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seqram2 scripsit: > Instead of saying that Mr. Bird is "sometimes" carnivore and sometimes > herbivore, sometimes male and sometimes female, it would seem to me > that what makes for a "prototype" are exactly those characteristics > which *are* constant across "almost all" instances of the critter. So > Mr. Bird has no specific size (though its size is limited to between > an inch or so and 10-odd feet), nor a gender, nor a diet, but does > have feathers, a beak, two wings, is warm-blooded, etc. You are talking about lo'e cipni (in the non-Jorge sense of lo'e), which is indeed "thin" in the sense of having only those properties shared by all, or at least all typical, birds. Mr. Bird is a different thing: he is the One Bird of whom all individual birds are avatars. Whether English (or other SAE languages) take Mr. X or individual Xes to be more important depends on X: for birds, it's the individual bird most of the time, but for the _New York Times_ it's Mr. Times that counts, not a particular copy/individual/avatar. -- John Cowan jcowan@hidden.email www.reutershealth.com www.ccil.org/~cowan I come from under the hill, and under the hills and over the hills my paths led. And through the air. I am he that walks unseen. I am the clue-finder, the web-cutter, the stinging fly. I was chosen for the lucky number. --Bilbo