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The correct saying is "The proof of the pudding is in the eating."
All you misquoters out there stop it or I'll revoke your pudding privileges.
lawman
Jordan
"you are what you eat"
Moooooooooooooooooooooo
So, as the pudding goes it doesn't have to be the precise pudding, rather it has to be a correct one, right?
The various puddings I had in England last year didn't seem to lend themselves to precision... Some foods must be precise, some foods just need to be generally correct. I'd place any of the pudding varieties firmly in the latter category.
So I suppose, if someone sets it in front of you and says it's a pudding, you just eat it and see what you find...
It'll likely either be a dessert-type thing with currants and brandy-soaked bread-type ingredients, or a custard-y dessert (like what US residents think of when they say "pudding"), or it will be a main-course bread-type thing filled with something else (like meat and gravy), or perhaps a fat sausage-like object made of animal parts you don't want to think about... and then there are subtypes of each one, and I'm sure I'm forgetting some, and there are probably others I haven't heard of yet...
I'm still not sure what any of them are trying to prove.
[edited by: mivox at 6:11 pm (utc) on Aug. 27, 2003]
Jordan
I like changing cliches because it makes people pay attention to them again when they'd long since expected to tune out.
My sweet little puddings could turn into porridges? I'm traumatized now. I'm going to get out of Foo for a while...
/claus
Though I guess tossing the pudding a second time would be rather likely if they did... especially if they gathered the leftovers from the cheese-rollers to go with it.
When in Rome I couldn't care less that you catch more flys with honey than vinegar because revenge is a dish that is best served cold, and one in the hand is worth two in the bush, because after all, you are what you eat. A little leven, levens the whole lump, so don't you go believin' all that glitters is gold, even when you wish upon a star, for you'd only be tilting at windmills; the proof is in the pudding. Wherever you go, there you are, but take care always not to choke under pressure, or you may be tossing your cookies untill the fat lady sings.
Jordan
Eww! Either way, ew!
This thread should be eligible for some kind of prize. Should we award it a proven pudding?
Jordan
Wait, pudding tossing is real?
Should we award it a proven pudding?
Who's going to prove the pudding for the award? ;)
Who's going to prove the pudding for the award? ;)
"Due to legal complications resulting from imprecision in the cases where it has been deemed proper for awards to be granted to proven puddings; presently, properely proven pudding must comply with the precise proper pudding proving methods listed in Appendix C. Jello is deprecated in this revision, though some UAs may still allow for Jello Pudding Pops under the provision that they are not served as precisely proven puddings." W3C [w3.org]'s rec on proven pudding pageantry implementation.
W3C to the rescue! ;)
Jordan
And, what form will the proof take?
I'd hate to eat the pudding only to find out that the proof was disgusting forensic evidence of some sort.
IF whatever you eat (the pudding) contains the proof, then when one eats it, he/she will ultimately discover the proof, and subsequently ... the truth.
Secondly, it is the context of the translation which matters and not the translation itself. He said/she said ... who cares? We all know and understand the meaning of the saying! Do we not?
The proof is in the pudding
Could it be a like the fortune cookie? As in there is a little bit of paper with some proof or evidence written on it.
Never buy a dwarf with learning difficulties; it's not big and it's not clever
The evidence you are looking for (the flavor) is in the pudding. The process of establishing the evidence in a cogent form (proving it's flavor) is in the manner of it's extraction (eating).
Postulation: The pudding tastes good.
Evidence: The pudding.
Problem: How to establish the truth of the postulation. (For this illustration, assume all senses work).
Test 1: Can one look at the pudding and establish the truth; i.e. how the pudding actually tastes? If so, then the proof is in the looking. If not, go to test 2;
Test 2: Can one smell the pudding and establish the truth? If so, then the proof is in the looking. If not, go to test 3;
Test 3: Will touching the pudding establish the truth? If so, then the proof in in the touching. If not, go to test 4;
Test 4: Can one listen to the pudding and establish the truth? If so, then the proof is in the listening. If not, go to test 5;
Test 5: Can one get a mental vibe from the pudding and establish the truth? If so, then the proof is in the mental connection you have with the pudding. If not, then go to test 6;
Test 6: Can one taste the pudding and establish the truth? If so (and this is the most likely answer and the reason for the adage) then the proof is in the eating.
Secondly, it is the context of the translation which matters and not the translation itself. He said/she said ... who cares? We all know and understand the meaning of the saying! Do we not?
Apparently not. ;)
lawman
The evidence you are looking for (the flavor) is in the pudding. The process of establishing the evidence in a cogent form (proving it's flavor) is in the manner of it's extraction (eating).Postulation: The pudding tastes good.
Evidence: The pudding
The evidence i'm looking for is not necessarily the flavour of any edible. It's rather used in context, as "is it an efficient widget? - the proof (of the pudding) is in the eating (/pudding)" (!?)
Anyway, your postulation is not an objectively verifiable one. Good taste may have different implications for different people, i's not exactly subject to evidence. How does it go now... de gustibus non est disputandum
Plus, if the evidence sought was indeed the flavour, then the pudding itself would not serve sufficiently as evidence; it would have to be the flavour (description of the taste) of the same pudding. What you are saying with "Evidence: The pudding" is essentially that the proof is the pudding - it's not even in it now...
/claus
Naive pudding-ism (the idea that all things being equal, pudding generally is as it seems to be), leads to asking about why pudding is the way it seems to be. This leads to discovery of the ingrediants, the process by which it is produced, &c. In short, naive pudding-ism leads to phsyics / chemistry / &c.
But physics and chemistry tell us that pudding is not generally as it seems to us to be. The texture that we think of as smooth is not actually anything like what we think of as smooth, the hue we think of as color is not actually anything like what we think of as color, and so on.
Thus, naive pudding-ism, if true, leads to physics / chemisty, which if true, lead to the denial of naive pudding-ism. Ergo, naive pudding-sim, if true, is false, therefore naive pudding-ism is false. ;p
Jordan
Anyway, your postulation is not an objectively verifiable one.
Who said the standard was objective. I'll settle for subjective.
The rest of you post reminds me of a legal saying:
If the law is on your side, argue the law.
If the facts are on your side, argue the facts.
If neither is on your side, argue like hell. ;)
lawman
And bring in as many semi related points, baffle them with anything everything and if you are good/lucky you can get them to forget what the hell you were arguing about and agree with you.
That's worked for me. What a face saver :)
lawman
Misquoted An Old Adage
a peeve pet
<edit>just ignore me...</edit>
lawman
okay, then it shouldn't matter much if it was in the pudding or in the eating, or indeed if the pudding was the proof itself. I'll buy that one. Anyway, i don't know if there are laws regulating pudding i just thought you were a bit fast in your arguments, although i do agree with the conclusion.
On the other hand, so was i because proof and evidence does not need to be the same, as in the natural sciences proof is often found theoretically while practical experiments establishing the evidence is impossible to carry out for one reason or another.
It's in the eating, i'd say. If for no other reason then because it does not make sense that it should be (in) the pudding itself, especially when this adage is applied to objects that clearly does not have anything significant in common with puddings.
The exception that confirms the rule is the now famous sixpence, although we do not know what matter this sixpence was proof of. Clearly, it should be "proof of the pudding", but what particular characteristic of the pudding a sixpence is supposed to be proof of remains a mystery to me. I suspect in this case that the proof was planted and intended to proof the (commercial) value of pudding.
/claus
I didn't start the analysis, but I'm a great goer-alonger so I jumped in. My pet peeve isn't in the analysis, it's in the shortened version of the original saying.
I suppose we could finally come to the subject of a short skit on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour where two men met in the middle of the stage. One said to the other "Well, you know the old saying." The other replied, "Yep", at which time each turned and left.
lawman
'curiosity killed the cat'
when the whole saying is
'curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back'
which has entirely different connotations.
ummm. ya, sleep time.
'curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back'
What does that mean; that the cat died satisfied and the satisfaction had regenerative properties?
