On Tue, 22 Jun 1999 21:19:30 -0500 (CDT), Susan B wrote:
>SJ>I am terminating this thread, since we are starting to go around in circles
>>and I am sure there will be plenty of opportunities to address the same points
>>again, and again, and again...!
SB>too bad. The thread contained several of my questions I was hoping you would
>answer. I have to assume you simply don't have answers, only rhetoric.
Susan's response is one reason I terminated the thread. It is basically fruitless
going around and around in circles debating points from people like Susan who
don't even recognise my answers *are* answers!
I made it quite clear when I rejoined the Reflector that I no longer had the
time to debate each thread endlessly. What happened before and is happening
again is that every post I make gets jumped on by two or three people of the
same mindset who basically say the same thing. If I answer each of them, I get
another two or three messages to each of my two or three replies and it grows in
geometric progression!
I would dearly love to argue each and every response, but if I am to stay on
the Reflector, I *must* terminate threads after two or three cycles.
[...]
>SJ>There is no intention to be rude, indeed my intention is to *minimise*
>>rudeness. As stated in my first message I will post all my messages
>>to the Group, in order to minimise the personal factor:
SB>It doesn't work. All it does is make you sound like you are ignoring someone
>who is speaking to you and talking past them as if they are not there. What
>*ever* you post to this list is read by several (but not all, I'm sure) of
>the members of the list. You don't need to make a special effort to address
>them.
Susan still misses the point that my posts *are* to the list as a whole, not
to her personally. I will continue to address my posts to whom they are
*really* intended, ie. the List. If she interprets this as rudeness, after I have
assured her it isn't intended to be, then I can't help that.
Besides, when I was last on the Reflector, from time to time people would make a
song-and-dance about how they were not going to read my posts to them again.
So I started addressing respomse to those people to the List as a whole. Then
I was accused of retaliation! Posting to the List as a whole by default will
avoid that problem coming up in the future.
>SJ>However, I will still keep posting to the Group, and I would encourage others
>>to do likewise. If everybody did this, it would make it a more scholarly
>>debate.
SB>Talking past someone who is addressing you will not make the debate more
>scholarly. Only scholarship will do that.
Susan again misses the point. I am not talking past her. I am talking *to* the
whole List about something she has posted to the whole List. As a member of the
List she is welcome to respond to, or ignore, my posts.
This is my final word on the subject. I will ignore any further messages about
these two topics.
Steve
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"All that is made seems planless to the darkened mind, because there are
more plans than it looked for. In these seas there are islands where the hairs
of the turf are so fine and so closely woven together that unless a man
looked long at them he would see neither hairs nor weaving at all, but only
the same and the flat. So with the Great Dance. Set your eyes on one
movement and it will lead you through all patterns and it will seem to you
the master movement. But the seeming will be true. Let no mouth open to
gainsay it. There seems no plan because it is all plan: there seems no centre
because it is all centre. Blessed be He!" (Lewis C.S., "Perelandra," The
Bodley Head: London, 1977, p251)
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