On Sat, May 9, 2009 at 1:18 PM, Carrol Cox <[email protected]> wrote: > To return to Lou's original post. Assuming the accuracy of chargaes > against Diamond made there, a legitimate digression was possible into a > discussion of either the misuses of science or of one parrticular > tendency (reductionism) within _some_ scientific currents or in the use > of science by non-scientists. But ravi chose to make the ridiculous > claim (ridiculous even if correct, since non-demmonstrable except by > telepathy) that Diamon's purpose was cementing his status among > intellectuals:
I don't see where Ravi made that claim about Diamond or about anyone else. What I got out of Ravi's original reply is simply this: Diamond's simplistic theories about blood-feuds among PNG tribes, with its scientific pretensions etc, has the same kind of attraction to mass audiences as other kinds of seemingly plausible pseudo-sciences such as Summer's theory about women's math skills, Milton Friedman's ideas about self-interest, Watson's theories about Africans etc. Also, I didn't realize that it is a violation of some human rights to "hijack a thread" and digress into another topic. Isn't that the whole point of a forum like PEN-L - to have free-flowing debate? -raghu. -- "I bought some batteries, but they weren't included." - Steven Wright _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
