On Mon, 2011-05-09 at 18:54 +0200, tlaronde@polynum.com wrote:


> Just look for the origin: the verb is "sophistiquer"... The usage and
> the dictionnaries are inconsistant, since "sophistiqué" (now used non
> pejoratively) is the past participle of "sophistiquer" that is
> definitively pejorative. (Look for "sophistiquement" too; all this comes
> from philosophy where sophiste is not to be taken in good part)...


This is where semantics encounters the "everybody's somebody's fool"
principle. I hang out with people who pay $20+++ for a liter of spoiled
grape juice. The more they pay the more their peers regard them as being
sophisticated. People outside that culture would see that very same use
of the term "sophisticated" as a pejorative. Sophistication is in the
eye of the beholder.