At 12:43 PM 8/21/2012, David Roberson wrote:
I suggest that the statement about the average Vortician is not
called for. Who placed you in a category above the others of the collective?
Enough said.
I suppose it's too much to expect....
To make this clear, people here have the right to say whatever silly
thing comes to mind. Or not-silly. And others have the right to say
it's silly or not-silly. "Silly" is primarily about ideas.
What I wrote was this:
Well, I suppose it's too much to expect for the average Vortician to
understand relativity.
We can also say that Vortex is a collection of looney-tunes. Like me,
for example. Or not, whatever.
The comment in question, and I'm not calling up the name of the
person who wrote it, [not yet, I later looked] because that's not my
point, was about relativity, and it demonstrated a major ignorance of
the meaning of time dilation in relativity. What I'd hope is that the
person would realize that there are some, ah, defects in their
knowledge, and they would go and learn about it, or even .... nah,
that's too much to expect for the average Vortician!
Ask.
By the way, I'm sometimes considered an expert on LENR. That's
because I wrote about it, over and over, starting in 2009 when I knew
little except for a general physics and chemistry background (from
school, long ago, and continued general interest). Eventually I came
to the point where I was writing for and with true experts, and I
continue to learn, because some kind people actually point out my
errors, when I'm lucky.
If I'm making errors, of any kind, on the level of that error about
relativity, I sure hope someone will point it out!
Having said that, David, are you pointing out an error? What error?
I'm not "in a category above the others of the collective." All of us
are free to "correct" each other, rightly or wrongly. Do you think I
don't feel that way?
In any case, David, thanks for presenting the opportunity to clarify
this, in case it wasn't clear.
Okay, now I look at the original message. It was from David Roberson
himself. Bad sign.
Look, I went to Cal Tech. This was a collection of the smartest kids
in North America, all jammed together, a few hundred of us at most.
(at least smart by certain test measures, there are other forms of
intelligence and by some of them, we might have been pretty stupid).
How did we talk with each other?
"Warm body!"
A warm body can tell the difference between light and dark, that was
the formal definition. It means being of minimal intelligence. A
"moron" would be a lot smarter.
Nowadays, it would likely be more colorful. I've spent some time
hanging out with students on a wiki, some of them quite "smart," and
how they talk with each other and anyone within reach would be
blood-curdling to someone expecting ordinary social courtesies.
Sensitivity to being called "ignorant" is not characteristic of
intelligence, it is characteristic of someone insecure about their
own position. Were David defending someone else, which is what I
thought at first, it would be another matter. But, no, he's defending himself.
Ah, well, I suppose it's too much to expect....
Vortex has always been a bit of a free-for-all. I have no particular
history with David, no collected prejudice. I had to look at his
contributions to the list to see them as appearing to begin about a
year ago. (I joined Vortex in 2009, when I'd been researching cold
fusion for a few months.)
'Nuff said, indeed.
