OT: Erik Naggum's Long-Windedness (was: (endp lst) or (null lst))
Oleg
both is the soul of Naggum, Erik Naggum wrote:
[snipped due to badwidth limitations]
> You know, "Oleg", I think humor is a good personality indicator.
> The problem is that different personalities tend not to understand
> each other's humor very well, or at all. I have this theory that
> there are "humor strata", and that people who are not communicating
[more snipped]
I have a better theory: people like you, who understand their intellectual
inferiority and inability to provide substance, often try to overcompensate
by providing volume.
Here endeth your psychiatry lesson,
Oleg
Marc Spitzer
So you are reduced to "I know you are but what am I" this quickly.
You failed at being a looser.
marc
Peter Lewerin
> both is the soul of Naggum, Erik Naggum wrote:
"10 seconds and counting... 7.. 6... ignition sequence starts... 3...
2... 1... flames engaged... PISS-OFF... WE HAVE PISS-OFF!"
--
Nobody expects the Swedish Inquisition!
Steve Long
"Oleg" <oleg_i...@myrealbox.com> wrote:
I enjoy -- and often marvel at -- the long-windedness, especially when I
remember that English might be his second language (few North American
residents speak a second language). In the old days, such extended retorts
were part of everyday correspondence.
Most all, I value the detailed critiques of both specific Lisp syntax and
generalized programming -- not just from Msr Naggum but the whole cll
community.
sl
Oleg
> On 1/4/03 6:33 PM, in article av85h4$836$1...@newsmaster.cc.columbia.edu,
> "Oleg" <oleg_i...@myrealbox.com> wrote:
>
>> Proving once again that brevity is the soul of wit, and that the lack of
>> both is the soul of Naggum, Erik Naggum wrote:
>>
>> [snipped due to badwidth limitations]
>>
>>> You know, "Oleg", I think humor is a good personality indicator.
>>> The problem is that different personalities tend not to understand
>>> each other's humor very well, or at all. I have this theory that
>>> there are "humor strata", and that people who are not communicating
>>
>> [more snipped]
>>
>> I have a better theory: people like you, who understand their
>> intellectual inferiority and inability to provide substance, often try to
>> overcompensate by providing volume.
>>
>> Here endeth your psychiatry lesson,
>> Oleg
>>
>
> I enjoy -- and often marvel at -- the long-windedness [...]
And do you call yourself a programmer by any chance?
If he writes code the way he writes his posts, his programs must be pages
after pages after pages of long-winded repetitive drivel.
The issue is not whether he is a decent coder however, but what makes him so
long-winded and verbally abusive. I don't know about the verbal
abusiveness, but I think his long-windedness is a product of
a) low intelligence, resulting in his inability to express himself tersely
or
b) same, resulting in a desire to overcompensate
In private email, two people who will go unnamed [1] suggested
c) narcissism
and
d) "[the fact that] Erik sucks" (which pretty much sums it up ;-)
Oleg
[1] I guess they didn't want to be stalked by Erik from thread to thread
Kenny Tilton
>>>[snipped due to badwidth limitations]
In case you hadn't noticed, the horse is dead. So now /you/ are the one
stinking the joint up. Move on, fer chrissakes.
--
kenny tilton
clinisys, inc
http://www.tilton-technology.com/
---------------------------------------------------------------
"Cells let us walk, talk, think, make love and realize
the bath water is cold." -- Lorraine Lee Cudmore
Nils Goesche
> If he writes code the way he writes his posts, his programs must be
> pages after pages after pages of long-winded repetitive drivel.
> The issue is not whether he is a decent coder however, but what makes him so
> long-winded and verbally abusive. I don't know about the verbal
> abusiveness, but I think his long-windedness is a product of
> a) low intelligence, resulting in his inability to express himself
> tersely
Look, troll: The last time you posted anything about Lisp here, you
didn't even understand the point of macros. How about doing some
productive work and think about them instead of insulting Lispers who
are obviously far ahead of your level of understanding?
Regards,
--
Nils Gösche
"Don't ask for whom the <CTRL-G> tolls."
PGP key ID 0x0655CFA0
Erik Naggum
| Look, troll: The last time you posted anything about Lisp here, you
| didn't even understand the point of macros. How about doing some
| productive work and think about them instead of insulting Lispers
| who are obviously far ahead of your level of understanding?
"Oleg" is not insulting me. He is trying to communicate to me that
he feels a debilitating powerlessness to respond intelligently to
me. I can feel his pain. I have presented him with a model of the
world with which he cannot begin to grapple, and I present this
model with such force that he can only feel rage and rebellion; all
he can do is succumb to a desire to shriek "no! no! it isn't so!".
"Oleg" is not the first person to encounter a text that presents the
reader with two simultaneous impossibilities: (1) a different view
to a reality he does not recognize but feels he should, and (2) such
a powerful model (or set of models) that the reader has two choices:
(a) to bow to and accept it, or (b) be steamrollered by it. The
failure to deal with such impossibilities causes people to take to
the street to protest against high prices of necessities, to fight
globalization with riots, etc. The /right/ way to deal with it is
of course to challenge the underlying model, but this requires both
skill and intelligence; hence his profound sense of powerlessness.
"Oleg" is the kind of person who needs texts that are squarely in
the mainstream, such that every idea is expressed with few words and
requires no thought of its readers. Because he is not intelligent
enough to recognize when other people are more intelligent than he
is, he truly believes that those who disagree with his models of the
world are wrong, or mad. People of that category have risen to the
role of president of the nation he posts from and probably lives in.
The impotent, futile rebellion of "Oleg" exemplifies the inability
of the illiterate and uneducated to deal with the expression of
ideas that require a background different from the one they barely
succeeded in securing. (Hence his preoccupation with high-school
drop-outs.) Now, contrary to what some people believe, you can be
illiterate and uneducated and still have an academic degree -- the
system is not bullet-proof in weeding out the useless. One may hold
a PhD and yet be culturally illiterate, unable to place information
in a larger context, much less question it and see it questioned.
Yet the more "approved" such a maleducated person is by his peers,
the more he may believe that the /exclusive/ models characteristic
of those of meager resources is also the fundamentally correct way
to approach models, i.e., that alternative truths threaten all the
established truths and that those who offer additional models have
intended to dethrone the accepted models, violently.
"Oleg" has also watched me try to shake people out of their sleep,
so he believes that being brutal is the acceptable method of getting
somebody's attention. The problem is that he has yet to figure out
when to apply this methodology and behaves much like a president of
one country who has memorized that the military could free a country
from an oppressor and therefore becomes an oppressor and attacker of
another country's leader because he is too goddamn stupid to figure
out the difference between attack and self-defense. We should
therefore give people in the formerly great United States of America
a lot of lee-way at this crucial time in history. Their bumbling
moron of a leader has been elected and is supported by the "Oleg"
category of people. It is about as fruitful to ask these people to
get a grip on themselves as it is to ask an illiterate to go read a
million words before he opens his mouth again. It may be the best
advice they could get, but it would take years to do it, and the
recipient of the advice would not grasp its benevolent nature.
If the United States of America cleans up the systemic flaws that
led George W. Bush to the presidency, perhaps its ignorant masses
will quiet down and once again accept that if somebody does not
agree with them, it could be because they know better, but as long
as this dangerous retard is their leader, we should expect that a
large number of miscreants want to be taken seriously like their
president, who is one of them. "Oleg" is just a symptom of a
tragedy unfolding on continental scale. His powerlessness and his
clear expression of /fear/ of something superior to himself that he
cannot control is simply to be expected. He posts from Columbia
University, in New York City, so he is probably still reeling from
the shock of finally having to deal with reality.
So be nice to "Oleg" and his like for the time being. When their
stupid president has gone to war and their currency has become so
cheap we Europeans can buy up the whole country instead of paying
for more members to the European Union, we have to act like true
gentlemen towards the infirm and the losers in battle. After all,
it was we Europeans who subjugated war to the rule of law, which the
uncultured Americans and their doddering lubbard of a president has
yet to grasp what means. An angry American who hurls insults at
this time is really an incredibly pathetic display of an attempt to
reach out and ask for approval and validation of his helplessness.
History will judge "Oleg" and "Dubya" much more harshly than we
could do here in a newsgroup supposedly about programming languages,
so the illness should just be allowed to run its course. With any
luck, the population of the United States wakes up before the next
election. Most of us can wait patiently for them to regain their
senses, so we should sit by their sickbed rather than beat them up
when they have violent fits.
I strongly recommend that whoever can still read this in the heavily
censored United States try to band together resistance groups so you
can recuperate some of your nation's glory. The right to bear arms
was instituted precisely to protect against wayward presidents and
politicians who led the country astray. It is not too late, you can
still be a civilized country. If you think other countries need to
get rid of bad leaders, set an /excellent/ example by removing the
single most dangerous man on the planet from power, so maybe Saddam
Hussein will resign nicely because he saw how effectively it worked.
We can deal with "Oleg" and his like after the important matters.
--
Erik Naggum, Oslo, Norway
Act from reason, and failure makes you rethink and study harder.
Act from faith, and failure makes you blame someone and push harder.
Oleg
> Oleg <oleg_i...@myrealbox.com> writes:
>
>> If he writes code the way he writes his posts, his programs must be
>> pages after pages after pages of long-winded repetitive drivel.
>
>> The issue is not whether he is a decent coder however, but what makes him
>> so long-winded and verbally abusive. I don't know about the verbal
>> abusiveness, but I think his long-windedness is a product of
>
>> a) low intelligence, resulting in his inability to express himself
>> tersely
>
> Look, troll: The last time you posted anything about Lisp here, you
> didn't even understand the point of macros.
I think you are referring to *your* lack of undertanding of typing, macros
and their relationship to HOFs, which was discussed about half a year ago
and has nothing to do with the subject matter, silly.
And BTW, the last time I posted anything about Lisp here was in the recent
"Two Do questions" thead. Flat-out lying would be bad for your credibility,
if you had any.
Oleg
Oleg
[snipped due to bandwidth limitations]
> If the United States of America cleans up the systemic flaws that
> led George W. Bush to the presidency, perhaps its ignorant masses
> will quiet down and once again accept that if somebody does not
> agree with them, it could be because they know better, but as long
> as this dangerous retard is their leader, we should expect that a
> large number of miscreants want to be taken seriously like their
> president, who is one of them. "Oleg" is just a symptom of a
> tragedy unfolding on continental scale. His powerlessness and his
> clear expression of fear of something superior to himself that he
> cannot control is simply to be expected. He posts from Columbia
> University, in New York City, so he is probably still reeling from
> the shock of finally having to deal with reality.
[...]
I was, in fact, in downtown NYC on 9/11/2001, but what does this have to do
with ANYTHING, sicko?! If the above isn't the most textbook example of
overcompensating logorrhea, what is?!
Oleg
Oleg
> Oleg wrote:
>>>>[snipped due to badwidth limitations]
>
> In case you hadn't noticed, the horse is dead. So now /you/ are the one
> stinking the joint up. Move on, fer chrissakes.
You sicken me not because you can not stand up to Naggum [1], which is
understandable, but because you grab every opportunity to suck up to him,
"numbnut". And if you continue to call yourself a New Yorker after what
your master just wrote about WTC attacks, you are a hypocrite too.
Oleg
u.r. faust
> I strongly recommend that whoever can still read this in the heavily
> censored United States try to band together resistance groups so you
> can recuperate some of your nation's glory.
LOL !
This is some of the funniest stuff that I have read in a long time.
Email it to Seinfeld !
--
natsu-gusa ya / tsuwamono-domo-ga / yume no ato
summer grasses / strong ones / dreams site
Summer grasses,
All that remains
Of soldier's dreams
(Basho trans. Stryk)
u.r. faust
> "numbnut". And if you continue to call yourself a New Yorker after what
> your master just wrote about WTC attacks, you are a hypocrite too.
Shame they missed the White House.
"Aurélien Campéas"
but that let me perplex :
> After all,
> it was we Europeans who subjugated war to the rule of law, which the
> uncultured Americans and their doddering lubbard of a president has
> yet to grasp what means.
How exactly did "we" subjugate war to the rule of law ? I just can't
figure it out (as far as the 20th century's wars are involved).
Maybe I should have asked in private. Please tell me if I really should
have. Thanks.
Aurélien.
Erik Naggum
| How exactly did "we" subjugate war to the rule of law?
The Geneva Conventions.
"Aurélien Campéas"
> * Aurélien Campéas
> | How exactly did "we" subjugate war to the rule of law?
>
> The Geneva Conventions.
Ouch ! I feared you would say that.
Do you suggest that those Conventions did help make the 20th century
european wars more human and less cruel ? That they did anything to
prevent an escalation in the scale and cruelty of 1st (mass-murder of
civilians enrolled by force in the "patriotic armies") , 2nd world wars
(like 1st + mass-slaughter of civilians according to so-called racial
criteria), not to mention the decolonisation wars... ?
We in Europe didn't subjugate anything. The Geneva Conventions are a very
bad joke in the face of the very million of people who died by forced
enrollment / work / displacement, guns, canons, flak, bombs, fire,
torture, provoken illness and starvation, gas, and any combination of
those.
So, it may not be a good argument to raise with Oleg or whoever, as Idiot
and Fierce and Dumb Patriotic United-States-ian as he might be...
Or maybe you were just trolling. But that doesn't look like you (fwik).
Aurélien.
Erik Naggum
| Ouch ! I feared you would say that.
And I feared you did in fact know and were only trolling.
| We in Europe didn't subjugate anything.
You are now mixing your opinion with legal fact. You also appear to
confuse the existence of a system with some desirable results, in
effect denying that the system exists if it has not produced all the
results you desire. You may find it surprising, but I do not wish
to entertain a discussion with you on such premises.
| Or maybe you were just trolling. But that doesn't look like you (fwik).
I thought you were. I know nothing about you, but you have shown a
lack of willingness to distinguish important historic facts from
your opinions based on human suffering. That is very troll-like in
my book. Bringing up human suffering is generally dishonest and
anti-intellectual. It is like discussing health care systems and
bringing up a suffering baby and asking "would you kill this baby?".
Those who do that kind of thing tend to explode in irrationalities
when I would answer "yes". I take it for granted that you now wish
to explode with hatred and will hurl accusations against me for
supporting genocide and what not at this point -- I have seen what I
believe to be your kind several times before -- so you do not have
to actually do it. If you wish to make a different point, such as
showing that you understand what "rule of law" means, I may respond,
but the way you have chosen to argue, any future silence on my part
simply means that I am too exasperated to deal with you.
"Aurélien Campéas"
> * "Aurélien Campéas" <aurel...@wanadoo.fr>
> | Ouch ! I feared you would say that.
> And I feared you did in fact know and were only trolling.
>
> | We in Europe didn't subjugate anything.
> You are now mixing your opinion with legal fact.
That's what you appear to do, in fact.
I oppose legal facts with facts.
Facts are.
Legal facts are on paper, until someone enforces them. That was part of my
point.
> You also appear to
> confuse the existence of a system with some desirable results, in
> effect denying that the system exists if it has not produced all the
> results you desire.
How can you infer so much from so little ? I am stunned.
Tom Lord said a few days ago :
> At first I was thrown off because some of your psychologizing of
> _some_ posters seemed to me to hit the mark. But then you used the
> same characterization on others to whom it clearly did not apply,
> suggesting that you're applying it blindly.
Are you repeating the same mistake here ?
> You may find it surprising, but I do not wish
> to entertain a discussion with you on such premises.
That's fine. I wouldn't, too. I am not surprised at all.
> | Or maybe you were just trolling. But that doesn't look like you (fwik).
>
> I thought you were. I know nothing about you, but you have shown a
> lack of willingness to distinguish important historic facts from
> your opinions based on human suffering.
"Lack of willingness" in this context is a little bit overboard. How can
you tell, from ONE post ?
My "opinions" (it seems so condescending) really are not that
important. I apologize if I gave the impression that I was barking some
opinions here. I am interested in facts.
Reread my post. It is not an opinion based on "human suffering" in
general. It is an assertion of the scale of the wars we had un Europe in
the 20th century, and some of their, hmmm, features. Maybe I write badly.
> That is very troll-like in
> my book. Bringing up human suffering is generally dishonest and
> anti-intellectual.
Yes.
> It is like discussing health care systems and
> bringing up a suffering baby and asking "would you kill this baby?".
Uh ?
> Those who do that kind of thing tend to explode in irrationalities
> when I would answer "yes".
Being human, affectively-wise, is not like being irrational. You are
confused. Please give some more context with your examples.
Also don't forget that rationality serves and end.
Although being rational is supremely important, there are cases were it
doesn't help.
> I take it for granted that you now wish
> to explode with hatred and will hurl accusations against me for
> supporting genocide and what not at this point -- I have seen what I
> believe to be your kind several times before -- so you do not have
> to actually do it.
This is were you derail. I'm not the kind you think I am.
> If you wish to make a different point, such as
> showing that you understand what "rule of law" means, I may respond,
> but the way you have chosen to argue, any future silence on my part
> simply means that I am too exasperated to deal with you.
Since I'm not so sure I understand what "rule of law" means, I would like
to be enlightened. There is no sarcasm here.
If you are already too exasperated, just don't bother and relax.
Aurélien.
Nils Goesche
> On Sun, 12 Jan 2003 08:14:35 +0000, Erik Naggum wrote:
>
> > Bringing up human suffering is generally dishonest and
> > anti-intellectual.
>
> Yes.
>
> > It is like discussing health care systems and
> > bringing up a suffering baby and asking "would you kill this baby?".
>
> Uh ?
>
> > Those who do that kind of thing tend to explode in
> > irrationalities when I would answer "yes".
>
> Being human, affectively-wise, is not like being irrational. You are
> confused. Please give some more context with your examples.
That's interesting. Do you really not understand the example?
> Also don't forget that rationality serves and end.
Now this seems rather meaningless to /me/.
> Although being rational is supremely important, there are cases
> were it doesn't help.
And this is trivially true; for instance, if you know you will be
checkmate in three moves, you can be rational all you want and it
won't help you -- although there is still a rational thing to
try: Continue playing in the hope that the other guy will make
some stupid mistake that leads to a stalemate; or suddenly gets a
heart attack and uses up all his time and you win...
But this is probably not what you mean. Often when people say
there are cases where rationality ``doesn't help´´ they mean that
in those cases irrationality would be more appropriate
(environmentalists often argue that way).
What do you mean?
> > If you wish to make a different point, such as showing that
> > you understand what "rule of law" means, I may respond, but
> > the way you have chosen to argue, any future silence on my
> > part simply means that I am too exasperated to deal with
> > you.
>
> Since I'm not so sure I understand what "rule of law" means, I
> would like to be enlightened.
This is not entirely trivial to explain, so I won't even try.
F. A. Hayek does a good job in ``The Road to Serfdom´´. Just a
short citation from that book (beginning of Chapter 6):
# Nothing distinguishes more clearly conditions in a free country
# from those in a country under arbitrary government than the
# observance in the former of the great principles known as the
# Rule of Law. Stripped of all technicalities, this means that
# government in all its actions is bound by rules fixed and
# announced beforehand -- rules which make it possible to foresee
# with fair certainty how the authority will use its coercive
# powers in given circumstances and to plan one's individual
# affairs on the basis of this knowledge. Though this ideal can
# never be perfectly achieved, since legislators as well as those
# to whom the administration of the law is intrusted are fallible
# men, the essential point, that the discretion left to the
# executive organs wielding coercive power should be reduced as
# much as possible, is clear enough. While every law restricts
# individual freedom to some extent by altering the means which
# people may use in the pursuit of their aims, under the Rule of
# Law the government is prevented from stultifying individual
# efforts by /ad hoc/ action. Within the known rules of the game
# the individual is free to pursue his personal ends and desires,
# certain that the powers of government will not be used
# deliberately to frustrate his efforts.
Regards,
--
Nils Gösche
Ask not for whom the <CONTROL-G> tolls.
PGP key ID #xD26EF2A0
Vijay L
> Kenny Tilton wrote:
>
> > Oleg wrote:
> >>>>[snipped due to badwidth limitations]
> >
> > In case you hadn't noticed, the horse is dead. So now /you/ are the one
> > stinking the joint up. Move on, fer chrissakes.
>
> You sicken me not because you can not stand up to Naggum [1], which is
> understandable, but because you grab every opportunity to suck up to him,
> "numbnut". And if you continue to call yourself a New Yorker after what
> your master just wrote about WTC attacks, you are a hypocrite too.
>
laughing at this post of yours. (I am often called "unpatriotic"
because I critisize most of the Indian govt policies, actions etc.)
Nevertheless, I find your reasoning to be hilarious. You are asking
Kenny to support you, not because what Erik said was wrong/right,
rather because he /mentioned/ the WTC attacks.
But, I am in agreement with you. All those who do not follow our
(remember, I'm on your side) point of view (that, I think, is everyone
except us) must be banned from using cll. They don't even know lisp,
that they claim to have been using it since before we were born proves
that their knowledge of lisp (and hence CS) is pathetically
inadequate. We are the programmers, we are the lispers, we are new
generation: going to take over [on] the world. Erik and his cronies
(i.e. those who do not agree with us) are the bad guys. What kind of
people would point out errors in us that we do not have (e.g. [they
say that] "we are unable to accept our errors")? Obviously they are
fools. And they attack upon our person (they, of-course, claim that
they don't, but we know better), and since such acts are so vile, so
despicable, the only way to counter it is to fling similar attacks
upon them ourselves. Wait, how about ignoring it? or worse actually
reading it and (still worse) /understanding it/? Yech! Only fools, and
cowards would bow down from the stand they've taken. Not us: men of
all men. (Refer Dave Barry's "Complete Guide To Guys"[*]) We
personally cannot understand how men like you (usually Erik) exist in
this world (now that we do, we simply refuse to acknowledge it, and
continue disbelieving) (quite similar to the belief of God that most
of us hold on to), trying to make this world a better [1] (er... I
mean worse) place to live in, we refuse to stand numb. We shall prove
that stupidity (oops, I meant superior intelligence), anger, rage,
violent instincts, and bombs in our control, will not be subdued. Ha!
You think Hitler was bad! Watch the new rage of hatred on the rise.
[2]
Ole![g]
[*] Guys, while stupid, do no harm (or so Barry sez) :)
[1] As is said in Catch-22 (or something close to it) One good apple
can spoil the rest.
[2] Oscar Wilde was right when he said that one is more intellectual
when being cynical. That paragraph was surprisingly easy for me to
write, primarily, I think, because I don't believe most of what I
wrote.
Thanks,
Vijay L
"Aurélien Campéas"
> That's interesting. Do you really not understand the example?
The example being :
> It is like discussing health care systems and
> bringing up a suffering baby and asking "would you kill this baby?".
No, I really don't understand.
I can try to interpret it (giving more context) : let's suppose the baby
is suffering some (short-term) incurable illness. Then it may be a good
thing to kill him, in order to prevent more useless pain for him (euthanasia).
Or is it something else ?
>> Also don't forget that rationality serves and end.
>
> Now this seems rather meaningless to /me/.
Rationality :
1 - due exercise of reason
2 - the quality of being consistent with or based on logic
And then...
>> Although being rational is supremely important, there are cases
>> were it doesn't help.
>
> And this is trivially true; for instance, if you know you will be
> checkmate in three moves, you can be rational all you want and it
> won't help you -- although there is still a rational thing to
> try: Continue playing in the hope that the other guy will make
> some stupid mistake that leads to a stalemate; or suddenly gets a
> heart attack and uses up all his time and you win...
It all depends on whether you want not to let the slightest chance to win
escape you or just in all fairness concede that you've lost. The important
thing is your intention.
How do your intentions (iow, your ENDS) relate to rationality ? This is
the hard part of the discussion...
> But this is probably not what you mean.
Yea. You mean I'm Just Another Moron, Maybe.
> Often when people say
> there are cases where rationality ``doesn't help´´ they mean that
> in those cases irrationality would be more appropriate
> (environmentalists often argue that way).
hmmm...
There are cases when rationality can't help you decide what to do. Because
the problem at hand is rationally undecidable. Or because we can't get all
necessary information to make an informed choice. These are just examples
on top of my head.
This has nothing to do with "irrationality", fuckin'Jesus !
FWIK, irrationality = madness (sort of), or a great tool to manipulate
people (by weakening their ability to reason), etc...
>> Since I'm not so sure I understand what "rule of law" means, I
>> would like to be enlightened.
>
> This is not entirely trivial to explain, so I won't even try.
> F. A. Hayek does a good job in ``The Road to Serfdom´´. Just a
> short citation from that book (beginning of Chapter 6):
> [cut]
I see here that between you and me there's a HUGE philosophical gap. Since
I've been told philosophy (rudiments of law, too), anthropology, etc... in
France I can only acknowledge the (cultural) gap.
The Rule of Law seems to be an important concept of yours. But I'll have a
hard time to map it onto what I already know. So Hayek's citation isn't a
great help.
At first look, I just find it all unsound and full of void... (so unreal
and ideological).
Respectfully,
Aurélien.
Kaz Kylheku
> On Sat, 11 Jan 2003 18:40:16 +0000, Erik Naggum wrote:
>
> > * Aurélien Campéas
> > | How exactly did "we" subjugate war to the rule of law?
> >
> > The Geneva Conventions.
>
> Ouch ! I feared you would say that.
>
> Do you suggest that those Conventions did help make the 20th century
> european wars more human and less cruel ?
Erik: In my country we subjugated property ownership to the rule of law.
Aurelien: No you didn't, people still get robbed in your country!
Nils Goesche
> On Sun, 12 Jan 2003 15:39:30 +0100, Nils Goesche wrote:
>
> > That's interesting. Do you really not understand the example?
...
> No, I really don't understand.
...
> Or is it something else ?
Yes, something entirely else. Forget about it. Examples are
like jokes: Either you get them or you don't. Explaining them
usually won't do any good -- that you don't get them means that
you do not have the necessary frame of mind to understand them,
and no explanation could overcome that (in reasonable time).
> Rationality :
> 1 - due exercise of reason
> 2 - the quality of being consistent with or based on logic
Sounds good...
> And then...
>
> > And this is trivially true; for instance, if you know you
> > will be checkmate in three moves, you can be rational all you
> > want and it won't help you -- although there is still a
> > rational thing to try: Continue playing in the hope that the
> > other guy will make some stupid mistake that leads to a
> > stalemate; or suddenly gets a heart attack and uses up all
> > his time and you win...
>
> It all depends on whether you want not to let the slightest
> chance to win escape you or just in all fairness concede that
> you've lost. The important thing is your intention.
Well, the question was whether there are situations where
rationality won't help you. Maybe my example sucked. Sure,
whether it helps you or not in this case depends on your
intentions, but this seems rather uninteresting to me.
> How do your intentions (iow, your ENDS) relate to rationality ?
> This is the hard part of the discussion...
Which I feel is besides the point. I want to know what it means
that ``rationality won't help me´´ and what I am supposed to do
or employ instead.
> > But this is probably not what you mean.
>
> Yea. You mean I'm Just Another Moron, Maybe.
How would I know? :-) No, I didn't mean anything like that.
> > Often when people say there are cases where rationality
> > ``doesn't help´´ they mean that in those cases irrationality
> > would be more appropriate (environmentalists often argue that
> > way).
>
> hmmm... There are cases when rationality can't help you decide
> what to do.
What cases? And if they exist, what follows from that?
> Because the problem at hand is rationally undecidable.
Hm.
> Or because we can't get all necessary information to make an
> informed choice. These are just examples on top of my head.
Hm.
> This has nothing to do with "irrationality", fuckin'Jesus !
> FWIK, irrationality = madness (sort of), or a great tool to
> manipulate people (by weakening their ability to reason),
> etc...
Oh yes, it has. In the following sense, which was the point of
my question from the beginning. Another example:
Many people believe that man causes ``global warming´´ and we are
supposed, and able, to do anything about it. There is absolutely
no scientific proof for this -- by applying as much rationality
as possible, we still can't come up with any conclusions of what
steps have to be taken, or if any at all (never mind the question
whether a significant ``global warming´´ is indeed going to
happen at all). So far, so good. Let's do nothing about it, I
say. However, the typical environmentalist, people like, say, Al
Gore, believe in ``global warming´´ anyway and argue that this is
a case where rationality ``fails´´ (it is very interesting that
people like that also often claim that the market ``fails´´ in
some regard -- which seems to be a totally meaningless statement
to me, too. The market just happens -- it cannot ``fail´´; much
like the rule of gravitation). So, as rationality ``fails´´ do
give the desired result, we have to disregard it and wreck our
economy anyway by taking all kinds of socialist measures that
will supposedly save the earth. Where does Al Gore know that?
This is what I would like to understand -- how do we magically
obtain truths like that without employing rationality?
(Obviously, I think you can't)
> >> Since I'm not so sure I understand what "rule of law" means, I
> >> would like to be enlightened.
> >
> > This is not entirely trivial to explain, so I won't even try.
> > F. A. Hayek does a good job in ``The Road to Serfdom´´. Just a
> > short citation from that book (beginning of Chapter 6):
> > [cut]
>
> I see here that between you and me there's a HUGE philosophical
> gap.
Yes.
> Since I've been told philosophy (rudiments of law, too),
> anthropology, etc... in France I can only acknowledge the
> (cultural) gap.
>
> The Rule of Law seems to be an important concept of yours.
Neither Erik nor I invented the term, that's for sure ;-) I don't
know who came up with it -- possibly John Stuart Mill (just
guessing). It is indeed a central point in what's often called
``classical liberalism´´. I find it very amusing that you don't
seem to like it :-)
> But I'll have a hard time to map it onto what I already know.
That's only natural if your philosophical education comes from
French (or German, as in my case) schools and universities.
Everybody knows Marx and Sartre, nobody knows Smith or Hayek. If
you want to broaden your horizon a bit, you're on your own...
But Amazon is a great help ;-)
> So Hayek's citation isn't a great help.
> At first look, I just find it all unsound and full of
> void... (so unreal and ideological).
What do you expect from just one paragraph?
Yes, the ``gap´´ /is/ huge. To build some bridges, one has to
start at the very basics and discuss for years. I don't think we
can do that here. If you really want to know what motivates
``evil right-wingers´´ like me to make so stupid and evil
statements, you might start reading their books. Hayek's ``The
Road to Serfdom´´ might actually be a good start.
And of course: I am just guessing here, too. Actually, I cannot
infer all I did about you from what you've written. I apologize
in advance if I totally misjudged you. Take it as a working
hypothesis :-)
Oleg
> You are asking
> Kenny to support you, not because what Erik said was wrong/right,
> rather because he mentioned the WTC attacks.
a) I'm not asking him to support me. I'm pointing out to him what's apparent
to anyone who lurks here or has access to the archives: the basic pattern
is that Naggum insults people on purpose for fun, and then jackals like
Tilton, Spitzer, Goesche swoop in, saying "you heard the man" and creating
an illusion of a peer consensus.
b) Naggum didn't just mention WTC. His message was that Americans "finally"
got what they deserved for electing Bush, not listening enough to Erik,
disagreeing with Erik, etc. :
http://groups.google.com/groups?dq=&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&selm=3251210602491305%40naggum.no
He calls me uneducated for disliking him, and then he writes that I may have
a Ph.D. [1], and still be illiterate. Doesn't this make for a very "narrow"
definition of education?
BTW I don't believe I mentioned my views on the American foreign policy on
USENET once. His having written that long Nazi-like facts-distorting
European supremacist tirade is a clear indication of mental issues.
Oleg
[1] Which I do expect to earn later this year.
P.S. I don't think I'm going to have much time for explaining what is wrong
with Naggum to every newcomer he attacks. Perhaps I will write a FAQ about
it if enough people request it in email or volunteer to contribute.
"Aurélien Campéas"
> I want to know what it means
> that ``rationality won't help me´´ and what I am supposed to do
> or employ instead.
Rationality doesn't help itself...
If any reasonning is based on a) some base elements b) some basic
rules to operate on our elements and c) applying rules in b) on a) to
build more elements, let me ask : how did you provide a) and b) ?
You had to make some (educated) guess.
iow, rationality is not complete, nor can stand on its own completely.
What to employ instead ? Nothing off course.
>> hmmm... There are cases when rationality can't help you decide
>> what to do.
>
> What cases? And if they exist, what follows from that?
See above.
What follows ?
Science is void if not based on some "accurate sampling of reality", where
accurate rimes with "sounds good", no better. (It doesn't imply that it's
based solely on that).
> Another example:
>
> Many people believe [cut]
In Jesus ? Buddha ?
I'm not with them. Neither you I guess.
Both are totally useless to explain anything in a rational way.
> that man causes ``global warming´´ and we are
> supposed, and able, to do anything about it. There is absolutely
> no scientific proof for this
There are some hints, though.
> [cut]
> This is what I would like to understand -- how do we magically
> obtain truths like that without employing rationality?
> (Obviously, I think you can't)
Yes you can't. This is obvious. But look at your example : global warning,
Al Gore, etc. This is a matter of politicians with an agenda, not science.
Global warning is nothing more than the "religion du moment", and
politiciancs in this instance exhibit the behavior of priests telling
bullshit to the masses.
[cut]
> What do you expect from just one paragraph?
Some light. Here I see only utter nonsens (sorry, I don't mind to vex you).
>
> Yes, the ``gap´´ /is/ huge. To build some bridges, one has to
> start at the very basics and discuss for years. I don't think we
> can do that here. If you really want to know what motivates
> ``evil right-wingers´´ like me to make so stupid and evil
> statements, you might start reading their books. Hayek's ``The
> Road to Serfdom´´ might actually be a good start.
What annoys me with liberals is how they build up an artificial
utterly oversimplified view of what is (or what is not) man, then go by
great lengths to show how reality is off course less than ideal (so
complex, so unpredictable) wrt their theory.
I really don't see how economy can be more than a part of sociology,
were most researchers (hmmm, those I read anyway) 1) sample vast aspects
of their domain 2) try to build some piece of theory, not the other way
around.
If liberal economists were to redesign physics on their own, we would
learn in school how great the ptolemean system is (with lots of maths to
"prove" their fictions), wouldn't we ?-)
But liberal economists sit here for a reason : they are extremely useful
as an ideological shield and pseudo-scientific caution for (liberal,
so-called socialist or whatever) politicians.
I would like to be proved wrong, off course, but I suspect that will be
hard.
> Regards,
Yep.
Aurélien.
Marc Spitzer
> He calls me uneducated for disliking him, and then he writes that I may have
> a Ph.D. [1], and still be illiterate. Doesn't this make for a very "narrow"
> definition of education?
Having a PHD does not mean you are educated in other areas was the
point made. The case could be made that by spending all your time
learning your one specific thing that you stand a better chance of
being deficient in other areas. Also there seems to be some
relationship to the degree of ignorance outside there area and their
self perceived knowledge of unrelated fields.
marc
u.r. faust
> b) Naggum didn't just mention WTC. His message was that Americans "finally"
> got what they deserved
Nice to see that even Erik can be right sometimes.
> He calls me uneducated for disliking him, and then he writes that I may have
> a Ph.D. [1], and still be illiterate. Doesn't this make for a very "narrow"
> definition of education?
No, it actually makes for an admirable definition of education.
I have worked with many truly uneducated PhDs.
Writing a thesis on the Spineless Tagless G-Machine does not make
one educated except in a very narrow sense.
> [1] Which I do expect to earn later this year.
Good.
I hope that you manage to find some time to educate yourself.
> P.S. I don't think I'm going to have much time for explaining what is wrong
> with Naggum to every newcomer he attacks. Perhaps I will write a FAQ about
> it if enough people request it in email or volunteer to contribute.
Please dont.
Naggum is responsible for the special flavour* of cll
*slighly rancid ;-)
Nils Goesche
> On Sun, 12 Jan 2003 19:34:37 +0100, Nils Goesche wrote:
>
> > Many people believe [cut]
>
> > that man causes ``global warming´´ and we are
> > supposed, and able, to do anything about it. There is absolutely
> > no scientific proof for this
>
> > [cut]
> > This is what I would like to understand -- how do we magically
> > obtain truths like that without employing rationality?
> > (Obviously, I think you can't)
>
> Yes you can't. This is obvious. But look at your example :
> global warning, Al Gore, etc. This is a matter of politicians
> with an agenda, not science. Global warning is nothing more
> than the "religion du moment", and politiciancs in this
> instance exhibit the behavior of priests telling bullshit to
> the masses.
Heh. Maybe I /did/ misjudge you :-)
> > What do you expect from just one paragraph?
>
> Some light. Here I see only utter nonsens (sorry, I don't mind
> to vex you).
(Don't worry about me. I am not easily offended.)
Nonsense? That Hayek paragraph? Now I am helpless. I have
absolutely no idea how anybody can think that it is nonsensical.
Disagree, ok (but how can you disagree with a definition?). But
nonsensical? Maybe some radical positivist or something...
> But liberal economists sit here for a reason : they are
> extremely useful as an ideological shield and pseudo-scientific
> caution for (liberal, so-called socialist or whatever)
> politicians.
``Liberal economists are a `shield´ for socialist politicians?´´
Now that's funny. I would say that socialist politicians have no
greater enemy than liberal economists... (liberal in the
classical sense. When Americans say `liberal´ nowadays they mean
something totally different -- the antithesis in fact. I hope
that's clear.)
> I would like to be proved wrong, off course, but I suspect that
> will be hard.
Of course. That's why I don't even want to start. It would take
too long, if it works at all. Let's just drop it.
Erik Naggum
| Since I'm not so sure I understand what "rule of law" means, I would
| like to be enlightened. There is no sarcasm here.
There is, however, irony.
What on /earth/ did you respond to my article for if you do not even
know what "rule of law" /means/?
Instead of your repulsively stupid behavior and disgusting display
of a severe lack of intelligence, you could simply have looked it up
and saved yourself the humiliation. The whole Internet at your
disposal and what do you do? You post an /ignorant/ opinion with so
much invective when you get exposed!
You are an insult to humankind, Aurélien Campéas. Recycle yourself.
"Aurélien Campéas"
> Nonsense? That Hayek paragraph? Now I am helpless. I have
> absolutely no idea how anybody can think that it is nonsensical.
> Disagree, ok (but how can you disagree with a definition?). But
> nonsensical? Maybe some radical positivist or something...
Maybe I'm "an insult to humankind" as said Naggum. I should recycle
myself...
hmmm, no I may be a radical-something, but not a positivist.
Ok, really I should have a look at Hayek's book sometime (just to convince
myself how hairy it is :)
> ``Liberal economists are a `shield´ for socialist politicians?´´
> Now that's funny. I would say that socialist politicians have no
> greater enemy than liberal economists... (liberal in the
> classical sense. When Americans say `liberal´ nowadays they mean
> something totally different -- the antithesis in fact. I hope
> that's clear.)
Look. The paradox is easy to overcome :-) You already did half the trip.
1) When Americans say `liberal´ nowadays they mean something totally
different -- the antithesis in fact (you said)
2) When X say 'socialist' nowadays they mean something totally different
-- the antithesis in fact (I add).
Who are the X ? The self-designating socialists, for sure...
Both kinds (false liberals and false socialists) play the same old tricks.
Oh, sometimes, so-called socialists try to be more 'Keynesian' (meaning
they value the role of the State as a regulating institution), and the
so-called liberals try to be as 'anti-State' or anti-interventionist or
anti-what-you-want as they can. So that the brave people have a chance to
"make a choice" on the electoral market...
>> I would like to be proved wrong, off course, but I suspect that
>> will be hard.
>
> Of course. That's why I don't even want to start. It would take
> too long, if it works at all. Let's just drop it.
Indeed.
Aurélien.
"Aurélien Campéas"
You are not a human, are you ?
You are the next generation of Emacs's Psychiatrist, gone mad.
But that is not so fun, in fact.
Aurélien.
Bulent Murtezaoglu
[...]
AC> In Jesus ? Buddha ? I'm not with them. Neither you I guess.
AC> Both are totally useless to explain anything in a rational
AC> way.
Surely you understand that they are neither applicable nor necessary
where rationality suffices. At least Islamic scholars used to think
like that long time ago. Religion is intended, I think the argument
went, for things that are squarely beyond the realm of rationality.
Therefore any irrationality one can rationally detect in one's
religious beliefs must be due to one's misunderstanding of religion!
Or so it goes AFAIK. This argument was partially designed to protect
the image of religion where science was respected. (eg if science
says A religion says B, it is A and you are misapplying religion).
[...]
>> that man causes ``global warming´´ and we are supposed, and
>> able, to do anything about it. There is absolutely no
>> scientific proof for this
AC> There are some hints, though.
Yes, so it appears. I think Niels is reacting to politicians diluting
the authority of science by asserting scientific validity where none is
available. The 'left' it seems robbed themselves of appealing to the
authority of God's word and such, but being politicians they have found
other things to pervert.
>> [cut] This is what I would like to understand -- how do we
>> magically obtain truths like that without employing
>> rationality? (Obviously, I think you can't)
AC> Yes you can't. This is obvious. But look at your example :
AC> global warning, Al Gore, etc. This is a matter of politicians
AC> with an agenda, not science. Global warning is nothing more
AC> than the "religion du moment", and politiciancs in this
AC> instance exhibit the behavior of priests telling bullshit to
AC> the masses.
Ah, I wish I had read this before typing the above! I am eliding the
other agreeable stuff. Carry on guys. Where's the lisp in all this?
cheers,
BM
Nils Goesche
> On Sun, 12 Jan 2003 22:48:09 +0100, Nils Goesche wrote:
>
> > But nonsensical? Maybe some radical positivist or
> > something...
>
> Maybe I'm "an insult to humankind" as said Naggum. I should
> recycle myself...
I do not believe in recycling.
> hmmm, no I may be a radical-something, but not a positivist.
> Ok, really I should have a look at Hayek's book sometime
Yes, please do that.
> (just to convince myself how hairy it is :)
Sure. Once the seed of evil is placed, it will grow and can
never be removed again. Much like cancer, but without the
negative consequences for the patient.
> Who are the X ? The self-designating socialists, for sure...
It doesn't matter how they call themselves. When Nils the
Red-Baiting Jackal growls and wags his tail three times, that
should be enough.
> > Of course. That's why I don't even want to start. It would take
> > too long, if it works at all. Let's just drop it.
>
> Indeed.
Much fun with the book.
Kenny Tilton
Poor Oleg, you found the end of a silly thread in which EN made a
scatological pun about shooting from the hip at my expense. So I
equally seriously suggested he might be a serial murderer and he call
me a numbnut. The only reason I might have responded was to let Erik
know that numbnut is kind of a wimpy insult, but for all i know he
deliberately used a rubber bullet because of the overall silliness of
the exchange.
You also missed my longstanding advice to everyone who gets sucked
into a flamewar anywhere with anyone: not every insult needs to be
answered. Some fall short of their mark, others are from people you
won't ever get through to anyway.
Clearly you feel differently, obsessed with answering every
counter-article. You have built your own cage. Free advice: let it go.
Especially if you feel someone said something that missed its mark.
btw, point of logic: you think it possible that I called him a serial
murderer and then cowered in terror (of my master?!) because he asked
(typep *kenny* 'numbnut)?. Weak.
But if you want to persist in this argument, you must first do penance
and find the many threads in which EN and i crossed swords. i do not
think you have been paying attention and/or following cll very long.
we are always lobbing grenades into each other's bunkers.
Your confusion is understandable, because just about the only other
people I criticize here are (sorry) dopes like you who are so enamored
of EN that you try to attach yourselves to his star by attacking him.
What you do not get is that all I ever do is point out that you dopes
are doing what you claim to be opposing, viz, stinking up cll with
non-Lisp chatter.
You then get upset because I pick on you and not EN, but /he/ never
yells at people for conducting flamewars. Get it? I am not for or
against flamewars -- hey, it's Usenet! -- but the inconsistency (oh,
you prefer "hypocrisy") of flaming EN for flaming always gets me
going. Why?
Because flamewars over Lisp are dum enough, but flamewars over
flamewars? Please.
And as for some famous WTC remark, sorry, been snowboarding for a few
days and not even Google seems to have that. What are you tslking
about?
kt
Kenny Tilton
> He posts from Columbia
> University, in New York City, so he is probably still reeling from
> the shock of finally having to deal with reality.
Yo, Oleg, is this what you are misquoting? Pretty sure I did read this
before and I did stop to think if there was something to protest, but
I did not find anything. That was pretty much the story line in US
media after 9/11, along with the horror and sadness of it all, and
desire for revenge.
The only quibble I would make is, hey, New York invented reality. They
can deal. I'm from Jersey.
Shame on you for the misquote, tho. You are self-destructing, dude.
> After all, it was we Europeans who subjugated war to the rule of law, ...
You know, that's actually a pretty sick thing to do. "Gee, that last
war was rather untidy. Next time we have a war, let's... [insert
suitable Monty Python sketch here]". Typically British kinda thing to
do.
> uncultured Americans
So... Joe Millionaire has not yet reached Norway?
> and their doddering lubbard of a president has
Calm down. We know what we are doing. It is our way of sabotaging
government. We cannot get rid of it, so we vote in the dumbest people
we can find. And the most popular, back-slapping, good ole boys n
gals, who won't do anything to make themselves unpopular.
The smart assholes (like Gore) are the ones who make trouble.
:)
kt
Erik Naggum
| Poor Oleg, you found the end of a silly thread in which EN made a
| scatological pun about shooting from the hip at my expense. So I
| equally seriously suggested he might be a serial murderer and he
| call me a numbnut.
It is actually a rather well-quoted line from Full Metal Jacket.
Erik Naggum
| I uncovered you, Erik Naggum.
Huh? I was covered before? Are you covered? Is this some French
thing? In my culture, openness, honesty, even directness is valued
and respected, but it appears that in yours, duplicity and crouching
under cover is so valued that removing someone's cover is damaging.
I am unfamiliar with the French culture, but from what little the
news media report from your country, you appear rabidly racist --
and your deeply disturbing statement strongly suggests the mental
workings of a person who searches for and quickly reaches a point
where he knows /enough/ about someone else. This kind of attitude
amazes me whenever I see it -- because to be human is to be able to
think, without having to tell everybody what you have thought about;
the obvious corollary is that you can never know /enough/ about any
other person. But apparently this is not how French people work.
Yours is truly one of the most insane comments this newsgroup has
ever seen. I can only marvel at the mental damage that preceded it.
How much of your psychology and behaviour is tied up in preventing
yourself from being "uncovered" by others? What are you so afraid
of that you think such a statement says anything whatsoever about
any other person than yourself? You revealed something disturbing
about yourself with that comment, but I wonder how you can both be
afraid of being uncovered and at the same time reveal that you are.
I think I have "uncovered" you, too: Your need to feel in control is
preventing you from being in control, inviting others to manipulate
you, instead.
| You are not a human, are you ?
I am not French, if that is what you imply with this very disturbing
question. I am sorry to see that your mental capacity has been so
far exceeded that you have to resort to such incredible lunacy, but
this is also quite consistent with what you have shown me up to now:
When you cannot deal with a fact, you work very hard to deny it. It
is a pattern that I had only thought would be found in psychotics,
and I do not mean that in the usual Usenet insult way, but in its
clinical meaning. How does it feel to be you, Aurélien Campéas?
Are you able to process information or do you make up everything you
need for your mental well-being? It is because I jerked you out of
your cozy psychosis that you have to react the way you do, right?
But now I wonder, did you ever get as far in your erudition that you
looked up "rule of law" and figured out what a jackass you have been
in this forum and for what you will now be remembered?
This newsgroup sure gets a large share of deeply disturbed people.
Are there more like you at home, Aurélien? Are there someone I can
talk to, some more French people, perhaps, to learn what it means
for someone like you to be uncovered? It is such a deeply twisted
thing to say. Perhaps I should just conclude that you are insane?
Erik Naggum
| b) Naggum didn't just mention WTC. His message was that Americans
| "finally" got what they deserved for electing Bush, not listening
| enough to Erik, disagreeing with Erik, etc. :
|
| http://groups.google.com/groups?dq=&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&selm=3251210602491305%40naggum.no
You know, well-adjusted people in this technological age make do
with the message-id. <32512106...@naggum.no>
I think those who are inclined to listen to you should reread it and
try to decide if you have just seriously malfunctioned. You are the
only person so far who has been able to show such a lack of ability
to read that you think it was about me. It was about you, you see.
Your strange reaction suggests that you fight me because you are so
self-centered and self-absorbed that when someone else makes a
presence in your solipstistic universe, you have to regain control
over yourself by expelling that other person. Such obsessive people
have been cured, however. Others of your kind waste away their
lives reading about celebrities, but for some reason I think less
lowly of those than of you.
I am actually amazed that you managed to get /none/ of the points I
made in that article. People of your calibre tend to get at least
one. All you got was the "feeling". What kinds of drugs are you on
who /both/ manage to obsess about me and /not/ read what I write?
| He calls me uneducated for disliking him
Fascinatingly untrue. With a mind like that, I understand why you
need a PhD so people are discouraged from making up their own mind
about your mental abilities. I hope you have paid a lot for it so
your money comes to better uses than your well-being.
| and then he writes that I may have a Ph.D. [1], and still be
| illiterate.
If you object to this, why do you insist upon showing the whole
world that you /cannot/ read what I write? You are not behaving in
a way that suggests you are terribly bright, you know.
| Doesn't this make for a very "narrow" definition of education?
It appears that you really think a PhD will give you an /education/.
Please go to the bursar's office and ask for your money back. Sorry
about wasting your life and your dreams, though, but I understand
why you get so upset. If I had been in your shoes and had wasted my
life getting a PhD only to be hired by McD so I would not be able to
pay back the gigantic loans you needed (it took 15 years, right?), I
would be spending my time on Usenet showing others of your kind that
they should take the McD job right away, too.
You have an /education/ when you realize, to the depth of your soul,
that your own contribution to the furthering of mankind has to build
upon the work of millions of people preceding you, people whose best
of hope of eternal life is being mentioned with a brief paragraph in
the largest encyclopedia, and realizing that /your/ best hope of
making your mark on human history is vastly slimmer than that.
| BTW I don't believe I mentioned my views on the American foreign
| policy on USENET once.
Thank God!
| His having written that long Nazi-like facts-distorting European
| supremacist tirade is a clear indication of mental issues.
If I had written a long Nazi-like facts-distorting European
supremacist tirade, I think it would be a clear indication of mental
issues, too. But I did not, you know. It is your illiteracy that
got the better of you, again. Are you quite certain that you are
not making up monsters under your bed to be afraid of? Perhaps you
should try waking up from that horrible dream you are living? Or
perhaps just stop taking those halluincogenic drugs.
| [1] Which I do expect to earn later this year.
Really? I intend to block that process. Demonstrating that you
would be a disgrace to the degree-grantor should be quite easy.
I occasionally hear from people who have found that there is a good
correlation between unemployable people and their stupid fights with
me on the Net. I enjoy this feedback tremendously, and I am quite
certain that when someone who considers hiring you will look up the
name Oleg Inconnu, if that is your real name, and decide that you
are not worth considering. Again, McD does not do such searches.
| P.S. I don't think I'm going to have much time for explaining what
| is wrong with Naggum to every newcomer he attacks. Perhaps I will
| write a FAQ about it if enough people request it in email or
| volunteer to contribute.
Somebody should keep this and remind of it sometime. It should be
the kind of idiocy that keeps people out of important positions.
Vijay L
> Vijay L wrote:
[snip]
> He calls me uneducated for disliking him, and then he writes that I may have
> a Ph.D. [1], and still be illiterate. Doesn't this make for a very "narrow"
> definition of education?
Jawaharlal Nehru, my country's first Prime Minister, said
(paraphrased): "My mother is illiterate but educated."
Education has little to do with literacy. Only that one of the aims of
education are towards people's becoming educated. Something that
appears to have failed in your case.
> BTW I don't believe I mentioned my views on the American foreign policy on
> USENET once. His having written that long Nazi-like facts-distorting
> European supremacist tirade is a clear indication of mental issues.
>
Nobody said that you did, Erik posted his views on your country.
> [1] Which I do expect to earn later this year.
Congrats in advance.
> P.S. I don't think I'm going to have much time for explaining what is wrong
> with Naggum to every newcomer he attacks. Perhaps I will write a FAQ about
> it if enough people request it in email or volunteer to contribute.
By all means. You have my comments in the previous posting to refer to
:)
Thanks,
Vijay L
Oleg
>
> | Doesn't this make for a very "narrow" definition of education?
>
> It appears that you really think a PhD will give you an education.
> Please go to the bursar's office and ask for your money back. Sorry
> about wasting your life and your dreams, though, but I understand
> why you get so upset. If I had been in your shoes and had wasted my
> life getting a PhD only to be hired by McD so I would not be able to
> pay back the gigantic loans you needed (it took 15 years, right?), I
> would be spending my time on Usenet showing others of your kind that
> they should take the McD job right away, too.
>
> You have an education when you realize, to the depth of your soul,
> that your own contribution to the furthering of mankind has to build
> upon the work of millions of people preceding you, people whose best
> of hope of eternal life is being mentioned with a brief paragraph in
> the largest encyclopedia, and realizing that your best hope of
> making your mark on human history is vastly slimmer than that.
The meaning of the rhetoric question you are quoting was that Erik Naggum's
definition of education is narrow enough to only include people who agree
with him. I didn't expect you to get it, and you haven't.
> | [1] Which I do expect to earn later this year.
>
> Really? I intend to block that process. Demonstrating that you
> would be a disgrace to the degree-grantor should be quite easy.
Pfff... And I intend to buy every American two SUVs and a tank. I don't mean
to hurt your feelings, but a quick ISI citation search reveals that you
don't have a single peer-reviewed paper published. If you went to grad
school, you are basically a loser for not having earned any scientific
recognition, and if you didn't... Long story short, you are a nobody. You
may fool a couple of simpletons on USENET into listening to you, but that's
where it ends.
> I occasionally hear from people who have found that there is a good
> correlation between unemployable people and their stupid fights with
> me on the Net. I enjoy this feedback tremendously, and I am quite
> certain that when someone who considers hiring you will look up the
> name Oleg Inconnu, if that is your real name, and decide that you
> are not worth considering. Again, McD does not do such searches.
Hahahaha!!!
I'm going partners in a biotech startup with people who knew me well for
_five_ years.
BTW, that was the most shameless FUD I've ever seen. Who exactly did you
prevent from being employed? Name two. No, name one. "Correlation"! You
aren't educated enough to use the term correctly, and you aren't smart
enough to avoid using it.
Oleg
Matthew Danish
> If you went to grad school, you are basically a loser for not having
> earned any scientific recognition, and if you didn't... Long story
> short, you are a nobody. You may fool a couple of simpletons on USENET
> into listening to you, but that's where it ends.
Thankfully, there are many people who do not think like this. I wonder
where the world would be today if we hadn't listened to a certain patent
clerk.
--
; Matthew Danish <mda...@andrew.cmu.edu>
; OpenPGP public key: C24B6010 on keyring.debian.org
; Signed or encrypted mail welcome.
; "There is no dark side of the moon really; matter of fact, it's all dark."
Oleg
> On Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 06:16:30PM -0500, Oleg wrote:
>> If you went to grad school, you are basically a loser for not having
>> earned any scientific recognition, and if you didn't... Long story
>> short, you are a nobody. You may fool a couple of simpletons on USENET
>> into listening to you, but that's where it ends.
>
> Thankfully, there are many people who do not think like this. I wonder
> where the world would be today if we hadn't listened to a certain patent
> clerk.
>
I'm pretty sure Einstein had plenty of peer-reviewed publications.
Kaz Kylheku
> Oleg <oleg_i...@myrealbox.com> writes:
>
> > b) Naggum didn't just mention WTC. His message was that Americans "finally"
> > got what they deserved
>
> Nice to see that even Erik can be right sometimes.
But that wasn't his message at all. Oleg's perplexingly convoluted
language comprehension filter manufactured it. I don't have to chase
the cited reference to know how Erik views the terrorist attacks, but
I read it anyway just to see from how little of a nothing could Oleg
create the accusation.
But thanks for thus revealing your own psychotic political views.
The destruction of the WTC was an attack on western civilization
itself, the most successful, most humane, most artistically, morally
and intellectually superior culture that ever did flourish upon this
planet.
All through history, successful cultures have had to fight off hordes
of murderous bandits who were bent on destroying them. When you assert
that the bandits are right, you become a bandit.
Ng Pheng Siong
> Thankfully, there are many people who do not think like this. I wonder
> where the world would be today if we hadn't listened to a certain patent
> clerk.
Somebody else might have asked the same questions and came up with the same
answers?
--
Ng Pheng Siong <ng...@netmemetic.com> * http://www.netmemetic.com
Christopher Browne
> According to Matthew Danish <mda...@andrew.cmu.edu>:
>> Thankfully, there are many people who do not think like this. I wonder
>> where the world would be today if we hadn't listened to a certain patent
>> clerk.
>
> Somebody else might have asked the same questions and came up with
> the same answers?
Conceivably, someone else in a /less desirable/ location might have
asked the similar questions and came up with the same answers, thus
leading to a less desirable state of affairs.
--
output = ("cbbrowne" "@acm.org")
http://cbbrowne.com/info/emacs.html
Rules of the Evil Overlord #185. "If I capture an enemy known for
escaping via ingenious and fantastic little gadgets, I will order a
full cavity search and confiscate all personal items before throwing
him in my dungeon." <http://www.eviloverlord.com/>
Tim Bradshaw
[Foam, drool, gibber]
Please, never let Erik, or anyone else, dissuade you from posting to
c.l.l. It's this kind of article that makes my life worthwhile. A
little practice and you'll be up there with the all-time c.l.l greats.
--tim
Erik Naggum
| The meaning of the rhetoric question you are quoting was that Erik
| Naggum's definition of education is narrow enough to only include
| people who agree with him. I didn't expect you to get it, and you
| haven't.
Quite right, I did not. One reason for that is that is so insane
as to question not only your mental capacity, but your sanity.
Since you did not expect me to get it, it at least suggests that
you are aware how insane it was. I guess this is progress.
| You may fool a couple of simpletons on USENET into listening to
| you, but that's where it ends.
This suggests that you know you are a fool and set out to prove
otherwise by getting a degree. Thank you for confirming it.
| I'm going partners in a biotech startup with people who knew me
| well for _five_ years.
They knew you well for that long? Man, that must be good!
| BTW, that was the most shameless FUD I've ever seen.
So it worked on you. Oderint dum metuant.
faust
>You
>aren't educated enough to use the term correctly, and you aren't smart
>enough to avoid using it.
Stop being so cruel to poor Erik.
He almost got a PhD many many years ago...
faust
>
>The destruction of the WTC was an attack on western civilization
>itself
Interesting.
So they managed to cram all of western civilisation into those two
towers ?
Must have been pretty crowded.
Rand Sobriquet
Oleg,
My understanding is that computer science is now an engineering
discipline: the deployment of working systems is what matters.
How many peer-reviewed papers did Seymour Cray publish? Does anyone
care?
-Rand
Marcus Breiing
>> I wonder where the world would be today if we hadn't listened to a
>> certain patent clerk.
> Somebody else might have asked the same questions and came up with
> the same answers?
That would be my guess, too. Ideas very close to the patent clerk's
were floating around the scientific community of his time; so close in
fact that he has been suspected of plagiarism repeatedly. Try this
search on Google:
http://www.google.com/search?q=einstein+plagiarism
This is not to say that Einstein was a plagiator--I don't have an
opinion on that--but if you read into the controversy a bit, it does
show that even if he was the first to publish this or that, he wasn't
the kind of once-in-a-millenium genius whose ideas and insights would
have occurred to his contemporaries only significantly later, if ever.
OTOH, we *certainly* wouldn't have gotten those cute
genius-playfully-sticking-his-tongue-out posters.
--
Marcus Breiing
http://breiing.com/mid/jJ78Eij4gSr
"The secret to creativity is knowing how to
hide your sources" -- Albert Einstein
Tim Bradshaw
> This is not to say that Einstein was a plagiator--I don't have an
> opinion on that--but if you read into the controversy a bit, it does
> show that even if he was the first to publish this or that, he wasn't
> the kind of once-in-a-millenium genius whose ideas and insights would
> have occurred to his contemporaries only significantly later, if ever.
This is pretty unfair to Einstein I think. Most of the maths of
special relativity (certainly the Lorentz transform), and arguably
most of the maths of GR too (though I think this is doubtful) were
known before he published them. But that's not really the point:
Einstein was the person who provided the physical insight as to what
it all meant, and that insight turns out to matter rather a lot. It's
like the difference between knowing a bunch of ad-hoc scope rules and
understanding lexical scoping. And of course he didn't just do
relativity - of the four famous 1905 papers, only two of them are
about relativity at all, and the photoelectric effect & brownian
motion papers were kind of important.
It's also pretty convincing that GR, certainly, was discovered `ahead
of its time' I think. There was almost no experimental evidence for
the theory (this is quite unlike SR, or QM where there was plenty),
and after some early work, there was really a long period where not
much was done in GR, until the ?60s? when people finally began to
really have the (mathematical, but also experimental to some extent)
tools and techniques to actually do something with the theory.
When I was a physics student (including starting a PhD in GR) the
received wisdom was that GR `should' have been worked out in the 50s
or 60s, but was discovered ~50 years `early'. Something was driving
that premature discovery, and Einstein is a pretty good candidate.
Indeed I think the issues about physical insight and being a driving
force are the critical ones - would Hilbert have been working on
gravitation if it hadn't been for Einstein, for instance? How far did
he drive QM forward?
I'm not claiming he was a once-in-a-millenium genius (he has to
contend with at least Newton!) but he was certainly very, very smart.
--tim
Nils Goesche
> * Marcus Breiing wrote:
> > This is not to say that Einstein was a plagiator--I don't have an
> > opinion on that--but if you read into the controversy a bit, it
> > does show that even if he was the first to publish this or that,
> > he wasn't the kind of once-in-a-millenium genius whose ideas and
> > insights would have occurred to his contemporaries only
> > significantly later, if ever.
> This is pretty unfair to Einstein I think.
I agree.
> Most of the maths of special relativity (certainly the Lorentz
> transform), and arguably most of the maths of GR too (though I think
> this is doubtful) were known before he published them.
Well, Riemannian Geometry is called Riemannian for a reason ;-) The
hardest part for Einstein, IIRC, was finding the right expression for
the gravitational tensor (one that leads to sensible physical
results). And about this, mathematics has absolutely nothing to say
-- one tensor is as good as any other (at least if it is related to
the curvature tensor somehow), and no mathematician had ever tried to
find one like it before, I think. For this alone Einstein deserves
all credit he gets IMHO. I have no idea why it is so fashionable
nowadays to descredit Einstein somehow. Maybe some people are
offended by the idea that there is such a thing as a genius at all.
The Hopi indians came up with something similar long before, I
suppose.
Regards,
--
Nils Gösche
"Don't ask for whom the <CTRL-G> tolls."
PGP key ID 0x0655CFA0
Erik Naggum
| Erik Naggum <er...@naggum.no> writes:
| > I strongly recommend that whoever can still read this in the heavily
| > censored United States try to band together resistance groups so you
| > can recuperate some of your nation's glory.
|
| LOL !
| This is some of the funniest stuff that I have read in a long time.
|
| Email it to Seinfeld !
I did not mail it to the New York Times or the University of
California at Berkeley and I had no idea who Emma Goldberg was.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/14/education/14BERK.html
Donald Fisk
>
> Tim Bradshaw <t...@cley.com> writes:
>
> > * Marcus Breiing wrote:
>
> > > This is not to say that Einstein was a plagiator--I don't have an
> > > opinion on that--but if you read into the controversy a bit, it
> > > does show that even if he was the first to publish this or that,
> > > he wasn't the kind of once-in-a-millenium genius whose ideas and
> > > insights would have occurred to his contemporaries only
> > > significantly later, if ever.
>
> > This is pretty unfair to Einstein I think.
>
> I agree.
Me too. Most of special relativity had already been worked out
before Einstein published on the subject, and credit is given to
those to whom credit is due, hence the terms Lorentz transformation,
Fitzgerald contraction, Minkowski space. Einstein added E=mc^2,
which is universally associated with him, even by people who only
have a vague idea what it means, and made sense out of the dissonance
between Classical Mechanics and Maxwell's theory.
There is one reason I can think of for the plagiarism accusation, and
that is that Einstein's papers (On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies
and Does the Inertia of a body depend upon its Energy Content?)
have no references (but one acknowledges Besso's constribution). This
is because they were supposed to be self-contained, I guess. Most
papers nowadays have too many references, put in just to show that
the authors have read the literature, not because you actually need
to refer to them to understand the paper.
> > Most of the maths of special relativity (certainly the Lorentz
> > transform), and arguably most of the maths of GR too (though I think
> > this is doubtful) were known before he published them.
True, but in a fairly horrendous notation, cleaned up by Einstein.
> Well, Riemannian Geometry is called Riemannian for a reason ;-) The
> hardest part for Einstein, IIRC, was finding the right expression for
> the gravitational tensor (one that leads to sensible physical
> results). And about this, mathematics has absolutely nothing to say
> -- one tensor is as good as any other (at least if it is related to
> the curvature tensor somehow), and no mathematician had ever tried to
> find one like it before, I think. For this alone Einstein deserves
> all credit he gets IMHO. I have no idea why it is so fashionable
> nowadays to descredit Einstein somehow. Maybe some people are
> offended by the idea that there is such a thing as a genius at all.
> The Hopi indians came up with something similar long before, I
> suppose.
Nothing much to add to that, except that many people are uncomfortable
dealing with smart people. Smart people can be unreasonable, awkward,
disruptive, and worst of all right. Einstein was the archetypical
smart person -- a household name, a face everyone recognizes.
(This has strayed quite a distance from Lisp, but I like these
side-discussions, and find them interesting too. I feel compelled
to mention Sheep at this point.)
> Nils Gösche
Le Hibou
--
Dalinian: Lisp. Java. Which one sounds sexier?
RevAaron: Definitely Lisp. Lisp conjures up images of hippy coders,
drugs, sex, and rock & roll. Late nights at Berkeley, coding in
Lisp fueled by LSD. Java evokes a vision of a stereotypical nerd,
with no life or social skills.
Christophe Rhodes
> Nils Goesche wrote:
> >
> > Tim Bradshaw <t...@cley.com> writes:
> >
> > > * Marcus Breiing wrote:
> >
> > > > This is not to say that Einstein was a plagiator--I don't have an
> > > > opinion on that--but if you read into the controversy a bit, [...]
> >
> > > This is pretty unfair to Einstein I think.
> >
> > I agree.
>
> Me too. Most of special relativity had already been worked out
> before Einstein published on the subject, and credit is given to
> those to whom credit is due, hence the terms Lorentz transformation,
> Fitzgerald contraction, Minkowski space. Einstein added E=mc^2,
> which is universally associated with him, even by people who only
> have a vague idea what it means, and made sense out of the dissonance
> between Classical Mechanics and Maxwell's theory.
One other data point. Once Einstein was fairly well-established, an
Indian physicist named Satyendranath Bose sent a manuscript to
Einstein. Einstein took this manuscript, had it translated into
German, and submitted it on Bose's behalf, with his endorsement, to
Zeitschrift fur Physik.
Cheers,
Christophe
PS: I don't know how many of the comp.lang.lisp readers have a physics
background, but, for what it's worth, among practicing physicists of
my acquaintance (and there are a fair number here in Cambridge :-)
Einstein is very highly regarded.
--
http://www-jcsu.jesus.cam.ac.uk/~csr21/ +44 1223 510 299/+44 7729 383 757
(set-pprint-dispatch 'number (lambda (s o) (declare (special b)) (format s b)))
(defvar b "~&Just another Lisp hacker~%") (pprint #36rJesusCollegeCambridge)
Bulent Murtezaoglu
DF> ... Most papers
DF> nowadays have too many references, put in just to show that
DF> the authors have read the literature, not because you actually
DF> need to refer to them to understand the paper. ...
I think it is done (ouside of grad school work) to make clear which parts
of the paper are not the author's original ideas. You might need to refer
to them, or prefer to, if the writing style of the original author is too
terse or otherwise incompatible with your understanding style. It also
helps produce/increase citation counts so people can look them up after
usenet skirmishes (and that is slightly more tasteful and immensely more
practical than posting other measurements).
cheers,
BM
Tim Bradshaw
> I feel compelled
> to mention Sheep at this point.)
Sheep was more-or-less how I first came in contact with Lisp. And
Unix in fact.
--tim
Marcus Breiing
>> > Tim Bradshaw <t...@cley.com> writes:
>> >
>> > > * Marcus Breiing wrote:
>> >
>> > > > This is not to say that Einstein was a plagiator--I don't have an
>> > > > opinion on that--but if you read into the controversy a bit, [...]
>> >
>> > > This is pretty unfair to Einstein I think.
Christophe,
Since the fragment of my posting you didn't elide in the above is only
my unambiguous statement that I'm *not* endorsing the plagiarism
theories, I'm left wondering whether that is what you think Tim
Bradshaw et al. actually found "pretty unfair" ;-)
--
Marcus Breiing
http://breiing.com/mid/EguMA1vUoqv
u.r. faust
> | > I strongly recommend that whoever can still read this in the heavily
> | > censored United States try to band together resistance groups so you
> | > can recuperate some of your nation's glory.
> | This is some of the funniest stuff that I have read in a long time.
> |
> | Email it to Seinfeld !
> I did not mail it to the New York Times or the University of
> California at Berkeley and I had no idea who Emma Goldberg was.
Then try mailing it to :
Department of Psychiatry
Haukeland Universitetssykehus
5021 Bergen
:-)
Len Charest
>
> | [1] Which I do expect to earn later this year.
>
> Really? I intend to block that process. Demonstrating that you
> would be a disgrace to the degree-grantor should be quite easy.
You are a sad, pathetic little man.
Tim Bradshaw
> Since the fragment of my posting you didn't elide in the above is only
> my unambiguous statement that I'm *not* endorsing the plagiarism
> theories, I'm left wondering whether that is what you think Tim
> Bradshaw et al. actually found "pretty unfair" ;-)
The bit I found unfair, I think, was the claim that other people would
have done what Einstein did more or less at the same time. I don't
think that's true: I think he was significantly ahead of others.
--tim
Christophe Rhodes
Apologies -- I should have proofread my trimming a little more
carefully to ensure that, as I now see could be interpreted, I wasn't
misrepresenting anyone's position.
I shall endeavour to be more careful in future.
Christophe
Nicolas Neuss
> Well, Riemannian Geometry is called Riemannian for a reason ;-)
I'm quite sure you know that, but for General Relativity you need
Riemannian Geometry for indefinite metrics. This introduces several
complications and differences which Riemann surely did not think of.
Nicolas.
Nils Goesche
That's just a slight generalization, nothing much compared to
inventing the whole concept of tensor analysis and curved manifolds, I
think.
Charlton Wilbur
BM> I think it is done (ouside of grad school work) to make clear
BM> which parts of the paper are not the author's original ideas.
BM> You might need to refer to them, or prefer to, if the writing
BM> style of the original author is too terse or otherwise
BM> incompatible with your understanding style.
I've found them tremendously useful in conditions where the author
says something like, "It has been conclusively shown that under normal
conditions, snootches are all flurble[1]," and my reaction is "WHAT?
snootches are flurble? conclusively shown?"
I've also found them useful in pointing me to other authors doing
similar research. The most productive way I've found to do research
is to find a half-dozen articles that seem relevant, then follow the
links in the footnotes of those articles that seem like they may be
relevant, and to repeat until the footnotes start pointing mostly at
articles I've already read or which I can establish are likely to be
irrelevant.
Charlton
J.L. Perez-de-la-Cruz
"Aurélien Campéas" wrote:
> ..
> Since I'm not so sure I understand what "rule of law" means, I would like
> to be enlightened...
Etat de droit, rule of law, ...
http://www.eur.nl/frg/iacl/papers/heuschling.html
On the other hand, Hayeck is vanilla-political-philosophy
these days. Someday I'll read him (and learn Java :-)