On Thu Jul 3, Shag wrote:
> if you've ever heard or use the expression "intense" to describe
> someone, what do you think it means?
I think there's one nuance people seem to have left out, which might be the most important one if someone has called you intense, namely as a term non-intellectuals apply to intellectuals. It's used by the kind of people who think "judgmental" is a bad thing; people who don't want to rock the boat, and think we should all get along by bracketing every zone of contention; people who avoid going into intellectual detail out of disinterest and politics out of politeness -- people like that might say "you're intense" as an attempt to explain why you scare people without being insulting and suggesting how you might soften it.
I've most often run into this usage in the secretarial pool. There it is as much a respectful compliment as it is an insult -- a way of saying "you're above us" while telling you how it feels. It also attempts to proffer a neutral explanation for how you could be a good person underneath it all, and to suggest that a modus vivendi is possible once people are sensitized to overlook certain things that this word prepares them for -- like allusions to books (which makes them feel stupid) or a constant readiness to argue (you would probably only think of it as "clarify") when their goal in life is the joy of agreement.
Michael