> From: Dan Minette <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> From: "J. van Baardwijk" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> > At 14:39 14-9-01 -0500, Dan Minette wrote:
>
> > >Not exactly, that's why I asked it as a question. You said "The
only
> reason
> > >why I might have less objections is that your version does not
already
> put
> > >the blame on a specific person when there is
> > > no evidence that this person is indeed guilty."
> > >
> > >I took "there is no evidence" as meaning that evidence did not
exist. Did
> > >you mean something else?
> > >
> > >If you just didn't know about evidence, then the usual statement is
> > >
> > >"I know of no credible evidence." Stating it as a fact indicates
that
> you
> > >have some basis for stating it, not that it is just an opinion.
> >
> > I'm sorry, but I have neither the time nor the money to have each and
> every
> > one of my posts checked by someone who majored in English, to see if
there
> > might be some chance that someone might misinterpret those messages.
> >
> Ah, Jeroen you wrote something that had a very clear meaning in
English.
> Since you have often written very well nuanced posts in English, a
> reasonable person might assume that you also know what expressing
something
> in present tense means. If your knowledge of English is unusually
> inconsistant, brilliant at some times, and not even elementary at
others,
> how in the world can someone know what your posts mean without asking?
>
> What I also find puzzling is that most of the mistakes I have seen have
> given an unfortunate anti-US or anti-Israel slant that you say wasn't
your
> origional intent. This is puzzling to me is that language mistakes
should
> be random. Once in a while I would expect a misunderstanding of a
second
> language to result in you accidently writing that the US is a wonderful
> country or that Israel is great. But, I don't remember ever having to
ask
> why you now seem to think Israel is always right.
>
> In short, if I just read your posts for vocabulary, use of grammer,
etc.,
> and didn't see things that indicated where you came from, I'd guess you
were
> an native English speaker with at least some college. I've seen
college
> educated Americans with an inferior command of the English language.
Yet,
> you do make mistakes that I've never heard with recent Mexican
immigrants
> that I know who have a much poorer command of the English language.
>
> Perhaps the easist way to remedy this is to not take the questions
about
> intent as hostile, and just answer them in order to clarify things. If
you
> clarify things, then I can understand what you mean and move on. But,
I
> think I should be able to start with the meaning of the words you
write, and
> then accept clarification if the words you wrote did not covey what you
> meant.
>
> Speaking of which, I would appreciate an answer to the question I asked
> above, so I can improve my understanding of what you meant to write.
> There's no hard feelings on my part at all. I'll be happy to carry my
share
> of the load of improving commuinications.
<delurk>
My thoughts, as an outsider:
His command of the language is superlative. It is logically
self-sustained. There are no obvious grammatical errors. It is
impossible to believe that what he writes is being misunderstood because
he 'doesn't understand English very well'. It is clear that he
understands what he is writing, and what he reads. When he states that
he is being misunderstood that can only be taken as a cop-out. He can't
support his words logically, so must resort to excuses.
Now it also seems to me that he consistently makes several logical errors
in his arguments, namely the 'post hoc ergo proptor hoc' error.
Furthermore there have been several instances that he has outright
refused to answer questions directed at him. The 'landmine' thread for
example has several of these. The only reason for this is that he could
not answer those questions and maintain his position. They were not in
his 'paradigm' and he could not address them. It has been shown that
some people do not see things that are outside of their paradigm. In
other words they ignore everything that contradicts their world
view. Another word for this is 'dogmatism'.
</lurk>
