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From: g-rh@cca.UUCP
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: This isn't for trash
Message-ID: <16111@cca.CCA.COM>
Date: Tue, 26-May-87 19:47:04 EDT
Article-I.D.: cca.16111
Posted: Tue May 26 19:47:04 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 28-May-87 01:17:10 EDT
References: <8705200049.AA01609@brahms.Berkeley.EDU> <1044@chinet.UUCP> <8705222242.AA19131@brahms.Berkeley.EDU> <1061@chinet.UUCP>
Reply-To: g-rh@CCA.CCA.COM.UUCP (Richard Harter)
Distribution: world
Organization: Computer Corp. of America, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 46

In article <1061@chinet.UUCP> rhonda@chinet.UUCP (Rhonda Scribner) writes:

[... long article which does not need to be repeated... ]

Rhonda, I sent you some mail which didn't get through, so I am going
to repeat it here.

I should hate to have to defend the kindly grad student's style of posting
[I have taken to calling him -- I have hopes that in 30 years or so it
might soften him up a bit.].  Personally, it doesn't bother me, but it does
make for a high noise factor now and then.  I will defend to the death the
right of anyone to claim that Matthew is obnoxious.  Nonetheless there are
some things that should be said in his defense.

First of all, he is not just a blow hard -- he often really does know what
he is talking about at a deep level.

Secondly, despite his undiplomatic phrasing, he is right about this newsgroup.
Newsgroups are created as specialty areas -- if you post articles about 
programming in soc.women, people will flame you about inappropriate postings.
This newsgroup was created for technical philosophy as a branch of science,
much as its title indicates.  There are newsgroups for cognitive engineering,
miscellaneous science, etc.  If I write an article about bridge I don't post
it rec.games.bridge, not to comp.os.vms.  Moreover, he is right about the
history of the group -- it was a moderated group which was renamed to be
a sci. group.  I didn't respond to Matthew's original survey but I did lobby
the administrators to have a sci.philosophy.tech group, and was gratified
to see that it was done.

There are people who wish to discuss hard technical philosophy, foundations
of mathematics, philosophical implications of QM and relativity, and things
like that with people who have a reasonable understanding of the issues
involved.  They lobbied for the creation of a group for that purpose.  The
people who lobbied for a group for discussing Indian culture would be unhappy
if somebody came in and started holding endless discussions about abortion.
Enough said.

Incidentally, I am opposed to the idea of this being a moderated group.
[Back when it was, it wasn't distributed very well, and never got off the
ground. When the group was renamed, it apparently was also given better
distribution.]  My feeling is that there are many people who would contribute
to an unmoderated group than to a moderated group, whose contributions 
would be of value.
-- 

Richard Harter, SMDS Inc. [Disclaimers not permitted by company policy.]