An axiomatic paradox?

[Mindy Newton]

Paul,

I'm unsure if you saw my post #300, since it was at the end of a page and you cross-posted starting a new page.

In case you didn't see that post, please read it.

--

Mindy, it's not the first time MSK has employed what amount to male-chauvinist responses.

On the mind-body issue, that is the center piece of the book I'm hoping to finish before I depart this earth. I'd like to continue the discussion, but I truly am extremely time-pressured now -- attempting to get some refurnishings accomplished before our annual "Thanksgiving Seminar," fall chores meanwhile, with many, many trees dropping many, many leaves, plus a series of conferences pending (e.g., I'll be gone 4 out of 7 days next week attending conferences).

I hope we can continue on the mind-body issue on another thread later.

Anyway, I hope we can get back to the subject, but I haven't time now for posting on it.

Jon Letendre, thank you!!

Ellen

___

Yes, we must discuss this. It is a subject I have worked on for a very long time. I, too intend to publish on the subject. I've been reluctant to air my original thought on a public site. At the same time, I'm wild to get critical feedback on this, so when you have time, let me know.

= Mindy

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mindy,

How did our posts cross? Strange...

Anyway, I answered your question.

Michael

[Dragonfly]

Oops, I didn't make myself clear. I do realize you were discussing Rand's implicit views. I was wondering about how you chose to describe Rand, implicitly, as dual-property versus dual-aspect. I subscribe to the dual-aspect view, myself. I think what that theory needs is an explanation as to why, and how the aspects come to be had.

I'm not sure a dual-property view gets you anywhere. Metaphysically, you still have to explain the duo, including interaction, don't you?

If you mean what I think you mean, I agree with you. The problem is the rather vague and conflicting definitions of all those terms, I've searched a little bit on the Internet and I found the information rather confusing. Therefore I try to avoid such terms and try to describe in my own words what I mean. I've already posted a lot of messages more or less relating to your question on this forum (search for example on "determinism" in my posts), and I won't repeat all those arguments here. In my opinion consciousness is a process that is only understandable to us in a high-level description of the workings of the brain, but it is essentially one and the same process as that which in principle (if not in practice) can be described in terms of all those firing neurons. I think that would be similar to your dual-aspect view. The nice thing is that you don't need mysterious interactions between mind and matter, the whole so-called problem of how the mind can initiate physical actions disappears. There is only one single process, we only switch in our description from the high-level intentional stance to the low-level physical stance. In fact we do the same with computer software: the instruction "print file X" is a high-level description of a process that is realized in the hardware of the computer and which results in the physical action of printing the contents of file X on paper.

[tjohnson]

There is only one single process, we only switch in our description from the high-level intentional stance to the low-level physical stance.

This is pretty much what Korzybski means when he speaks about different orders of abstraction, I think.

[Mindy Newton]

Mindy,

No. Jon did. I intimate that you ignored his strawman (implying a sanction).

I normally don't like the strawman technique, but then competitive debate is not my favorite form. I never use the strawman except to exaggerate an already existing one. Let's just say I am not adverse to putting new clothes on a strawman to show his true nature.

Here is a fuller explanation. What happens to a celestial body that gets hotter and hotter and hotter? It eventually turns into a ball of fire. Jon claims that my understanding of global warming in a very acrimonious debate was precisely this, without the ball of fire thing.

That was introduced to derail the debate and turn this into an "us against them" issue. (No more ideas. Sides instead.) Isn't that what a strawman is supposed to do? I merely added the ball of fire thing to show how ridiculous it was.

I am still awaiting a corroborating quote. I seriously doubt one will be forthcoming. For the record, here is my original quote. It was the thread starter. It was at the beginning of the debate, not during it.

I have never been interested in ecology one way or another, so whenever I have seen the phrase, "global warming," I always assumed that it meant something like the earth getting hotter from the atmosphere all the way down to the core. I was pretty surprised to see that it was merely the weather and the atmosphere (and, to a smaller extent, the ocean). A much better term for me to have understood at my lack-of-interest distance would have been "warming of the earth's weather." I am sure that there are many people who are at the awareness level I was on this and they would be surprised to learn that all the shouting is not over our planet getting hotter. It isn't. Only the weather is.

This is a fight and crusade about the weather.

In other words, I kicked off the debate by saying that this had been my mistaken impression before I looked at some material. Before that thread, I don't recall writing anything about global warming. Jon's contention is that I adhered to that position after a lot of debate. Look and see for yourself (my bold):

I claimed that you admitted to understanding global warming as about earth-warming, as opposed to atmospheric warming. And this really is what you thought, only about a year ago, and after submitting many opinions about the global warming debate.

This smacks of intentional distortion to show just what a dummy I am, thus I should take his advice, keep my trap shut and listen breathlessly to the wise ones. I won't say this is the case because I respect Jon, but it certainly qualifies as a strawman. This kind of crap is the problem with competitive debate. People focus on people and not on facts.

You are free to your own opinions, of course. But before sanctioning a strawman, I suggest you look at what is proposed and not just accept an opinion blindly. On certain issues like global warming, I have found that people are not very objective and they are prone to distortions and errors.

I personally see no value in winning an argument (whatever that means) by distorting what someone wrote. I do see a lot of value in keeping to the facts, whether an argument is won or not (whatever that means).

Michael

I didn't see a straw man argument from Jon. You are saying I did, and that I then did something that counts as a sanction of it? I don't know the facts you are using here. One thing I will make explicit is that I don't remark on every error I read here. That's got to be clear to anyone, and, I would think, it must be everyone else's policy also. Just think what that would mean!!

The business above about your statement from long ago might give you reason to complain that Jon's composed a straw man, but it's ridiculous to imagine I have knowledge of it and sanction it! In fact, reading the quote you included, your interpretation of the matter is right on. If that's all Jon has to go on, he's mis-remembered things, or mis-stated them. But I'll thank you to keep your firehose closed down to something like the diameter of the fire.

These are petty matters compared to the refusal to acknowledge and uphold any intellectual standards, which now threatens to dominate this site.

= Mindy

[Mindy Newton]

Oops, I didn't make myself clear. I do realize you were discussing Rand's implicit views. I was wondering about how you chose to describe Rand, implicitly, as dual-property versus dual-aspect. I subscribe to the dual-aspect view, myself. I think what that theory needs is an explanation as to why, and how the aspects come to be had.

I'm not sure a dual-property view gets you anywhere. Metaphysically, you still have to explain the duo, including interaction, don't you?

If you mean what I think you mean, I agree with you. The problem is the rather vague and conflicting definitions of all those terms, I've searched a little bit on the Internet and I found the information rather confusing. Therefore I try to avoid such terms and try to describe in my own words what I mean. I've already posted a lot of messages more or less relating to your question on this forum (search for example on "determinism" in my posts), and I won't repeat all those arguments here. In my opinion consciousness is a process that is only understandable to us in a high-level description of the workings of the brain, but it is essentially one and the same process as that which in principle (if not in practice) can be described in terms of all those firing neurons. I think that would be similar to your dual-aspect view. The nice thing is that you don't need mysterious interactions between mind and matter, the whole so-called problem of how the mind can initiate physical actions disappears. There is only one single process, we only switch in our description from the high-level intentional stance to the low-level physical stance. In fact we do the same with computer software: the instruction "print file X" is a high-level description of a process that is realized in the hardware of the computer and which results in the physical action of printing the contents of file X on paper.

Yes, I agree with you.

There has to be some explanation of why the two levels of abstraction are remote, though. Physicists will want to say, I think, that first-person psy. terms don't enter into physical descriptions at any level of abstraction. I have in mind a way to answer that challenge.

The next, and burning question is what is different about certain physical/neurological processes such that they are what conscious processes are?

= Mindy

[william.scherk]

You're right about that, Jon. I believe it's a straw-man technique. Defend oneself against an "accusation" that was never made. It's a tactic chosen because that defense is win-able, while the real issue is a lost cause. If nothing else, it tends to de-rail the subject, because the argument then becomes whether or not the straw-man issue was somehow implied.

You are right. That's exactly what Jon did with me with that global warming crap. (You should read that thread.) All I did was return the favor and exaggerate his own nonsense a little.

[ . . . ]

I observe that people who debate competitively usually turn a blind eye to the strawmen that support them, while criticizing the strawmen that oppose them. I call that a double standard, but that's me.

Michael, it is a credit to you that you acknowledge mistakes and note your ignorance. But I don't quite understand some of your statements when they are taken together.

One such puzzle is the "quip" about Ellen. You state that if we don't like quips, we should not read your posts. Fair enough, but it sounds like you think a statement like "Ellen is so lovely when she is angry" is something benign and unremarkable.

Another puzzle is the "people who debate competitively" line. As I understand it, competitive debate is the rules-based form of structured argument where teams are scored and ranked. Is it possible you are conflating several senses of the word 'debate'? There is formal debate, there is an argument containing opposing points, there is deliberation and consideration, and there is argument plain. You may mean simply that you see some arguments as merely an exercise in domination, an exercise rife with rhetorical tactics, fallacies, and evasion of the opponent's points and implications.

In this case, I would simply see a lousy argument, and a psychological righteousness -- a purely tendentious stance.

I know you won't answer the question specifically with reference to people on this list -- people who debate competitively -- but I wonder who you have observed besides Jon that fits the bill of an 'out to win' discussant, who ignores so-called strawmen arguments.

To my eyes, what Jon was responding to was the 'cute when mad' comment. I have the impression, rightly or wrongly, that your quip was irrelevant and disrespectful of Ellen's difficulties in 'grokking' Paul Mawdsley -- with the context being Mindy's take on Mawdsley's frustrations. Ultimately, I think that you agree that judging an idea or a person requires some careful deliberation and a close attention to what is actually said.

Sure enough you once thought, in your ignorance of the meaning of global warming, that the whole globe was getting hotter, from atmosphere to core. You can see how this is funny, and you can see how one might seize on such a statement, fairly or unfairly, because it is hilariously wrong. So, you might also appreciate how that statement would stick in the mind, and later be forked up for derision.

Of course, Jon was wrong to state that your ignorance of the term came after discussion. It clearly did not. The hilarious misunderstanding came before you set out to inform yourself on the issues. One hopes Jon will admit this mistake and apologize for the misidentification.

But, back to the underlying comment that got Jon going -- your putdown of Ellen, your quip -- and what I believe to be a point that bears repeating.

This is what Jon said:

No, you don't really suck. But you keep getting in it with Roger and Ellen, for example—on subjects where you just don't know what the frick you're doin'. They've pleaded with you. It's not a big deal. Just slow down. Think about what you want to say. Don't say too much.

I'll break it down.

Jon figures you sometimes enjoin discussion where you needn't, where your lack of knowledge hobbles you. He also suggests that in these cases you slow down and be more deliberative, that you restrain yourself.

Now, I believe you did take in Jon's point (before you went off to correct the record and rail against strawmen one-upmanship). I believe you drew an inference from Jon's remarks -- that you should keep your trap shut and listen to the wise ones; that you are a dummy.

Since you respect Jon, as stated, I think you can deliberate on the underlying point. Rather than give the worst inference, you can give the best. You can strip away the combative elements and understand that like anyone here you sometimes get in over your head. Sometimes you strike out at folks unfairly, folks who point out the depth of the issue, folks who say, in effect, "you may not know the issue well enough to debate it effectively, Michael."

There is a balance to be struck between the pleasure of discussion and argument and the pleasure of understanding. There is a balance to be struck between your roles as host/convener/owner of the whole site, and your roles as participant and interlocutor on individual threads.

I'll reiterate my metaphor of Emperor and Policemen. At OL you are Emperor -- you promulgate the laws and policy, which is as it should be.

You also find yourself -- since there is no separate moderator as at OO.net and elsewhere -- as the beat cop, monitoring discussions, chiding, adding your commentary.

At times, of course, the patrolman cap gets dislodged, and the beat cop imagines himself the law, the Imperial Entity, speaks in edicts, diktat, ukase. Sometimes all the roles can get mixed up -- the cop arrests, charges, tries, judges and sentences presumed offenders. The Emperor comes out of the palace and gets involved in street-fights.

You see? It's hard to be a fair and impartial peace officer when one is a party to a dispute as well as the occupier of the throne. As I have pointed out to you before, the balance is difficult.

_________________________________

Back to the underlying issue as I see it. We all have what the French call amour propre, which can be baldly translated as 'self-esteem. This translation misses many senses that pertain, and the sense in which I use it (the Spark Notes entry illustrates the more baleful, problematic sense).

To wound one’s amour propre, is to gall his good opinion of himself—to wound his vanity.

I'll be straight with you, Michael. It does well for all of us to consider that preserving our self-esteem, preserving our self-image, is centrally important psychologically.

When I say of myself, I am fair, I am thoughtful, I am just, I invoke my amour-propre. If I am to have integrity, what I say I am must be what I actually am. My actions must match the press release, so to speak, if I want to be seen to have integrity.

Of course, if I said I never play 'gotcha'; winning a discussion is of no importance compared with reaching true conclusions; I don't use strawmen; I don't enter discussions of which I am ignorant; I don't argue fallaciously; I don't care what other people think -- I am setting the bar very very high. I am likely to be caught out, and have my integrity impugned when it happens -- as it must -- that I do play gotcha, that I do argue fallaciously. In which case, my choice is to defend my amour-propre, or to admit mistakes.

The higher I set the bar, the more difficult it can be to stand down. Since my self-image is involved, since my reputation is involved, I may from time to time be more interested in preserving my 'face' than interested in admitting error. It's a human thing.

Do I respect myself and the truth, or do I frantically seek to preserve my vanity? If there is a large gap between what I say I do and what I really do, I will have a bout of cognitive dissonance (please re-read my post on Carol Tavris for the full context -- we have been round this mulberrry bush before). What choice I make obviously affects my reputation. If a lot of careful, thoughtful people point out that I have made a mistake, and I insist against evidence that I have not, I appear a fool . . . no matter my protestations.

The more I protest against the evidence, more fool me.

Michael, we do well when we keep to the straight and narrow and admit error. There was a very good discussion on OL in which you did just this: the thread in which you changed your opinion from "I could not say it better myself" to "this is crap and I am mistaken" (the thread on Evolution, Creationism and Intelligent Design). I note it took one hundred and ten posts before you changed your mind . . .

Back to Ellen and your quip. It derailed discussion, in my opinion. It was a remark easily interpreted as flip and evasive condescension.

Ellen is a crackerjack mind, a great value to this list, and one of several people here that guarantee my participation. She is like a whetstone to me -- a solid abrasive that serves to sharpen the knife of critical thinking. She is an ally in the search for truth and understanding, and a formidable discussion partner. When Ellen corrects me, I pay attention.

Please reflect on what I write here. My remarks are not meant to disparage you or demean the excellent value you provide me by hosting this list.

[Edit: spelling and grammar]

Edited September 24, 2008 by william.scherk

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mindy,

When you take sides on something without being familiar with it, you sanction the side you took. All I asked you to do was become familiar with the issue so you don't make that error. You're the one who chimed in with snide comments ("It is very, very common, of course" and so forth in reference to my posts). I just let you know what that looks like from the side you bashed.

(Why do I think there are emails humming around in the background? )

I personally think choosing sides in an intellectual environment like OL is a stupid thing to do, anyway, much less choosing when you don't know the facts. But you chose, you commented, and I evaluated—as I always will do. And I would expect you to do the same thing in my position. There are no one-way streets on OL except for extreme hate things like bigotry.

If there is one thing I try to encourage, it is independent thought. You yourself have a wonderfully independent spirit. I am sure you are aware that there is no independent thought without examining facts. So before taking sides on anything (in the event you ever feel a penchant for that particular brand of foolishness), I do suggest becoming familiar with the facts before commenting. But it's your choice.

These are petty matters compared to the refusal to acknowledge and uphold any intellectual standards, which now threatens to dominate this site.

I have no idea what you are talking about. Who is refusing to acknowledge and uphold intellectual standards? People who try to start a clique spat based on publishing misinformation and telling people how they should behave? And those who try to silence certain posters because they disagree with them? Is that who you are talking about? Those standards?

There are plenty of great ideas and discussions going on all over this site for those who wish to join them. You yourself have contributed to several of them with some first-class thinking.

Now that, I value and admire. This other stuff is crap. If I don't treat it like the crap it is, it contaminates the forum. (Believe me, I speak from experience.) Then the ideas actually do disappear. But for now, you can rest assured. There is no danger of intellectual degradation. There is only the danger of certain people being disgruntled because others disagree with them and then trying to start crap (online and off). But these people are very few. And even they have very good minds. You can see them using their fine minds, too, when they are not acting like that.

Try running a forum sometime. It's a barrel of laughs.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

William,

Let's take the covers off.

Ellen tries to run people off this forum. She has done that several times. I won't have it with GS or Paul.

People want to talk around this and pretend it is something else. So I'll say it out loud. Make of that what you will.

And underneath, I do think Ellen is lovely when she gets miffed. (Seriously.) There's no male chauvinism or any of that crap involved. There is lack of me taking her crap seriously. That I agree with.

You know why people get pissed when I say that? And why they get even more pissed when I responded with the reverse to Mindy? It's because I do not obey their attempt to control. I do not fall in line. I do a Pastor Manning instead. Since when are PC Nazis part of this intellectual environment?

Wanna see something interesting, too? See if you can grok a connection here:

But, having experienced being very misinterpreted, and having witnessed MSK (for example) being quite misinterpreted on various threads, the evidence leads me to conclude otherwise in this specific situation.

I read through your post #289. I'm going to speak frankly now while I'm feeling this strongly:

In all the time I've known you in listland, you've never before angered me. I'm angered now, and I'm feeling, oh, hell, never mind; just forget it and drop it.

By her own admission, she had only read the beginning of Paul's post when she posted that. And the section I quoted is right at the beginning. One of Ellen's nonstop subtexts whenever she and I disagree is that she knows what I really mean and I don't (and I'm a dummy, of course), as she misrepresents my words. Part of our friction is that I bring this to light and correct her. Quote by quote. Fact by fact. She doesn't like to be corrected, either.

She tried to do that with Paul and it didn't work.

I imagine it hurts to see someone else see all this and say so. At least it made her angry.

And Paul, bless his heart, had no idea what he was getting into. I don't know what all the values involved are here (well... I do know some of them), but I do know that the behavior is very predictable. Just look at the patterns. (Why do I still feel the breeze from all those emails?... )

It would be interesting if we could get back to the ideas, if anyone is interested...

But clique spats are good for entertainment. Do carry on...

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Well, if Michael is going to uphold "intellectual standards" he could do worse than give me the boot for starters. That might be all it takes. B) ;)

--Brant

[Brant Gaede]

I will say there is a lot of mountains out of molehills on OL.

--Brant

[Ellen Stuttle]

I studied and I still maintain the final position I posted back then: The fundamental issue was about inducing public fear (especially to get government money) on all sides and not about global warming on any side. Different slants. Different fears. The same money.

Counter-statement for the record: Michael's assessment that the global warming debate is driven by the same motives and techniques on all sides is mistaken and maligns the characters of some extraordinarily honorable people. I know some of those people myself; I know a lot about others via my husband's knowing them. For that matter, my husband is among the folks whom Michael's assessment maligns, since a large percentage of Larry's time these days, outside his teaching responsibilites, is spent in efforts to counteract what he calls the AGWAs (Anthropogenic Global Warming Alarmists).

Ellen

___

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ellen,

I am not maligning anyone. I am simply not taking all those calls to demonize people seriously, while looking at some very common ground between the the demons and the demonizers. (Both sides.)

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

This one has some gems.

William,

Let's take the covers off.

Ellen tries to run people off this forum. She has done that several times. I won't have it with GS or Paul.

There is exactly one person I've ever tried to run off this forum: Victor Pross.

Wanna see something interesting, too? See if you can grok a connection here:

I read through your post #289. [....]

By her own admission, she had only read the beginning of Paul's post when she posted that.

Um, where does he get from "I read through" (emphasis added) that by my own admission, I'd only read the beginning?

And the section I quoted is right at the beginning. One of Ellen's nonstop subtexts whenever she and I disagree is that she knows what I really mean and I don't (and I'm a dummy, of course), as she misrepresents my words. Part of our friction is that I bring this to light and correct her. Quote by quote. Fact by fact. She doesn't like to be corrected, either.

I've many times said, to the contrary, that I don't understand what he means. (It's a polite way of saying that I often find what he says -- not on all subjects, granted; on certain subjects -- pretty wafty.)

I've also noticed that when I ask what he means, he thinks I've stated; when, for instance, I write "I guess," he interprets it as "I know"; when I give him an alternative, he only notices one of the possibilities, the one he finds unflattering.

As to misrepresenting words, Michael's good at that. But not at quoting.

Ellen

___

[Brant Gaede]

I studied and I still maintain the final position I posted back then: The fundamental issue was about inducing public fear (especially to get government money) on all sides and not about global warming on any side. Different slants. Different fears. The same money.

Counter-statement for the record: Michael's assessment that the global warming debate is driven by the same motives and techniques on all sides is mistaken and maligns the characters of some extraordinarily honorable people. I know some of those people myself; I know a lot about others via my husband's knowing them. For that matter, my husband is among the folks whom Michael's assessment maligns, since a large percentage of Larry's time these days, outside his teaching responsibilites, is spent in efforts to counteract what he calls the AGWAs (Anthropogenic Global Warming Alarmists).

Anthropogenic global warming is the heart of the Green religion with Satan being capitalism and CO2, an extremely weak greenhouse gas. Sunspot activity seems to be at the heart of any global warming, which btw, comes and goes. The more sunspots the more warming. Right now there is one observable sunspot and global temperatures haven't gone up in the last ten years. We could be in for global cooling.

I'm waiting for my check, Michael. I don't know who is sending them out, but I want mine. James Hansen sure gets his--from NASA.

--Brant

[william.scherk]

Let's take the covers off.

Ellen tries to run people off this forum. She has done that several times. I won't have it with GS or Paul.

When and if you calm down, I'd be interested in your reaction to my post above. It was posted in good faith, and in recognition of the great value I find at OL.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

By her own admission, she had only read the beginning of Paul's post when she posted that.

Um, where does he get from "I read through" (emphasis added) that by my own admission, I'd only read the beginning?

Ellen,

Here are your own words.

One of the things which angers me is precisely the length. Did you not see the PS to my post, in which I said it would take me at least an hour to respond to your #283 and that I didn't have the time (but might be able to manage it this week)? Plus you know (or at least you have been told several times) that e-list work is a physical ordeal for me at the best of times.

So then you respond with a hugely long post, which would take me at least a whole afternoon to answer in any detail.

I took this to mean you had skimmed his post, seeing there was lack of time, discomfort, etc. Normally when people skim, they read the beginning and skim the rest.

If you didn't have time, but still forced yourself to take the time to do an in-depth read of his post, your comments did not convey that.

As to the other issues, I have spoken my mind. I don't expect you to agree with me and I didn't when I spoke it. I stand by what I wrote.

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

(Why do I still feel the breeze from all those emails?... )

Incidentally, what does that mean? All what emails? It's been well over a year since you and I had any email correspondence (unless I might have sent an email to ask if the server was down at one point), and when we were corresponding it was almost entirely in reference to a project in which we were both involved.

The only occasion on which we had a dispute by email was during your global warming thread, when I was trying to no avail to correct some false charges you were making.

Your comment leads me to wonder if similar comments you've made in regard to numbers of emails you received from Linz are similarly exaggerated.

Ellen

___

[Ellen Stuttle]

(Why do I think there are emails humming around in the background? )

Why do you think that?

Ellen

___

[Jon Letendre]

Michael,

I misremembered your admission as coming in the discussion—you actually presented it in the opening article. I was wrong about that.

The sentence that introduces your telling of having learned that global warming was about the atmosphere: “Another very pleasant surprise was the basic science lesson I received from this film.” [An Inconvenient truth.]

So you found out that global warming refers to atmospheric and not whole-earth warming by watching Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth.

I thought you still didn’t know even after seeing the film. Sorry.

My point is not much changed by this, however. WSS seems to see what I’m getting at. Why not let your defenses down and consider that we criticize you on this point because we care about you? What’s with all the ‘trying to control you’ and ‘win a debate’? Please consider that it may just be constructive criticism.

However, if you think it wise to get into debates with well-prepared people about global warming when you only just then* learned what it’s actually about, then by all means ignore what I’ve said and knock yourself out.

* Sad but true, I expect a challenge on this. The article begins, “I have just seen” [An Inconvenient Truth and The Great Global Warming Swindle.]

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ellen,

Since you brought it up, I remember emails you were sharing with a small group of people. I even remember one of my own being spread to the four winds. Of course, I have copies. I would have to dig and my time is really being compromised on a thundering tempest in a teapot that sounds more like a squeak, but I would be glad to supply you with them.

Doubt all you want about Perigo. I have copies also. I will not publish those, though. (Nor yours.) My personal standards are a bit different on this.

I only think emails hum because I have seen so many hum in the past, with sudden clique behavior. I speculate from noticing patterns.

It's funny that people who gossip forget so easily...

I personally admit I gossip at times. I just don't forget.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

I read through your post #289. I'm going to speak frankly now while I'm feeling this strongly:

In all the time I've known you in listland, you've never before angered me. I'm angered now, and I'm feeling, oh, hell, never mind; just forget it and drop it.

By her own admission, she had only read the beginning of Paul's post when she posted that. And the section I quoted is right at the beginning. One of Ellen's nonstop subtexts whenever she and I disagree is that she knows what I really mean and I don't (and I'm a dummy, of course), as she misrepresents my words. Part of our friction is that I bring this to light and correct her. Quote by quote. Fact by fact. She doesn't like to be corrected, either.

Michael

She said she read the post through. What did I miss?

--Brant

[Brant Gaede]

(Why do I still feel the breeze from all those emails?... )

Incidentally, what does that mean? All what emails? It's been well over a year since you and I had any email correspondence (unless I might have sent an email to ask if the server was down at one point), and when we were corresponding it was almost entirely in reference to a project in which we were both involved.

The only occasion on which we had a dispute by email was during your global warming thread, when I was trying to no avail to correct some false charges you were making.

Your comment leads me to wonder if similar comments you've made in regard to numbers of emails you received from Linz are similarly exaggerated.

Ellen, that Linz reference was uncalled for. Michael has made nearly 8000 posts on OL alone. Quantity is not his problem, to say the least.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

William,

Here goes some comments on your previous post.

1. The very first thing I want to mention is a nasty little meme that is being implanted and I want to tear it out by the root. That is that I am a dummy in certain issues when I post. If you reread your own post, this is taken as a given, almost in a patronizing manner.

The reality is that I enter discussions often to learn, but I do read (and contrary to the opinion of some people, I do quote well as my high volume of posts with proper quotes attest). Just like everyone, I know some things better than others. But not knowing much is not the same as not knowing anything at all and it certainly does not give me a certificate of dummy.

Here is where my warning bells go off: To demonize or not to demonize. That is the question.

Whenever I see the word "passion" being used to excuse people from providing proper explanations while they hoot down anyone asking, my warning bells turn into a full set of clangers. That happened, for instance, with the global warming thread. (Even in the explanations. Shoving about 25 hours of dull reading and statistics at a person and demanding instant agreement is also a form of intimidation. That was used consistently. It's there if you look.)

When I perceive such "passion" and I am not all that familiar with a subject, I often read some contrary views, the most reasonable I can find at the time, and comment about what I have read. That pisses people off, but I don't do it to be cantankerous (although a nasty side of me likes it). I do it because I refuse to be bullied into thinking anything. If an idea is good, it has to stand qua idea. Not because people shout it to drown out questions.

2. You mention repeatedly, almost in some kind of insinuative way, that you find value on OL. I will state up front I find great value in you (and Jon and Ellen, for that matter). As to whether you wish to post here or not, that is entirely up to you. So if there is some kind of threat intended (and I am not claiming there is, I'm only addressing a wiggle of my antenna from past experiences), it means nothing to me. Literally. My stated policy is that what is good for William is good for OL. That goes for everybody. I do urge you to look after your values as it is your life and you deserve happiness. Beyond that, I have no opinion. The forum is yours or not to do as you see fit.

3. Competitive debate. I specifically mean winning an argument being the primary value sought. In lesser venues, this is accompanied by posters high-fiving each other and other tribal behavior, even and especially when wrong.

Objectivists and Objectivism-friendly people are notoriously famous for being thin-skinned about being wrong. They can't stand it. It galls them and humiliates them to no end. When I see an admission of error in this environment, it is usually done with grave ceremony as if someone had died and the person in error was speaking at a funeral. This leads to a discussion behavior I call competitive debate. Funerals are not pleasant and it is better to avoid them if possible. Actually the reason it is necessary to beat the other guy is not to be better than him, but to prove that the winning poster was not wrong. The poster has to prove this to himself.

I just came up with part of that thought as I was typing it. Hmmmmm... I like it. It sounds true to my experience. Valliant, of course, is a caricature of this. And, of course, when I criticize this with a much higher class of thinker (like here on OL), I am talking about one aspect within a rather rich context. As a rather ugly metaphor for comparison, let's say the difference with someone like Valliant is equivalent to an elephant dump as compared to to a mouse passing wind. (Sorry, but I couldn't resist... )

What I find galling when this arises is that often I am just getting to an insight or someone else is, then boom. Off goes the vanity gun and the race is on. The issue is no longer what the idea is, but who is wrong. I have a feisty nature, so I often stand up to this when it happens and pull the covers off. If that irritates people, I also get irritated by what I consider to be an ignoble use of a fine mind to derail some of my own thinking (or that of others) right when thing are getting good and interesting.

All this has to do with what you call amour propre and your Carol Tavris thing on cognitive dissonance and the "YOU make mistakes, not me" syndrome. I'll stick to old-fashioned vanity. I don't even care why it happens. I have produced pop artists. Intellectuals are pikers at vanity compared to these creatures. I admit to being sick and tired of dealing with vanity and this often makes me a bit... er... colorful in my expression of it.

Unfortunately, this is forum life. There are several factors that contribute to all this. I have not found a perfect solution other than be myself. Despite the friction, I'm a good guy, not one of the bad guys. So it usually works out with some feathers ruffled (sometimes even mine), but that's all.

4. What you find hilarious about my original position concerning global warming is precisely the reason I decided to discuss it back then. I tried to find solid information on global warming from Objectivist and Objectivism-friendly sources, but I kept coming up with intimidation. Not knowing anything about global heat behavior might be hilarious to you, but at that time my position and total ignorance of global warming was shared by the majority of people. This was borne out by surveys in MSM at the time. People are more aware nowadays because of all the media stuff, but not back then when it was just starting to get on a good roll.

So here's the question I was essentially asking, and still ask. How are you going to educate people if you laugh at them for not knowing something?

Well... you could try to intimidate them. Or yell at them. Or call them stupid.

All that, in addition to some other very unpleasant stuff, is on the global warming thread. It's hilarious, I know. It certainly didn't convince me and I wanted to be convinced.

If you reread that thread, you will see me say time and time again that you cannot convince people with those tactics and the proof was in the fact that there were so many people on the other side. But there was no general call to understand on that thread. There was a general call to express contempt for many intelligent people and, to my mind, do nothing short of joining a gang. Well, I can't go there. I never will, either.

My own views on global warming (not the controversy, but the topic) are very much those expressed by Bill O'Reilly. (I paraphrase, but I am pretty sure the gist is this): There are a lot of boneheaded fanatics ("pinheads") who are environmentalists and I disagree with the fanaticism, but I too want to see clean water and clean air if man was the one who dirtied them. So I am not an anti-environmentalist fanatic. I just think they are wrong about a lot.

One day, maybe people who know facts about all this will take public awareness seriously enough to become competent communicators. For as boneheaded as Al Gore is, he certainly is a highly competent communicator. So are his supporters. Or maybe the keepers of the truth will think public awareness is hilarious and keep wondering why they are not taken seriously by the same public and keep losing ground.

5. You keep talking this stuff about Emperor. I like the banter and there is a small truth in being the traffic cop, but I am not flattered by this analogy. In fact, it is a bit uncomfortable. I am one of the few people you will ever know who can truthfully say that he does not like power. (Many say that, but when they get power, they show their hind ends. We have all seen this.) I have had power. I have let it go to my head. I have both given it up and I have had it taken from me by betrayal. My present reaction to all that former sound and fury is, "What in hell was I thinking? I didn't even like where I was at when I was there."

Sure, I have my corner of the universe here. But power is not on my plate. This thing came about almost by accident. Some people who know my plans know exactly what OL's potential is going to blossom into and there is no room for illusions of power on my part. Something really beautiful and productive is coming and, audience-wise, what we have here is a drop in the bucket. If you want to see power-games, I expect there will be plenty when all that gets rolling. People love to parade before others almost more than they love money and some get quite vicious about controlling it. So there will be no lack of Shakespearian drama for entertainment.

Of course, I will have to keep things organized and, this being my project, I will have to exert authority over what is produced and marketed, etc. But if I let a personal power trip become part of this, there will be a big honking mess. Been there. Done that.

There's other stuff I could discuss, but it is getting late.

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

Ellen,

Since you brought it up, I remember emails you were sharing with a small group of people. I even remember one of my own being spread to the four winds. Of course, I have copies. I would have to dig and my time is really being compromised on a thundering tempest in a teapot that sounds more like a squeak, but I would be glad to supply you with them. [....]

Michael,

I thought you were talking about emails between you and me (which, as I say, there haven't been, unless for some sporadic list-business issue, in more than a year).

So is what you were referring to instead my corresponding with Daniel Barnes and DF? We're friendly with one another; we share a lot of interests. However, none of us has had much time for corresponding lately, except a very occasional note. And we wouldn't have any reason to be talking about the goings-on on this thread. So it doesn't seem likely that you were thinking of emails being exchanged between me and them.

There was exactly one of your emails to Daniel which was shared, in part, the part pertaining to your whisking Victor's plagiary of Dykes off the site within minutes of Daniel's calling Victor on the plagiary. The only person who's spread that email "to the four winds," if anyone has done so, is you. I think you published it later on this site.

If you don't want the thundering tempest, Michael, I recommend that you stop heating the pot with your innuendos and outright accusations.

Ellen

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