On Tue, Sep 30, 2008 at 12:19 AM, Ian Kelly <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Of Wooble's three arguments in that case, the third one is the only > one that is persuasive (although I invite Judge Wooble to show me a > dictionary that explicitly equates "privilege" with all-caps "MAY" as > e appears to claim in eir second argument). The third argument, > however, is inapplicable to the case at hand. It states that, per > game custom and the best interests of the game, a privilege cannot > imply a CAN. It does not state that a privilege cannot explicitly > state a CAN.
The first, too, is irrelevant to this case; the crux of the issue is whether privilege, in ordinary-language meaning, is MAY or CAN. How about both? Googling 'rights and privileges', one of the websites that comes up contrasts the right of life or liberty with the privilege of driving a car. Assume that a teenager does not have the privilege of driving his car, and MAY NOT and CANNOT do it (he doesn't have access to the keys, for example). If he gained the ability to do it (found the keys), but was still forbidden to do it, we wouldn't say that he had gained the privilege of driving his car; nor would we in the more bizarre situation that he became allowed to do it but remained unable to. We would only say that he has the privilege of driving his car if he MAY and CAN do so.
