On May 18, 2005, at 12:57 PM, Dan Minette wrote:
From: "Warren Ockrassa" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Something is clearly bothering you here, but unless you're willing to state what it is, I can't see how it can be addressed in a rational discussion.
I've had an off-line conversation with someone who's on list and
pro-choice. He has remarked on how clear my arguments were, but told me
that he bet I'd not be able to get you or Gary to see them.
That's entirely conceivable (so to speak), sure.
May I suggest that I am arguing with an unspoken presupposition of yours
and Gary's. Those are the hardest for us all to get around, because the
supposition is done so quickly, it's not recognized. In engineering
applications, those are the ones that cause pretty capable people to miss a
problem for weeks....and is why engineering groups are often helped by
"creative naivety" that is to say someone who has the tools to attack a
problem, but hasn't worked in that area.
That's sensible and consistent with my experience as a programmer. I can't beta test my own software, because I know what it's supposed to do, so I don't deliberately do things to break it. Someone else has to do that. (This is true of proximally all programmers, FWIW.)
Self-editing is similar. It's easy to overlook technical *and* narrative problems in one's own writing. New eyes are often necessary to catch the lacunae. (The work-around for self-editing is to let a finished story rest for a few weeks or months, then revisit it.)
OK, so what in your view is the unspoken assumption at play here?
-- Warren Ockrassa, Publisher/Editor, nightwares Books http://books.nightwares.com/ Current work in progress "The Seven-Year Mirror" http://www.nightwares.com/books/ockrassa/Flat_Out.pdf
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