Word: absurd
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...long run the expert in the use of unwarranted assumptions comes off better than the equivator. He would deal with our question on Hume not by baffling the grader or fencing with him, but like this: "It is absurd to discuss whether Hume is representative of the age in which he lived unless we first note the progress of that age on all intellectual fronts. After all, Hume did not live in a vacuum...
Carswell's further discussion of the O.A. is quite to the point-he himself realizes its superiority to any E., however A. His illustration includes one of the key "Wake Up the Grader" phrases- "It is absurd." What force! What gall! What fun! "Ridiculous," "hopeless," "nonsense," on the one hand: "doubtless," "obvious," "unquestionable," on the other, will have the same effect. A hint of nostalgic, anti-academic languor at this stage may well match the grader's own mood: "It seems more than obvious to one entangled in the petty quibbles of contemporary Medievalists-at times indeed, approaching the ludicrous...
...accepted the oversimplification that all narcotics are dangerous and thus should be outlawed. The all but universal acceptance of marijuana, at least among the young, raises the question of how long the nation's present laws against its use can remain in force without seeming as absurd and hypocritical as Prohibition...
From their polar positions, Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley Jr. see themselves as witty, wily intellectuals magnificently equipped to interpret (respectively) the left and right of U.S. life. Except when they confront each other directly, the notion is not entirely absurd. But when they fence on television or in type, bitchiness erodes their polish and learned discourse dissolves into tantrums...
...long run the expert in the use of unwarranted assumptions comes off better than the equivator. He would deal with our question on Hume not by baffling the grader or fencing with him, but like this: "It is absurd to discuss whether Hume is representative of the age in which he lived unless we first note the progress of that age on all intellectual fronts. After all, Hume did not live in a vacuum...