To be explicit about something I wasn’t explicit about in my other reply:
The set {Yemen, Oman, Somalia, Dubai} is “wrong”, for the same reason that {plane, train, boat, driver’s-seat-of-car} is
Again, I disagree; it’s a useful set for practical purposes
There is an ambiguity here, but if what you are claiming to disagree with is the analogy to {plane, train, boat, driver’s-seat-of-car} (as opposed to merely the “wrongness” of either), then you genuinely do not have a good understanding of, or are stubbornly refusing to acknowledge, the relevant political geography, and I would suspect you of having heard of Dubai before you had heard of the UAE (probably as a result of journalists’ ignorance), and anchoring on this fact.
But I can’t be sure to what extent we really have differing models of how the world works, as opposed to at least one of us going out of our way to signal something (willingness to disregard official politics in your case, familiarity with the Middle East in mine).
But I can’t be sure to what extent we really have differing models of how the world works, as opposed to at least one of us going out of our way to signal something (willingness to disregard official politics in your case, familiarity with the Middle East in mine).
If your goal was to signal your familiarity with the Middle East, you’ve utterly failed since it appears you didn’t know how the UAE was organized. You come across as one of those people who memorizes lists of countries and capitals and possibly shapes but has no idea how the map does (or does not) correspond to facts on the ground.
To be explicit about something I wasn’t explicit about in my other reply:
There is an ambiguity here, but if what you are claiming to disagree with is the analogy to {plane, train, boat, driver’s-seat-of-car} (as opposed to merely the “wrongness” of either), then you genuinely do not have a good understanding of, or are stubbornly refusing to acknowledge, the relevant political geography, and I would suspect you of having heard of Dubai before you had heard of the UAE (probably as a result of journalists’ ignorance), and anchoring on this fact.
But I can’t be sure to what extent we really have differing models of how the world works, as opposed to at least one of us going out of our way to signal something (willingness to disregard official politics in your case, familiarity with the Middle East in mine).
If your goal was to signal your familiarity with the Middle East, you’ve utterly failed since it appears you didn’t know how the UAE was organized. You come across as one of those people who memorizes lists of countries and capitals and possibly shapes but has no idea how the map does (or does not) correspond to facts on the ground.