h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

There are many "Two kinds of People in the World" theories. This is just one of them.

It certainly was not dreamed up by a former editor of h2g2; my earliest memory of it is in the film "Tunes of Glory" (Alec Guinness/John Mills) circa 1960. I'd be amazed if it didn't predate that.

Personally, I have some sympathy with the pessimist/optimist analysis though I dont think it really says anything very meaningful about people. As members of society the Ps and Os are probably equally valueable, amusing, attractive......whatever - by and large.

I would take issue with the statement that a half-empty glass must logically once have been full. It might be in the process of being filled or it might deliberately have been half-filled and while I accept that we probably would not then describe it as half-empty (though "still half-empty" is a distinct possibility)it would be an accurate description of its state.

I also question the evaluation of air as "worthless" - where would we be without it? - and the implied one of beer is intrinsically more valuable - in other than crude monetary terms - but that is just a personal view.

End of ramble.

Stephen

Oh, pishtosh. Beer is extrinsically worth more than air, because it costs more, because of supply/demand curves and the like. The entry doesn't talk about the intrinsic value of either beer or air, so don't vent your anti-capitalist wrath here!

The entry includes two 'two kinds of people' theories, and does not exclude the possibility of more. Oh, and the bit about a former editor is *humour*. Look it up in a dictionary.


-Xanthia

Thank you for your reply. I will look humour up in the dictionary if you will look up coutesy!

Is it possible to be an opptomistic peesimist'
or a pessimistic optomist

I would be really interested in seeing a supply/demand curve for air...

Whether there are optimistic pessimists or pessimistic optimists would probably depend on viewpoints. Someone could be considered optimistic, for a pessimist, or pessimistic, for an optimist.
Is there a middle ground, somewhere that the optimists consider pessimistic and the pessimists consider optimistic?

I just thought I would save a lot of people a lot of time and point out that looking up 'coutesy' in the OED would be futile. Rather discourteous, I thought, to send us all on a wild goose chase. By the way, 'humour' is there and worth checking out!

Cheap shots are cheap! Im sure you understod the message. I am quite willing to enter into a discussion with anyone who is reasonably polite; you were not!

And by the by: inability to recognise humour is far from being confined to me (even if I can be accused of it which I question!)

Think on!

Stephen

Ahh, you judgemental people. I'd never heard of the theory that "There are two kinds of people, those who think there are two kinds of people and those that don't..." but I like it.

But what is most ironic is that everyone immediately wants to be in the latter category, yet that wish itself, to split yourself away from unpleasant others, means that you are being judgemental and have to go in the first category.

Bah, I just did that!