Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Feynman on standardization
Message-ID: <1989May7.232428.14416@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Date: Sun, 7 May 89 23:24:28 GMT

From the concluding essay ("The Value Of Science") in Richard Feynman's
last book, "What Do *You* Care What Other People Think?":

	Our responsibility is to do what we can, learn what we can,
	improve the solutions, and pass them on.  It is our respon-
	sibility to leave the people of the future a free hand.  In
	the impetuous youth of humanity, we can make grave errors
	that can stunt our growth for a long time.  This we will do
	if we say we have the answers now, so young and ignorant as
	we are.  If we suppress all discussion, all criticism, pro-
	claiming "This is the answer, my friends; man is saved!" we
	will doom humanity for a long time to the chains of authority,
	confined to the limits of our present imagination...

For some reason this made me think of a number of current standardization
efforts, notably ISO networking, X.400 and sons, and the X/NeWS standards
war.  I can't imagine what the connection could be... :-) :-) :-)
-- 
Mars in 1980s:  USSR, 2 tries, |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
2 failures; USA, 0 tries.      | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu