>From:    Jason Creager <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: "domestical" ferrets
>Edward Lipinski wrote:
>>**DOMESTICAL and not domesticated, since the ferret is certainly not
> domesticated but rather is being processed (adapting)towards some final
>>time when the domestication will be complete...
 
>"Certainly" as in absolutely, positively, without a shadow of a doubt?
>
>Hogwash!
 
Reply: Is hogwash!  the same thing as pork drippings?  or is it more like
what's left on the ground after the porker goes through the carwash?
 
The use of the adjective modifying the noun, "ferret" can be one of three
degrees termed positive, comparative, or superlative.  For example, "warm,"
"warmer,'" and "warmest" indicate the positive, comparative, and the
superlative degree of warmth.
 
With respect to the term, "domestic," in addition to indicating the
positive, comparative, and the superlative degree of the qualifying
adjective, we should also consider the sequencing "delta" of the noun,
"ferret," as for example on the very first day that it could be considered
having moved from "wild" to "domestic." Now, as silly as it may read, let
me make the point that going from wild to domestic is a specific degree of
change (of the ferret) as measured by escalation steps, one after the
other, that takes the organism from "wild" to the initial escalation or the
very first step of domesticity, howsoever that could have been measured.
 
I think that you must agree that domesticity must have started at some
time in the past, perhaps in tiny little "steps" of observed behavior and
trained response, but certainly not measured by scientifically defined
genetic changes that were mapped and clearly defined.
 
In the ferret, or any animal, including man himself, the ultimate degree of
change has not yet been achieved, to be sure.  Simply stated the "delta" is
unlimited, not considering the possibility of total annihilation.  As a
matter of fact you will be hard put to define the adjective "domesticated,"
as indicative of having reached an end point in the evolution of the
organism.  The reason for this is due to the plasticity of the DNA that
must necessarily respond to training, chemical and radiologic stimuli that
are inescapable in a dynamic and pulsing universe of which we are captive.
 
You must agree that we are but putty in the molding hands of the cosmos
(read God here for the opiated masses).
 
In other words, the superlative is, as we know it or more correctly, don't
know it, is unknown and is crudely comparable to predicting the future,
final development as having been ultimately reached.  Is it not an
inescapable conclusion that the superlative of the ferret's evolution is
not yet here?
 
Therefore concluding that the superlative of the ferret's evolution in not
yet here, we are obliged as intelligent beings to define the ferrets
evolutionary status as "comparative,." and as such we have no choice but
to use the comparative degree of domesticity or the word "domestic" rather
than "domesticated."
 
Is the final analysis does the use of the term, "domesticated" as a
superlative adjectival modifier of the noun, "ferret" indicative of the
ignorance of the writer?  I'm afraid the answer is positive.  Hogwash?
 
Edward Lipinski (who emphatically states that the only "domesticated"
ferret is a dead ferret and what you got is a "domestic" or "domestical"
ferret.)
 
[Moderator's note: The ignorance of which writer?  BIG]
[Posted in FML issue 2575]