
that's because readers construe it as "lie at the root of both (vulnerability and empathy)" - in which case, the sentence will feel incomplete, because it is incomplete, and hence the use of a full stop will feel wrong (abrupt).
using an ellipsis (it is an ellipsis) however, you leave the sentence trailing into unnecessary ambiguity - the usage of good english connotes clarity. that being said, it is a lesser evil than gg's use of "perspective".
i agree: a person who is more sensitive has higher faculties of perception, and hence higher possibility of being wounded (more vulnerable) - the same person should be able to feel a greater range of affection, and hence, identify with more permutations of emotions - we're referring to magnitude here. or, we can refer to precision - sensitivity being the ability to detect more subtle nuances in their feelings, or the feelings of others.
But how would that sentence be incomplete? Other than maybe the 'that' turns the whole thing into a sort of dependent clause. Do I know you, by the way?
Oh yes, you're right, it is because the "that" turned it into a dependent clause. I think it is also because of the "both" - what does it refer to?
You've seen me before, but no, we don't really know each other.
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