From: rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu (Eric Rescorla)
Subject: Re: supporting allegations
Organization: Rescorla for himself.
Date: Sat, 3 Oct 1992 17:19:46 GMT

In article <r7nz86q@rpi.edu> keegan@acm.rpi.edu (James G. Keegan Jr.) writes:
I'm reposting most of this article mainly because I know that CJ
has killfiled Jim but that she occasionally reads my posts.
CJ, can you support your claim.
>what follows is a post by cj, complete and unedited. in
>this post, cj states "I know that Keegan used the
>mailing list to try to get people to post in support of
>him." this is the specific item i have been referring
>to as cj's lie about me.
Yes. So I had guessed.

>cj, of course, never supported this allegation.
As far as I can tell, this is true.

>if mr. rescorla and the others who have been
>clamoring for supporting evidence or an apology have
>any integrity whatsoever, i am sure their attentions
>will now be focused on the initial allegation.
Yes. I think that CJ SHOULD support it or retract it.

>on the matter of suzanne lucia, who i have stated was
>one victim of cj's false insinuations, cj infers that
>suzanne lucia was the recipient of my non-existent
>mailing and was simply posting in response to my
>mailing, rather than as an act of her own free will.
>not only does the mailing claimed by cj not exist, but
>suzanne lucia had not been on the mailing list for
>almost a year. worse yet, cj was the maintainer of the
>list and updated aliases regularly. in other words, cj
>had to know that he inference about suzanne lucia was a
>lie when she made it, imo.
Nonsense.
You could have written to Suzanne independently. She could
have seen your postings and decided to back you because she is
your friend. All that CJ says is "Are you letting friendship
take precedence over thoughtfulness." One could read it that
CJ is saying that Suzanne saw the alleged mailing by you and
decided to support you, but if either of the two possibilities
I suggest were true, I do not believe they would make CJ's suggestion
false, therefore CJ could not have known that they were untrue
and therefore could not have been lying about Suzanne Lucia.

Here is the relevant passage from CJ's post. I've deleted the
rest.
>This is really unlike you-- you're usually more thoughtful than
>this.  I know that Keegan used the mailing list to try to get
>people to post in support of him.  Are you letting friendship
>take precedence over thoughtfulness?  I'm sorry, Keegan!   I
>like you, but I won't agree with you if I think you're wrong.

Now, the dynamics are a bit complicated here.
1) CJ has asserted that you have made certain statements. You are,
to my knowledge correct in saying that she has not supported that
assertion.

2) You have asserted that CJ is lying when she makes that assertion.
In order for CJ to be lying, three things must be true.
a) She must have made the statements. I think you've shown pretty
conclusively that she did make them.
b) The statements must have been false.
You have not shown this to be the case. Indeed, unless the mailing
list has an indexing system, I don't see how you can. If you have the
entire list archived, I suppose posting the relevant days would show
pretty clearly. Do you?
Alternately, I don't see how you can show this. This makes it very
hard for you to claim that CJ was LYING, which you have.
c) She must have KNOWN it to be a lie. I think your argument that
CJ could not have made such a statement and have it be false without
knowing it is a strong one, however, so I think this point is
not really relevant.

So... The way I see it, both you AND CJ have made substantive allegations
which are unsubstantiated. I think you should substantiate that you
did not write such a mailing and that she should substantiate that you
did. Clearly one of you must be wrong. So far, I really can't tell which
one it is.

There is one minor detail. Mailing list messages are analogous to private
email. For CJ to post such a message would be a violation of nettiquette.
Mr. Keegan, does CJ have your permission to post such a message from
you, if she believes one to exist?

CJ, I know you've stayed out of this so far, but I think it is time
for you to support what you said about Mr. Keegan.


-Ekr



-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eric Rescorla, DoD#431 (Nighthawk S)              rescorla@rtnmr.chem.yale.edu
Former chemist now CM400 mechanic                 ekr@eitech.com(preferred)
   "Base 8 is just like base 10, really...if you're missing two fingers."
Newsgroups: talk.abortion,talk.religion.misc,alt.atheism