why to avoid impossible conversations

From: Mike Cole (mcole@weber.ucsd.edu)
Date: Mon Oct 01 2001 - 20:27:48 PDT


Paul and Eric-- your interchange illustrates perfectly what happens when
people on xmca venture into topics well beyond their joint areas of competence.

Eric-- you either did not read paul long enough or with enough care to understand
that he was not justifying the killings in new york.

Paul-- Quesetions like, "can you read for comprehension" add nothing except
bile to the discourse.

Collectively, your interchange reinforces the prior experience of xmca
discussions. When we wander into areas where we have insufficient common
grounding, this medium ceases to be useful. It is demonstrably fragile even
when we constrain ourselves to areas where we (presumably) have some common
grouding.

Take it offline if you feel compelled to, but spare the many people on xmca
who have very limited access that kind of conflict. Please
mike



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Nov 01 2001 - 01:01:22 PST