I taught the computer to learn to play checkers" -- a more subtle achievement than teaching a computer to play checkers, he pointed out -- "and over the next 10 years I got gradually more and more hooked on the relationships between computers and the mind".
Individual performances continued to receive praise; in 1987, Bill Collins analyzed The Letter (1940), and described her performance as "a brilliant, subtle achievement," and wrote, "Bette Davis makes Leslie Crosbie one of the most extraordinary females in movies".
That this sixth sense doesn't feel dramatically clumsy or downright preposterous is one of the film's subtle but significant achievements.
Alex Clark found Aravind Adiga's second novel, Last Man in Tower, to be a more subtle and nuanced achievement than his blazing attack on the new India, the Booker-winning White Tiger.
Colleagues say that the prime minister's driving ambition is to remain in office for longer than his predecessor, Shinzo Abe, who lasted all of a year (Mr Fukuda is in his eighth month).Still, it would be a mistake to ignore the one subtle but crucial achievement of Mr Hu's visit.
And there is a more subtle sense that his achievements make white Americans feel a little better about themselves, and a bit more open to Powell.
