Re: The P content model

Hi Shane,

I think we're in danger of over-complicating something that is pretty
straightforward.

Tina rightly pointed out that a paragraph is usually about the
development of a single idea. She quoted a few sources to back that
up, and I have no problem with that.

But the key thing here is that 'developing an idea' will require the
use of all sorts of grammatical constructs, such as quoting, lists,
tables, and so on. In other words, the 'concept' of a paragraph is
more to do with the act of conveying meaning through ideas, than the
actual marks on paper or screen.

I can only imagine that the question about whether my example was one
paragraph or three, only even arises because there is too much focus
on whitespace, and insufficient attention to the semantics; to flip it
on its head, do we need an expert to tell us that this is *not* a
paragraph?:

  I have to disagree with your idea that:

It makes no sense on its own, and could only be regarded as a
paragraph if you see whitespace as the key criteria of demarcation.
However, I maintain that my original example *is* a single paragraph,
whether formatted like this:

  I have to disagree with your idea that:

    [T]he structure of a paragraph does
    not admit itself to contain a table, a pre, or even
    a blockquote.

  which, as I have just shown is not true.

or this:

  I have to disagree with your idea that: "[T]he structure
  of a paragraph does not admit itself to contain a table,
  a pre, or even a blockquote", which, as I have just
  shown is not true.

Whichever way you look at it, it's one paragraph ... one idea.

Regards,

Mark

On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 1:46 PM, Shane McCarron <shane@aptest.com> wrote:
> I fear that we are going to end up in a rat hole on this one, endlessly
> debating a topic on which none of us are expert.  Is it possible that
> someone in this group, or someone we could bring in, is actually an expert
> in this field and can say conclusively whether, for example, the following
> is 1 paragraph, 2 paragraphs and a quotation, or 3 paragraphs?
>
> Mark Birbeck wrote:
>>
>> Hi Tina,
>>
>> <p>I have to disagree with your idea that:
>>
>>  <blockquote>[T]he structure of a paragraph does
>>  not admit itself to contain a table, a pre, or even
>>  a blockquote.</blockquote>
>>
>> which, as I have just shown is not true.</p>
>>
>
> --
> Shane P. McCarron                          Phone: +1 763 786-8160 x120
> Managing Director                            Fax: +1 763 786-8180
> ApTest Minnesota                            Inet: shane@aptest.com
>
>
>



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Received on Monday, 12 January 2009 14:21:27 UTC