I wrote a sidebar about this in 2012: http://thenakedlistener.wordpress.com/2012/02/17/fullstopspace/.

For situations where the fullstop/period/fullpoint follows an initial or abbreviation in midsentence, just one space (not two). In other words, just carry on (e.g. The M.B.A. was completed). The general rule of thumb is to reduce space between individual words as much as possible unless there is some other purpose to put in extra intratextual space (which usually is for special typographical effect.

Not to put too fine a point on things, and speaking as a financial printer, anyone who turns in copy with two character spaces after sentences will be charged extra. Simple as that. Of course, those who prefer two spaces can do whatever they feel like best for their blogs, etc. For professional purposes, I would not recommend the preference by reason of “avoidable cost control.”

But as I think you’ll see, the CMOS and MLA’s stylistic requirements were modified from the original typesetting standards for a very pragmatic reason: greed. No, really! Their styles evolved because newspapers and magazines were trying to maximize the amount of text they could lay out in a particular space — leaving more room for advertising. So they sacrificed readability and clarity for… money!

These standards then crept into all the major journalism schools, of course, since if you wanted to write for any publication which depended on advertising, you had to follow their (relatively newly modified) styles.

But those who learned to type on manual typewriters were taught to maintain readability and clarity as paramount. The following will explain what I mean, and is taken from an article in Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentence_spacing.

“Until the 20th century, publishing houses and printers in many countries used additional space between sentences. There were exceptions to this traditional spacing method—some printers used spacing between sentences that was no wider than word spacing.[6] This was French spacing—a term synonymous with single-space sentence spacing until the late 20th century.[7] With the introduction of the typewriter in the late 19th century, typists used two spaces between sentences to mimic the style used by traditional typesetters.[8] While wide sentence spacing was phased out in the printing industry in the mid-twentieth century, the practice continued on typewriters[9] and later on computers.[10] Perhaps because of this, many modern sources now incorrectly[5] claim that wide spacing was created for the typewriter.[11]”

​[I didn't remove the reference numbers and they aren't linked here, but you can consult the Wikipedia article to view them for yourself.]

​The fact that single sentence spacing was referred to as “French spacing” indicates how foreign it was to most English people. As you may know, historically the English despise the French and vice versa. Though I have both British and French roots in my family, I tend to lean toward the English for most guidance.

​As the Wiki article discusses, the double (or at least, increased) spacing was used in typesetting to distinguish the periods at the ends ​of sentences from mid-sentence periods, such as those following initials or abbreviations. Many people find it difficult to read​ text w​ithout this differentiation​, especially when reading aloud.​ So there was, and still is, very sound reasoning for continuing the practice.

Also, as we move further into the digital age, and we are printing less and less, the issue of saving space is becoming increasingly moot. In fact, as we are reading more and more text on computer screens, readability and clarity once again seem increasingly important.

Bottom line? Obviously there isn’t One Standard to which we can all defer, which is unfortunate for those of us who crave black and white and detest gray. So if one is not writing for a for-profit publication, it falls, I’m afraid, to one’s personal preference (or that of one’s boss).

I personally find French spacing to look cramped. Couple that with the fact that my automatic method of typing, hard-programmed into me over decades, is for my thumb to tap the space bar twice at the ends of sentences, and I doubt seriously I will ever change.

Ciao for now

The point seems to be. We must follow the commands of God (or Zeus in this case) until it leads us to irrationality. In the next paragraph he says to follow these commands “as long as I (the subject) maintain that which is becoming and consistent”. It would be inconsistent to believe it is night when it is not or to believe yourself to be in misery when you are not.

Tell me what you think. I have fun trying to puzzle these things out.

I’m not following along with your reading plan because I’m not going to start reading the Great Books until I have moved (probably within the next few months). My books are sadly packed away until then. But I love reading your posts and your ideas on the selected readings.