> My personal take (and why I wrote that paper) is that people need the > flexibility to disagree on syntax, and that that's why the protocol layer > is what should be made standard.
i suspect many people who actually thought about the issue would agree with this. there was a little known attempt to extract out the guts of the make engine so that other make-like tools could be written. i may be able to find a reference. anyhow, even though make does not really scale well, and is deficient in dependency and "build" expressiveness, many people insist on putting more and more bletcherous features and structures on top of it. it is amazing (and depressing) the type of contortions many software companies get into just to get make to build their product. a good friend who has been working on this topic (and arguing against make) since eighties calls this "the tyranny of adequacy." his alternative system QEF [a free version was included in an EUUG tape during late eighties under the name "dtree" - if anyone has those tapes online, please let me know] is worth reading about as well. some of his papers are in www.qef.com/html/additional.html
[online usenix proceedings have some papers on other make-like tools and variants that are now lost in the mists of computing. that recent thing called ant is not much better, IMO.]
oz --- imagined forest - we would be lost without it. [oz/2002]
> > My personal take (and why I wrote that paper) is that people need the > > flexibility to disagree on syntax, and that that's why the protocol layer > > is what should be made standard.
> i suspect many people who actually thought about the issue would agree with > this. there was a little known attempt to extract out the guts of the make > engine so that other make-like tools could be written.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but if you read the paper, you'll see the parts you're seeming to be talking about (the dependency processing engine) are exactly NOT the part I'm talking about being protocol...
It is surely the case that 'make' has the deficiency of being very single-purpose and the paper discusses his deficiency; that problem is 'fixed' by just having one make-file per task, i suppose. but the problem of not wanting to use a makefile is not as easily fixed if the recipient is used to calling make. (I guess you could make a simple make file that just had one task to do, but...)
The actual dependency stuff 'make' does is of no personal interest to me at all, really. It's probably fine--maybe even quite helpful--but it's 'detail'.
What matters to me is just having a function like load-system or print-system which is implemented any way someone wants.
In fact, the first thing _I_ would want to do if I had separate protocol support is to make a version of 'make' that just used 'sh' instead of all that baggage--that is, that just substituted an imperative script for the complicated dependency junk.
>i may be able to find > a reference. anyhow, even though make does not really scale well, and is > deficient in dependency and "build" expressiveness, many people insist on > putting more and more bletcherous features and structures on top of it. it > is amazing (and depressing) the type of contortions many software companies > get into just to get make to build their product. a good friend who has been > working on this topic (and arguing against make) since eighties calls this > "the tyranny of adequacy."
What a great term.
> his alternative system QEF [a free version was > included in an EUUG tape during late eighties under the name "dtree" - if > anyone has those tapes online, please let me know] is worth reading about > as well. some of his papers are in www.qef.com/html/additional.html
> [online usenix proceedings have some papers on other make-like tools and > variants that are now lost in the mists of computing. that recent thing > called ant is not much better, IMO.]
? Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but if you read the paper, you'll see the ? parts you're seeming to be talking about (the dependency processing engine) ? are exactly NOT the part I'm talking about being protocol...
ok, i'll look at the paper again soon. i skimmed it a while ago.
? [...]
? In fact, the first thing _I_ would want to do if I had separate protocol ? support is to make a version of 'make' that just used 'sh' instead ? of all that baggage--that is, that just substituted an imperative ? script for the complicated dependency junk.
right, others have tried that sort of thing too, though i would have to look around for references; one that jumps to mind is an inside-out tool: a fully functional shell called mash (part of the inferno system) that can load a make module to specify make-like rules for instance. i don't think it can specify the relationships and dependencies in an imperative way, though.
oz --- the problem with being avant-garde is knowing who's putting on who. -- calvin
> [Heh. I think I heard that they realized at some point in the initial > deplyment of 'make' that the tab/space thing was a problem and wanted > to go back and fix it, but there were already 10 or 20 deployed users > (can't remember exactly, but the number was this order of magnitude) > and they didn't want to disrupt such a large number of people by > making a 'gratuitous' change. (My telling of the story is approximate > and from memory; if anyone has a pointer to a truer telling, they should > post it here.)]
i checked with a few friends at the labs, but they could not recall this story. did not check with feldman. make came out with v7. if the deployed users had been different internal departments, with some time invested in replacing many build scripts with make, the impact of the 'gratuitous' change may have been larger than the numbers suggest. quarter of a century later, it is hard to tell...
oz -- a technology is indistinguishable from its implementation. -- marshall rose
> > [Heh. I think I heard that they realized at some point in the initial > > deplyment of 'make' that the tab/space thing was a problem and wanted > > to go back and fix it, but there were already 10 or 20 deployed users > > (can't remember exactly, but the number was this order of magnitude) > > and they didn't want to disrupt such a large number of people by > > making a 'gratuitous' change. (My telling of the story is approximate > > and from memory; if anyone has a pointer to a truer telling, they should > > post it here.)]
> i checked with a few friends at the labs, but they could not recall > this story. did not check with feldman. make came out with v7. if the > deployed users had been different internal departments, with some time > invested in replacing many build scripts with make, the impact of the > 'gratuitous' change may have been larger than the numbers suggest. > quarter of a century later, it is hard to tell...
Hmm. Curious. I'll see if I can track down a source at my end. I think I remember who told me this. In any case, it'd be a shame if it weren't true. So many of the best teaching tales turn out on close examination to be false. Then again, I saw a nice talk on storytelling at the MIT biz school in which the assertion was made that it is better to tell a good story than a true one. (That flies against comp.lang.lisp tradition of demanding references when people assert that the sky is blue, of course...)
> Hmm. Curious. I'll see if I can track down a source at my end. I think I > remember who told me this. In any case, it'd be a shame if it weren't true. > So many of the best teaching tales turn out on close examination to be false. > Then again, I saw a nice talk on storytelling at the MIT biz school in which > the assertion was made that it is better to tell a good story than a true one.
Stories do not have to be true to be useful. I doubt that any of Aesop's tales were actually true, but they endure and provide insights.
> (That flies against comp.lang.lisp tradition of demanding references when > people assert that the sky is blue, of course...)
Such a demand is usually a challenge - one that usually goes unanswered. I personally prefer to research and _provide_ references. By, the way, the sky is _not_ always blue.
-- Duane Rettig Franz Inc. http://www.franz.com/ (www) 1995 University Ave Suite 275 Berkeley, CA 94704 Phone: (510) 548-3600; FAX: (510) 548-8253 du...@Franz.COM (internet)
Duane Rettig <du...@franz.com> writes: > I personally prefer to research and _provide_ references.
that is great, and appreciated. but what do you do when other people casually claim things that you cannot with some reasonable effort find any support for? if the claim is not explained in a way that indicates expertise in the field, one would have to ask for references. i happen to think that discussions in a usenet comp.group need to have somewhat firmer grounding than the discussions about the nature of capricorn vs aquarius. :)
oz [on usenet since 83] --- the power of the unaided human mind is highly overrated. -- donald norman
> > I personally prefer to research and _provide_ references.
> that is great, and appreciated. but what do you do when other people > casually claim things that you cannot with some reasonable effort find > any support for?
I think you partially answer your own question:
> if the claim is not explained in a way that indicates > expertise in the field, one would have to ask for references.
Yes, the first step is to try to find references yourself, to honsestly see if you can corroborate the other person's claim. If that fails, the next step is to ask for references. However, it is always hard to ask for references on the 'net, because people can't see your body language, and what you might have meant as "I've searched all of the places I know, and can't find the basis for your statement. Will you help me?" ends up being taken as "You are absolutely wrong, and I challenge you to find anything that proves your claim to be right". That second interpretation is easier to make, because more often than not, it was the intended meaning - as I said in my previous post, requests for references are usually taken as a challenge. So if you really intend the first meaning, you usually have to make it very clear, sometimes including your reason for wanting the reference so that it disarms a potentially defensive position which the other person has taken.
The last step should never be to argue endlessly with the person. After a reasonable number of exchanges, one must recognize the fact that opinions will not be changed, and that it is not important who gets the last word. As an argument goes on and on, there comes a point where both sides look foolish, the one who is right and the one who is wrong (and which one was that anyway? Who knows? Who cares? :-)
> i happen > to think that discussions in a usenet comp.group need to have somewhat > firmer grounding than the discussions about the nature of capricorn > vs aquarius. :)
Yes, I agree, but the only person I can control on the net is myself. So I recognize the fact that people will argue the nature of capricorn vs aquarius, and strive not to contribute to it myself.
> oz [on usenet since 83]
Duane [on usenet since ... before 83]
-- Duane Rettig Franz Inc. http://www.franz.com/ (www) 1995 University Ave Suite 275 Berkeley, CA 94704 Phone: (510) 548-3600; FAX: (510) 548-8253 du...@Franz.COM (internet)
* ozan s yigit <o...@blue.cs.yorku.ca> | i checked with a few friends at the labs, but they could not recall | this story. did not check with feldman. make came out with v7. if the | deployed users had been different internal departments, with some time | invested in replacing many build scripts with make, the impact of the | 'gratuitous' change may have been larger than the numbers suggest. | quarter of a century later, it is hard to tell...
What a sad testament to the ability of Unix tools to process text. sed, ed, shell scripts, find, whatever, and they _still_ could not figure out how to change the syntax of the input files to a program like that? One has to wonder if the cobbler's children are indeed barefoot. -- In a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none. In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.
70 percent of American adults do not understand the scientific process.
* ozan s yigit | if the claim is not explained in a way that indicates expertise in the | field, one would have to ask for references.
Asking for references is an expression of passive-aggressive hostility.
Asking for help to understand something, indicates that you are willing to trust the person you are talking to to be able to explain things to you, instead of telling him that you do not trust him at all. If the person you are talking to is honest, he will run out of explanations if you ask decent, honest, reasonably intelligent questions (i.e., not the kind that a certain nutcase keeps asking over and over), and defer you to other sources, but if you start off with such a request, you have given very specific reason for the person you ask to believe that you do, in fact, not trust him to be able to answer your questions, so you do would not even bother to try. Also note that the nutcase who keeps asking for references never looks them up -- his later questions betray that he has expended no effort at all trying to grasp anything on his own. This is quite common on USENET.
The reason these people ask for references is that it is, precisely, a hostile move on their part, but those who are not particularly bright, believe it is some useful academic ritual, the failure to comply to which is some sort of technical defeat, and so the requestor scores a point with the leering dumb guys in the audience. Why this is valuable to these people, I have yet to understand. "All these stupid people agree (or laugh) with me, so I must be right"; to coin a term for this, let me call it dumbocracy.
To go off on a tanget, the combination of mass agreement and stupidity is probably the most dangerous element in popular Western culture, and such things as the American electorate actually going and electing George W. Bush president have already made it harder for those with better than average intelligence to be heard. Incidentally, the last line of my signature is from a CNN article: http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/04/30/science.understanding.ap
So why do people ask for references? They obviously think it works well to humiliate someone despite strong evidence to the contrary. One may speculate that have come up short in their own research or have found some references that turned out to be completely bogus and have been hurt by it. Instead of providing their own references to debunk something they do not believe to be true, they find it much more rewarding to pretend that others fail to prove their point if they can ask for and then mock their references.
All in all, a hostile request for references is a pretty indecent and dishonest way of derailing the open information exchange: Instead of letting people think aloud freely, the likes of our resident nutcase will jump up and ask for references for anything at all, but randomly. Such hostility has a much stronger effect on how people feel about posting and contributing than a strong, directed response to particular issues. It is a systematic attack on those who have independent ideas, and only those who are so much in the mainstream as not to be worth listening to, go free of such passive-aggressive attacks. Given an unexpected, but correct answer to a question, the reference-requestor will ask for references, but not for the expected, but incorrect answer. It matters more to people who know the correct answer to document it than it does to people who post incorrect answers -- the result of not caring much about anything to begin with. It usually takes much more time to look things up than to answer from memory, but this confidence and trust is shot to pieces by the reference-requestor cum nutcase, who prefers that people who do not have correct answers post their random guesswork. In my view, the motivation for asking for references is to make it easier in the long run for the nutcase to spread dis- and misinformation and not be opposed -- also notice how the resident nutcase requests references only when he wants the opposite position to be true, but does nothing to show that.
The same issue that I discussed about people who ask for proof all the time applies to references. Very little of what we know to be true can be _economically_ proven to be so. That is, even if you could prove it, it is not in the interest of an open information exchange to raise the cost of posting to that which requires proof. What we do is let people post various things they believe to be true, and then debunk it if it is not, with real facts and references. So little is provably true, but so much of what people believe is provably false, that it is far more productive to let people think freely and meet resistance than it is to force people to subject their opinions to resistance before the fact, which is what providing an iron-clad proof essentially is. The key is not to repeat known falsehoods. People who do that, however, do have a tendency to demand proof and references from those who debunk them. Our resident nutcase has done this several times, and things have just died or turned ugly because people tire of explaining the same things to the same guy over and over. Through the persistence of unchecked stupidity, it would appear in google searches and the like that the nutcase wins by number of matches, unchallenged claims, and the like. This is a fairly sinister way of attacking the base of a community's common trust in what it knows to be true. Then again, the nutcase lost his faith in Lisp and did not follow up by moving to another community, such as Python's, so one has some reason to suspect sinister, long-term destructiveness just there.
So if you want references, provide references for your own views. Look things up to debunk what other people have posted. If you ask others for references, but do not actually document your need for them, and do not thank the person for providing them, etc, it is only hostile. -- in a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none. In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.
70 percent of American adults do not understand the scientific process.
> Hmm. Curious. I'll see if I can track down a source at my end. I think I > remember who told me this. In any case, it'd be a shame if it weren't true.
If memory serves correctly, this story is told in the Unix-Haters Handbook (I can't confirm this any longer, somebody "borrowed" my copy). Not that that's necessarily where you heard it, but it does suggest that the story has widespread currency
Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.net> wrote: > * ozan s yigit >| if the claim is not explained in a way that indicates expertise in the >| field, one would have to ask for references.
> Asking for references is an expression of passive-aggressive hostility.
You once replied to a message with "Don't post your beliefs as facts".
> Asking for help to understand something, indicates that you are willing > to trust the person you are talking to to be able to explain things to > you, instead of telling him that you do not trust him at all. If the
This does not need to be such a black and white decision, you know. I think that you have both deep and broad knowledge of all things concerning Lisp. But I do not think that you have patience enough to explain things to people starting from different premises.
> person you are talking to is honest, he will run out of explanations if > you ask decent, honest, reasonably intelligent questions (i.e., not the > kind that a certain nutcase keeps asking over and over), and defer you to > other sources, but if you start off with such a request, you have given > very specific reason for the person you ask to believe that you do, in > fact, not trust him to be able to answer your questions, so you do would
Or I might just want to see your sources so that I can try to arrive at my own conclusions without being influenced by your train of thought.
Or I might think that your view is right and that I want to promote it in other places, but need more generally accepted proof than "private communication in usenet newsgroups".
Some time ago, I posted in a side note that I had read an online article that the MS XP EULA prohibits the use of vnc to display XP-desktops on non MS-sanctioned computers. Shortly after I received a note asking for the URL, because the poster wanted to use this fact to influence some decision in his company. Hostility? Not at my end of the line.
> not even bother to try. Also note that the nutcase who keeps asking for > references never looks them up -- his later questions betray that he has > expended no effort at all trying to grasp anything on his own. This is > quite common on USENET.
> The reason these people ask for references is that it is, precisely, a > hostile move on their part, but those who are not particularly bright, > believe it is some useful academic ritual, the failure to comply to which > is some sort of technical defeat, and so the requestor scores a point > with the leering dumb guys in the audience. Why this is valuable to > these people, I have yet to understand. "All these stupid people agree > (or laugh) with me, so I must be right"; to coin a term for this, let me > call it dumbocracy.
This last paragraph is once again a rhetorical rehearsal of your opinion that everybody not agreeing with you is stupid.
> To go off on a tanget, the combination of mass agreement and stupidity is > probably the most dangerous element in popular Western culture, and such > things as the American electorate actually going and electing George > W. Bush president have already made it harder for those with better than > average intelligence to be heard. Incidentally, the last line of my > signature is from a CNN article: > http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/04/30/science.understanding.ap
> So why do people ask for references? They obviously think it works well > to humiliate someone despite strong evidence to the contrary. One may
If you are honestly trying to teach other people you should be prepared to give references for whatever reason they are asking them.
> speculate that have come up short in their own research or have found > some references that turned out to be completely bogus and have been hurt > by it. Instead of providing their own references to debunk something > they do not believe to be true, they find it much more rewarding to > pretend that others fail to prove their point if they can ask for and > then mock their references.
How should they provide references when have none? They might be trying to learn something, and asking for references is a valid means of doing this. Of course, they could always try for themselves and search the web, but it is a well known time-saver to start with references provided by somebody else, be it the bibliography in a book, links on a website or participants in usenet groups.
> So if you want references, provide references for your own views. Look > things up to debunk what other people have posted. If you ask others for > references, but do not actually document your need for them, and do not > thank the person for providing them, etc, it is only hostile.
>> person you are talking to is honest, he will run out of explanations if >> you ask decent, honest, reasonably intelligent questions (i.e., not the >> kind that a certain nutcase keeps asking over and over), and defer you to >> other sources, but if you start off with such a request, you have given >> very specific reason for the person you ask to believe that you do, in >> fact, not trust him to be able to answer your questions, so you do would > Or I might just want to see your sources so that I can try to arrive > at my own conclusions without being influenced by your train of thought.
To give a concrete example supporting your point:
I teach a introductory Lisp course. One of my students very frequently will ask for references. For instance, when I recently discussed the difference between &optional and &rest, he wanted to know where he could look in the HyperSpec or Aluminum Book to get this information.
I know perfectly well that he's not asking to be aggressive, or because he doesn't believe me. And he's not hurting me or the class by asking. Instead, he's wanting to more effectively use the other resources that he has available. It's really a great help.
Daniel Barlow <d...@telent.net> writes: > If memory serves correctly, this story is told in the Unix-Haters > Handbook (I can't confirm this any longer, somebody "borrowed" my > copy).
ah. interesting. i've been told on occasion that one constant at the labs at those days was "what is done is done, live with it." meaning that even if the numbers were smaller (may 74 unix users group was attended by about two dozen people from about a dozen institutions; june 75 meeting had fourty people from twenty institutions) it may not have mattered. [i suggest those who are really curious about these issues outside rhetorical points should get in touch with peter salus, dennis ritchie or brian kernighan and ask for their perspective.]
oz --- the average pointer, statistically, points somewhere in X. -- hugh redelmeier
* Stefan Schmiedl <s...@xss.de> | You once replied to a message with "Don't post your beliefs as facts".
Yes, and it appears to be in strong need of repeating to some people.
| This does not need to be such a black and white decision, you know.
Maybe you should apply some of your gray matter, then.
| I think that you have both deep and broad knowledge of all things | concerning Lisp. But I do not think that you have patience enough to | explain things to people starting from different premises.
I'm missing the part where you explain why I should care what you think.
> The reason these people ask for references is that it is, precisely, a > hostile move on their part, but those who are not particularly bright, > believe it is some useful academic ritual, the failure to comply to which > is some sort of technical defeat, and so the requestor scores a point > with the leering dumb guys in the audience. Why this is valuable to > these people, I have yet to understand. "All these stupid people agree > (or laugh) with me, so I must be right"; to coin a term for this, let me > call it dumbocracy.
| This last paragraph is once again a rhetorical rehearsal of your | opinion that everybody not agreeing with you is stupid.
But that is not my opinion, you fucking idiot. Of course, you are so monumentally stupid that you think you can legitimately "disagree" what somebody else's opinion is, right? The one person you would never listen to is the person you have made up your mind what thinks, right? Such is the nature of the stupidity that I have a very strong distaste for, yet you guys are so fantastically retarded that you are not even aware of your stupidity.
Anyone intelligent enough to read, knows that your crap here is only your own lack of intellect showing through, because I disagree with you _and_ because you _are_ unintelligent. These are quite unrelated facts. The need for you retards to keep repeating this point makes me believe that it is a powerful self-defense mechanism. "No, no, I'm not stupid, I'm just disagreeing with gravity and physics in general."
| Only if you live in a hostile environment.
You _are_ the hostile environment around here. Please die, Stefan. And, please, make as little noise about your exit as possible. That, too, is off-topic here, you see. The other option, to start thinking, is of course completely irrelevant to even _suggest_ to something like you. -- In a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none. In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.
70 percent of American adults do not understand the scientific process.
* Joel Ray Holveck <jo...@juniper.net> | I teach a introductory Lisp course.
On a newsgroup? On _this_ newsgroup? Do you "teach" the concept of context, too? -- In a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none. In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.
70 percent of American adults do not understand the scientific process.
> How should they provide references when have none? They might > be trying to learn something, and asking for references is a > valid means of doing this. Of course, they could always try for > themselves and search the web, but it is a well known time-saver > to start with references provided by somebody else, be it the > bibliography in a book, links on a website or participants in > usenet groups.
He,he. Have you ever seen an author of so called "new age" crap who can give you any reference? Go to your local library and look into a book about Ufos and the like; you will not see any reference there.
Look, it is easy: Eric has his television box, a computer and a newsnet account. He does not need more in order to become intelligent. He does not know how a peer reviewed article looks like. My cat Felix sometimes shows me some of its stunts. And so behaves Eric too.
Why not ignore him? He is really irrelevant. Or is Naggum your Lisp distributor? Or inventor of Lisp? Or author of your Lisp teaching material? No.
* Stefan Schmiedl <s...@xss.de> | This last paragraph is once again a rhetorical rehearsal of your | opinion that everybody not agreeing with you is stupid.
You know, since you retards have such a huge problem with this, maybe you need to be told what really goes on. I doubt it will help, considering that the only people who invoke the "disagree clause" are just plain nuts, but let me at least try:
First, I voice my disagreement with what I believe is misinformation, i.e., information contrary to reasonably established truth, such as stale and known falsehoods, repeated falsehoods about which people agree, etc. At this point, the person I disagree with has not yet been ddetermined to be either evil or stupid or retarded. I just disagree, and say so.
Second, the person who posted the misinformation is the one who actually cannot deal with contrary views and disagreement, and takes it personally, including, but not limited to posting his opinions about me, as if that could possibly help -- now I know he is really out of his mind.
Third, I probably not so gently point out that I am not interested in his personal opinions on anything, particularly not me, and could he please do something to explain or defend his position, instead of himself?
The person in question generally does absolutely everything _but_ explain why what he posted should be considered true, reacting instead like a five-year old kid who is much more concerned that people do not "believe" him than to _make_ them believe him. Basic debate skills, like actually making a coherent argument, are OUT. The strong need for this person to have people agree with _him_, as opposed to his _positions_ on something, now emerges as the primary reason for posting to a public forum, and lack of such agreement backed by a rebuttal of his point is considered hostile and a personal attack, no matter how it is phrased. If the whining loser can find an excuse to think it is personal, he will seize upon it. Since the dumber you are, the more you may believe that I would dislike you from the start, which is not unreasonable considering that I have been quoted quite widely for saying this:
I'm bothered by the fact that stupid people don't spontaneously combust, which they should. -- Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no>, comp.lang.lisp, 07Mar99.
dumb people post with considerable angst of being verbally brutalized, and so react in advance to what they believe will happen, no matter what _actually_ happened. (Remember, they are stupid, so this monumental idiocy does not trouble them at all.) In the end, they remain defiant in believing what they believed to begin with, unchanged, and all they remember (because they are so stupid) is that (1) I disagreed with them, (2) they were both stupid and called on it, and (3) it hurts a lot.
Thus is the myth they already believed to begin with self-reinforcing.
However, this is what happens when I disagree with you and you are more intelligent than a cornered hamster:
First, I voice my disagreement with what I believe is misinformation, etc, just like above.
Second, the person who posted the alleged misinformation _either_ sees that he was mistaken and may shut up or apologize, _or_ explains what he meant and where he came from, probably fully answering my objections.
Third, if there is a third, I may see his point and agree with it or at least see it as a legitimately different view on something, and may shut up or say so, _or_ I argue why the explanation does not hold water and point to contradictory information. Generally, the second stage repeats, with ever more obscure points of difference until ...
Fourth, we have arrived at a philosophical point of difference that may either yield significant insight in a flash, lend more credence to the hopes of life on other planets and interstellar travel and many other wild things, or, most likely, show that either side is running out of arguments and knowledge and relevance to the forum.
At no point in this exchange is the intelligence of the person who disagrees in _evidence_. More likely than not, intelligent people who discuss things, arrive at a common understanding.
When the lack of intelligence on the part of either side becomes a problem, then and only then does it enter into the evidence and become an issue. Failure to grasp something after repeated explanations that other people understand and appreciate, is a problem only with the participant in the debate, and no longer the arguments.
People who _continue_ to disagree with facts _are_ stupid.
People who _continue_ to disagree with me because they think it is some sort of personal defeat to concede a point to me, _are_ stupid.
People who do not even listen to what I say because they have made up their mind that anything I say is a personal attack, _are_ stupid.
Moreover, people who are unable to defend their position, but only defend themselves (usually by attacking others), are _nuts_. People who have to make up horrible things about their opponent because reality is not bad enough that they can escape the conclusion that _they_ are the bad guy, are literally going mad and turn out to be permenantly insane more often than not.
Then there are the people who think that because I do not generally post misinformation myself, I am never mistaken or _believe_ that I am never mistaken because they do, and they cannot fathom that it is possible to avoid making mistakes a lot, because they make mistakes all the time. However, the reason is: I check things before I _post_. I am the kind of guy who actually owns, reads, and uses dictionaries, reference works, standards and specifications, and I am sufficiently well aware of my level of certainty with something that I do not generally _post_ some half-cooked guesswork. I go check it on my own. I hate wasting time on idiots who post guesswork and never learn to stop doing it, so in a public forum, I do not post if I do not know the answer and am pretty sure it is a correct answer. I have a very solid reputation for knowing all kinds of stuff and generally for reporting on them with as good accuracy as would a scientist or an established authority, and this is limiting me in many ways, because it is harder for me to think aloud than for most other people. However, my true and honest distaste for people who post things that they could easily have found out on their own by expending _less_ effort than they used to post their bogus nonsense, is probably infinite. I know that it does show, but how do you avoid my mythical or real wrath? It is really very, very simple: Know your own stuff, explain it or defend it if need be, and do _not_ be the first to go personal. Stupid people cannot figure this out, of course, and the more stupidly concerned stupid people are with "proper behavior", the less they see how things start and what _merits_ nice treatment, and the more willing they are to blame me for all ills on the planet, especially if they are the retarded moralist type who _only_ posts when he can attack me for something he is too goddamn stupid to understand. You are that kind, if I recall correctly, Stefan Schmiedl. -- In a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none. In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.
70 percent of American adults do not understand the scientific process.
* "Siegfried Gonzi" <siegfried.go...@kfunigraz.ac.at> | Look, it is easy: Eric has his television box, a computer and a newsnet | account. He does not need more in order to become intelligent. He does | not know how a peer reviewed article looks like. My cat Felix sometimes | shows me some of its stunts. And so behaves Eric too.
This is the kind of conclusions that people who confuse what their very limited intelligence can think up with reality. This is the kind of people I have to endure in spades. The magnitude of the evil I have to suffer because of the massive idiocy of such creep probably does not quite register with people who have never seen it happen, but think for yourself. How would _you_ react to something like this fucked-up mental case? Granted, Siegfried Gonzi is obviously unable to deal with anything he cannot first force-fit into his very limited coping ability, but he and that "Biep" shit and others of similar moral constitution just _have_ to express themselves in public.
| Why not ignore him? He is really irrelevant. Or is Naggum your Lisp | distributor? Or inventor of Lisp? Or author of your Lisp teaching | material? No.
I am _so_ fucking tired of people who have to post their fantastically moronic explanations of me. I am obviously so important to them in their lives that they have to _post_ about me and what they cannot do on their own. That I have some opinions that go against their retarded views, is so important that they _have_ to attack me like Siegfried Gonzi and this Stefan Schmiedl character do.
Fuck it. -- In a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none. In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.
70 percent of American adults do not understand the scientific process.
On Sat, 11 May 2002 14:23:18 GMT, Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.net> wrote stuff I won't repeat here.
Well, Erik.
Actually I am astonished that you read this post, as I am "a totally waste of time", remember?
And thanks for confirming the part about "not enough patience".
> Anyone intelligent enough to read, knows that your crap here is only your > own lack of intellect showing through, because I disagree with you _and_ > because you _are_ unintelligent.
Do you have any references for this? Oh wait. I should try and dig proofs up to debunk this myth.
> These are quite unrelated facts. The > need for you retards to keep repeating this point makes me believe that > it is a powerful self-defense mechanism. "No, no, I'm not stupid, I'm > just disagreeing with gravity and physics in general."
Well, sometimes I *do* disagree with physics in general. For example there are two different theories regarding the extent of the universe and its age. One is generally acknowledged, another explains human observations in a much easier way.
And, BTW, Galileo and Einstein did disagree with physics and gravity, as known and accepted at their respective times, too.
>| Only if you live in a hostile environment.
> You _are_ the hostile environment around here. Please die, Stefan. And,
Now really, Erik. What would my wife or kids say?
Please let me rephrase my sentence:
Only if you choose to live in a hostile environment.
If you think that comp.lang.lisp is not big enough for the both of us, you might want to consult your newsreaders manual to find out about automatic deletion of offending threads. Please note that I do not ask you to leave, I just ask you to follow up on your intention to ignore me.
> please, make as little noise about your exit as possible. That, too, is > off-topic here, you see. The other option, to start thinking, is of > course completely irrelevant to even _suggest_ to something like you.
> I am _so_ fucking tired of people who have to post their fantastically > moronic explanations of me. I am obviously so important to them in their > lives that they have to _post_ about me and what they cannot do on their > own.
There are not that many people around who have uttered a death wish against me in public. So you have made yourself very special to me.
> That I have some opinions that go against their retarded views, is > so important that they _have_ to attack me like Siegfried Gonzi and this > Stefan Schmiedl character do.
If you can't stand reading news, why do you still do it? You don't have to put yourself under this continuing stress.
Thien-Thi Nguyen wrote: > if discussion isn't for learning, what is it for?
Many things that look like discussions are not.
Eric is correct that many so-called discussions are simply knife fights disguised under a veneer of politeness. This is especially true of many "academic" rituals (like asking for references in an informal setting) where the rigor and knowledge of the one who asks is elevated simply by his taking the offensive. It is simply a debased form of argument from authority - debased because the authority that the one who asks gains from the ploy is as virtual as his argument usually is.
Daniel Barlow <d...@telent.net> writes: > If memory serves correctly, this story is told in the Unix-Haters > Handbook (I can't confirm this any longer, somebody "borrowed" my > copy).
I didn't find this story in my copy, starting from the index entries on make and a few other likely keywords. Not that this disproves anything of course.
