> Nope. The 'however' example was merely presenting you with a
> thought exercise

Okay, so this was a misunderstanding from my side that I thought you were still referring to Velcro_SP's sentence there. Point taken.

> so you could appreciate what I meant by 'loose connection',
> I was not stating it was a word you could use as a direct
> replacement.

I don't consider linking two statements in order to provide another perspective to consider a "loose connection" at all. To my mind it's a strong semantic connection. That's probably the cause of the misunderstanding from my side as to my mind that example is too far apart from the case we're discussing.

> I've done what I need to in this thread now, you asked for
> a native English speaker's perspective, I gave you this.

True, thanks again for you taking your time for this, even if it didn't help me in any way with why I wanted a native English speaker to give his opinion.

> if you want to enhance your English skills, try to think
> like a native speaker.

Thinking like a native speaker requires knowing (not just assuming) the different meanings the words can carry in the different contexts they're used. With that we're at square one again because it doesn't make sense to me semantically how in Velcro_SP's sentence the word "when" can mean something like "look at it like this" like you suggested, as I explained.
Besides, a non-native speaker trying to think like a native speaker always ends up as a non-native speaker thinking like he believes a native speaker thinks. Spot the difference?

> the more advanced you are at listening to someone speaking
> a language, the more you can adjust for their mistakes and
> still understand what they're saying.

You as a native English speaker now say that Velcro_SP might have made a *mistake* in his sentence? If yes, that would be a complete new idea you're suggesting here (as well as a contradiction to what you before said you thought about the sentence). I mean he would have clarified in his reply to me if he did, wouldn't he? Or is this just a general "thought exercise" again that has no connection to what this discussion is about specifically?

> Something for you to consider in the future.

You mean it's better to assume a mistake than to assume he actually meant what he wrote? And you mean in a case with statements that seem to contradict each other it's better to assume a mistake in either than to assume he underwent a (mostly positive) thought process which made him change his opinion and implicitly retract the former statement? If yes, then I disagree with you wholeheartedly.
I mean it was two and a half days that passed between the two statements, which I consider enough time to undergo a positive thought process. If it was two and a half minutes instead then it would be obvious that one of the statements must have a mistake in it (but I still wouldn't know which one of the two statements).