Service needn't be servile. Attitude and the Ferengi Rules of
Acquisition will suffice. Now if we could only deal harshly
with the media portrayal stereotypes of those misunderstood
emissaries of capitalism.
"May I do you a service?" showed up in some Heinlein story.
I've liked it, as it can be uttered utterly superciliously,
or humbly. Lots of topspin on that phrase. He shortened it
to "service", which I am not sure I like. Hmm.
Anders Sandberg wrote:
>
> On Sat, Nov 24, 2001 at 11:58:26PM +0200, scerir wrote:
> > For "sciavo" or "sciao", means, in Venetian dialect,
> > ?servant" or "slave?.
> >
> > The Latin word "sclavus" became the Venetian
> > "sciavo", then "sciao", at last the Italian "ciao".
> >
> > So when we say "ciao" we are saying something like
> > "your humble servant"!
>
> Interesting. This form of greeting seems to have been very widespread.
> The swedish (somewhat slangish) greeting "tjenare" is derived from
> "tjänare", which also means literally servant. There are some old forms,
> such as "din mjukaste tjänare" (your softest, i.e. humblest, servant)
> occasionally found in letters.
>
> So, among us freedom loving independent extropians, what would the
> proper non-hierarchical greeting be? "Your ambitious peer"? :-)
>
> --
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> Anders Sandberg Towards Ascension!
> asa@nada.kth.se http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/
> GCS/M/S/O d++ -p+ c++++ !l u+ e++ m++ s+/+ n--- h+/* f+ g+ w++ t+ r+ !y
-- My moronic mnemonic for smart behavior: "DICKS" == diplomacy, integrity, courage, kindness, skepticism.
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