Equivocality

It was not long into our first year together that I found the book.

It was a handsome hardcover volume, the sort of heavy, expensive book of photographs that the too-stylish always seem to have on their coffee tables. When I first came across it, it was sitting on the small desk next to the big window in her study. The title was simply “Michelle,” written in elegant gold script subtly embossed into the dustcover. The black and white cover image depicted a woman sitting at an outdoor café, in the process of bringing a big latte to her lips, smiling. I looked hard at that photograph for a second, and saw that the woman with the coffee was indeed my Michelle, in her famous white dress.

There is a “Simple English” language option for Wikipedia (simple.wikipedia.org). A separately maintained copy just like the French, Japanese, Arabic, Swahili etc. Who knew?

And it’s excellent. The articles are very simple (Wiki policy is only use the 1,000 most common words) and on average very well written. The big surprise for me was how well the articles render very complicated abstract ideas such as “money.” Some subjects do take a beating — “quantum mechanics” is damn near impossible to explain without mathematics, let alone technical vocabulary — but most of them come through amazingly well, especially considering that the translators are all self-appointed volunteers!

Now. Think about the implications of a Wikipedia for all the people in the world who read English only poorly….

If not everyone has an equally sexy body, how do we deal with this fact in a fashion both healthy and realistic? This is the question I want answered.