HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: gilligan@bldrdoc.gov (Jonathan M. Gilligan)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Fabrikant and Concordia ME's response
Date: 2 Sep 92 22:51:34 GMT
Organization: National Institute of Standards and Technology

In article <1992Aug31.220721.13464@cs.sfu.ca> jamie@cs.sfu.ca (Jamie Andrews) writes:
>In article <16281@pitt.UUCP> geb@dsl.pitt.edu (gordon e. banks) writes:
>>I don't know about Canada, but here they would not have any
>>standing in court to have him committed against his will.
>
>     Even when they knew he was trying to get a gun and had made
>death threats and acted violently?  They even had him searched
>for guns once.

That's true in the states too. There are two principal reasons: first,
the conditions for committing someone are the same as for finding them
not guilty by reason of insanity. Since people get really outraged
when someone ``gets off'' by pleading insanity, they have tightened up
the laws about insanity, which in turn makes it much more difficult to
lock someone up before he has committed a crime. To be judged insane,
a person must be out of control or unable to distinguish good from
evil. Someone who is capable of distinguishing good from evil and who
is capable of deciding whether or not to kill, but who has decided to
kill cannot be pre-emptively locked away because he's sane.

Second, the idea of locking up a person who has not committed a crime
introduces some disturbing ideas regarding civil liberties and the
right to the presumption of innocence. How do you presume innocence
yet lock someone up because of what he _might_ do in the future?

A good example of this in action was the case of Bradford Prendergast
a decade or so ago in Massachusetts. P. was violently angry at his
ex-girlfriend for breaking up with him. He made threats and ultimately
showed up at her workplace with a knife, cut himself, and smeared
blood around. He was arrested and sent to a state mental institution
for observation and evaluation. The shrink who saw P.  judged that he
was probably going to kill the woman, that he knew this was wrong, and
that this was a deliberate decision on P's part.  Thus, a judge ruled
that P. was legally sane and sent him to a state prison for the
maximum sentence (90 days or so, for making threats). When P. was
released, he kidnapped and killed the woman.

Remember the standard here: Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, and Charles
Manson were sane. That means that you could not have locked any of
them up until they committed their crimes, no matter how certain you
might have been that they would commit them (unless you had hard
evidence that they were actively planning them.  Then you might be
able to get them on threats or---if they discussed them with someone
else---conspiracy. But that would be a legal matter of punishing
crimes they already had committed, not a matter of prevention).

---Jon
-- 

Disclaimer --- The government probably disagrees with my opinions.
From: adam@concour.cs.concordia.ca (Adam Steele)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Two die, three hurt in university rampage - Montreal Gazette
Date: 28 Aug 92 01:59:49 GMT
Organization: Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec

In article <1992Aug25.170604.20773@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> gat@forsight.jpl.nasa.gov (Erann Gat) writes:
 
>I find this very puzzling.  On what basis did they charge him with
>contempt?  Was there a court order enjoining him from posting his
>letters to the net?

From the Gazette today (27/8/92 "Fabrikant Involved in Host of
Legal Actions") it appears that the contempt of court charges arose 
from the case he had brought against Dean Swamy and Prof. Sankar.  
The article cited Fabrikant's attack in email of the court system, 
and in particular Alan Gold - a justice of the Quebec court and 
Concordia's chancellor.  His problems with the justice system stemmed 
in part from procedural difficulties he had after he dismissed his
lawyer.

Adam

--
~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~
Adam Steele                                  "... And there is no safeword for
adam@cs.concordia.ca         (Internet)       Doctoral Students."
adam@denovo.lacage1.ntn      (Trivianet)        - Matthew Harelick on a.s.b
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: disaacs@pietrzak.carleton.ca (Dave Isaacs)
Subject: Re: Do the police have Fabrikant's postings?
Organization: Carleton University
Distribution: na
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 14:37:31 GMT

In <1992Aug25.233647.18922@ccu.umanitoba.ca> feld@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Michael Feld) writes:

>In article <1992Aug25.211931.12120@reed.edu> orpheus@reed.edu (P. Hawthorne) writes:
>>The events that have unfolded before us are stunning, and I would prefer to
>>get over the ersatz trauma of having followed the thread to it's horrible
>>conclusion, but I feel compelled to ask: Do the police have copies of his
>>recent posts here? I mean, are we sure that they've been handed over?

>I believe so; Canadian t.v. news shows Fabrikant's dept head holding
>fanfolds of offprints from what looks like this newsgroup; certainly
>the text they've highlighted looks like the stuff he uploaded here.
>-- 
>Michael Feld                         | E-mail:  <feld@ccu.umanitoba.ca>
>Dept. of Philosophy                  | FAX:     (204) 261-0021
>University of Manitoba               | Voice:   (204) 474-9136
>Winnipeg, MB, R3T 2M8, Canada	                     


What I don't think anybody (well the media anyways) realizes is that the
postings were distributed internationally, and not just to directly named
individuals.

-- 
__________________________________________________________________________
 ____  ____  __  David Paul Isaacs ________________________________________
 _____ _____ __  Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering ________
 _____ ____  __  Carleton University ________________________________________
 ____  __    __  Ottawa, Ontario ___________________________________________
_________________disaacs@ccs.carleton.ca __________________________________
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: btd@IASTATE.EDU (Benjamin T Dehner)
Subject: Re: Two die, three hurt in university rampage - Montreal Gazette
Reply-To: btd@IASTATE.EDU (Benjamin T Dehner)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Tue, 25 Aug 1992 21:44:17 GMT

In article <1992Aug25.172229.22707@kong.gsfc.nasa.gov>, jonke@kong.gsfc.nasa.gov
(Stephen Jonke) writes:
> In article <disaacs.714756296@cunews>, disaacs@martha.carleton.ca (Dave
Isaacs) writes:
> > 
> > This is from the Montreal Gazette, 25-August-1992
> > 
> > TWO DIE, THREE HURT IN UNIVERSITY RAMPAGE
> > By Aaron Derfel, Geoff Baker, and Elizabeth Thompson
> > 
> > Montreal- A shooting rampage at Concordia University left two employees
dead
> > and three wounded Monday after a man walked into the university's main 
> > downtown building with a handgun.
> 
> > The charges were based on a number of electronic on a number of Fabrikant's
> > electronic mail messages.
> > 
> 
> Has anything like this ever happened before?  That is, what we have here is
> publically available copies of notes from a madman before their killing
> spree.  In other situations the individual might write notes that in their
> distorted view justified what they were about to do, but that would be
> evidence not readily available to the public.

	But there seems to be a bit of a difference here.  We are not talking
about a suicide note or death threats, but file correspondence with a 
univeristy derpartment about ongoing legal matters.  

> Although there may be some small degree of truth to what Fabrikant claimed, I
> highly suspect that any person for whom these things could and does drive
> them to commit a killing spree would be greatly distorting the truth for
> themselves, and in this case for us as well.

	Another thing, these postings, while most likely biased, do contain
elements of verifiable fact.  Fabrikant's publication list, the publication
list of the head of his department, the personnell department recomendations,
contract awards (including contract numbers) and the like.  While by no means 
am I suggesting that this is the full story, I think there is enough facts here
to give Fabrikant the benefit of the doubt, instead of dismissing him as a 
madman with a gun.

> 
> Steve

--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Benjamin T. Dehner    Dept. of Physics and Astronomy 
btd@iastate.edu       Iowa State University 
                      Ames, IA 50011
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Concordia Deaths 
From: (Lisa Nixon)
Date: 26 Aug 92 10:18:50 +0900
Followup-To: sci.research.careers
Distribution: world
Organization: NTU

I just wanted to express my sorrow at what has happened at my alma mater. 
I knew Mike Hogben through work at Human Resources at Concordia University.
 Tragedies like this shouldn't happen.  

Lisa Nixon
BA Con U '91
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: sri@ctrvx2.vanderbilt.edu (R. Sritharan)
Subject: Re: Halt harrasment, lawyer urged Fabrikant in 1983.....
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: Vanderbilt University
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 19:52:00 GMT

In article <blake.715375500@milton>, blake@milton.u.washington.edu (Blake Hannaford) writes...
>alexa@hpnmdla.sr.hp.com (Alexander Anger) writes:
> 
>>These lawsuit actions by Fabrikant against the world speak much about
>>his character.  I have had to change my opinions about the man quite
>>a bit since the original postings forwarded by "Dov".  Fabrikant seems
> 
> ...
> 
> 
> 
>>On Fabrikant's prolific literature, one almost gets the impression from
>>reading the abstracts that he was as good at squeezing papers out of
>>related topics as the best administrator.  Although interesting in
>>their own right as intellectual tomes, the description of the problems
>>leaves one wondering if any ME who ever built a real structure could
>>make use of them.
> 
>Another recent posting which is quite revealing in this regard is taht
>of someone who did a computer literature search on Fab.  There were 
>indeed many papers, but all were single authored by Fabrikant.  THis
>is inconsistent to say the least with what seemed to be his main 
>greivance - that his adminstrators forced him to include them as
>authors even though they knew nothing of the work. ... why don`t
>they show up on the printout???
> 
I think the list of references in his book includes several multi-
authored papers also.

R. Sritharan
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: geb@dsl.pitt.edu (gordon e. banks)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Concordia shootings
Date: 27 Aug 92 16:53:23 GMT
Organization: Decision Systems Laboratory, Univ. of Pittsburgh, PA.

Of course he was a mad man.  What could the secretary have done
that justified him shooting her?  What is scary about these
incidents is that we come to expect such crimes from people
of other social classes than ourselves.  When one of us is
the perpetrator, it hits a little too close to home.  It makes
us worry about whether in some set of circumstances we might
also go berserk and do such horrible things to ourselves and others.

-- 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gordon Banks  N3JXP      | "Skepticism is the chastity of the intellect, and
geb@cadre.dsl.pitt.edu   |  it is shameful to surrender it too soon." 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: tjfeue@bb1t.monsanto.com
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Fabrikant did not post to sci.research.careers
Date: 26 Aug 92 16:01:45 CST
Organization: Monsanto Company, St. Louis, MO

In article <1992Aug26.033318.1123@news.iastate.edu>, mds@iastate.edu (Mark D. Smucker) writes:
> 
> One thing should be noted here, Dr. Fabrikant did not post to this
> group,  Dov Bai ( bai@msiadmin.cit.cornell.edu ) posted all of the
> articles.  I am curious where Mr. Bai got the articles etc.  What
> other groups saw the same set of postings?

According to the email headers on the first post, he got it emailed 
direct from an account on the Concordia VAX.  Oddly, almost all the
recipients had names starting with "B", but not all as would be 
expected if it was a section of alphabetic listings.  Maybe Dov can
share with us some insight into the infamous Dr. Fabrikant.  Dov?  
You out there?

  TED FEUERBACH   Scientific Systems Consultant  Trilogy Consulting, Inc. 
  Lake St. Louis, MO        (314) 537-6603       tjfeue@bb1t.monsanto.com
  Disclaimer:  The opinions expressed herein are MY OWN and obviously not
  the opinions of Trilogy, Monsanto or either of my two ex-wives.           
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers,soc.culture.canada
From: maniattb@cs.rpi.edu (Bill Maniatty)
Subject: Re: Illuminating Fabricant quotation
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 02:19:47 GMT

In article <wcsjc.715192126@cunews>, wcsjc@alfred.carleton.ca (John Coughlin) writes:
|> In <Btp6IA.D0p@math.uwaterloo.ca> mskucher@math.uwaterloo.ca (Murray S. Kucherawy [MFCF]) writes:
|> 
|> >If you read through his other letters, you'll notice he doesn't have a
|> >complete mastery of our language.
	[Stuff Deleted]
|> 
|> What struck me is his poor command of English after having lived in Canada
|> for a dozen years or so.
	[Stuff Deleted]

Its obvious that these people both expect Fabrikant to have mastered English
to become tenured.  I'm not sure that is fair, since Concordia is in Quebec
if I remember correctly, which would mean that French is the primary language
there.  That means that he would not get much chance to practice his English.

Bill
|> -- 
|> Flesh: John Coughlin                            Elvis ate my Cadillac
|> Net: wcsjc@ccs.carleton.ca     Vox: +1 613 957-2851     Fax: 990-7370

-- 
|
|	maniattb@cs.rpi.edu - in real life Bill Maniatty
|
From: mjassels@cs.concordia.ca (Michael Assels)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Do the police have Fabrikant's postings?
Date: 3 Sep 92 18:13:04 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: Computer Science, Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec

In article <1992Aug29.205529.27540@thunder.mcrcim.mcgill.edu> vugranam@pike.ee.mcgill.ca (Vugranam Chakravarthy Sreedhar) writes:
>In article <4822@daily-planet.concordia.ca> mjassels@cs.concordia.ca (Michael Assels) writes:
>>
>>When Fabrikant was a disgruntled academic, I thought his claims should be
>>examined.  Now that he's a murderer, I think his claims should be tossed
>>immediately into the nearest garbage can (if it's large enough for the
>
>I don't agree. 

I understand now that the sci.research.careers community as a whole doesn't 
agree.  I guess I'll just have to adapt myself to the current fashions.

>>entire dossier).  If there are problems in academia, let them be brought
>>up fresh by someone else at some other time, after Fabrikant's personal
>
>and create another Fabrikant!! 

May I assume we are agreed that creating another Fabrikant would be a 
bad thing?

Perhaps I'm just too optimistic about human nature, but I'm still ready to
hope that there are some disgruntled academics out there who will pursue
their grievances to a satisfactory conclusion without resorting to bloody
murder.  Surely there are some civilized victims of corruption out there
whose cases deserve attention.  Can't we redirect our sympathy their way?

--
Michael Assels,  Analyst,  Comp. Sci.,  Concordia U.,  mjassels@cs.concordia.ca
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| "The hot sticky organ was already beginning to rise and fill.  It moved     |
| under her touch like an animal."    - Judith Krantz, "Princess Daisy"       |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| "A field mouse? A boa constrictor?" - Clive James, on "Princess Daisy"      |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: stgprao@st.unocal.COM (Richard Ottolini)
Subject: Re: WANTED: "Offical" rules of authorship
Organization: Unocal Corporation
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 15:27:11 GMT

It is not like some government organization legislated such.
Most standards in the US are set by professional societies and tempered by
library organizations.  You usually find the rules in paper submission
regulations written by each society for their journals.  Professional societies
are cooperative organizations.  They started during the Age of Englightenment
with most of them coming into being in the last century as areas of inquiry
became defined. Regulations will vary depending on the needs of a given society
and types of experiments they conduct. They are adjusting to modern conditions
where experiements may involve many hundreds of people and much of the
investigation involves computers.
Library organizations try to impose standards on journal formats to make
cataloging simpler.  Other organizations such as employers and grant agencies
like to obtain some measure of productivity from publication lists for their
purposes.  Some, but not all journals are published by for-profit presses that
impose certain stardards to maximize revenue.
Some non-US countries have strong national science societies, e.g. royal academies,
that can impose regulations on professional societies.
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers,soc.culture.canada
From: dwjz@bcarh28f.bnr.ca (Doug Zolmer)
Subject: Re: Illuminating Fabricant quotation
Organization: Bell-Northern Research, Ottawa, Canada
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 04:20:32 GMT

In article <wcsjc.715192126@cunews> wcsjc@alfred.carleton.ca (John Coughlin) writes:
>What struck me is his poor command of English after having lived in Canada
>for a dozen years or so.  Perhaps the delay in granting of tenure is related
>to this.  I mean, no matter how brilliant his research papers may be, if they
>must be edited by a grammarian every time, it would be a bit embarrassing for
>Concordia, don't you think ?

Don't be so sure of this.  Many professional people (many with Masters degrees 
or Doctorates) in the company that I work for can barely write a proper 
English sentence.  These people have lived in Canada all their lives.  I find
that Canadians, in general, seem to be very lax when it comes to writing
standards. 

>-- 
>Flesh: John Coughlin                            Elvis ate my Cadillac
>Net: wcsjc@ccs.carleton.ca     Vox: +1 613 957-2851     Fax: 990-7370


--
dwjz@bnr.ca  Voice: +1 613 763-8217  Disclaimer: my opinions only
From: sarkar@tuna.cis.upenn.edu (Nilanjan Sarkar)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Halt harrasment, lawyer urged Fabrikant in 1983.....
Date: 1 Sep 92 19:19:05 GMT
Organization: General Robotics and Active Sensory Perception(GRASP) Lab,
              University of Pennsylvania

In article <19030001@hpnmdla.sr.hp.com> alexa@hpnmdla.sr.hp.com (Alexander Anger) writes:

<deleted>

>
>On Fabrikant's prolific literature, one almost gets the impression from
>reading the abstracts that he was as good at squeezing papers out of
>related topics as the best administrator.  Although interesting in
>their own right as intellectual tomes, the description of the problems
>leaves one wondering if any ME who ever built a real structure could
>make use of them.
>
>Sorry, Mr. Fabrikant, you are not the Robin Hood of academia.


First point :
	It is unfair to indicate that the quite impressive CV of
Fabrikant is due to his ability to "sqeeze papers out of related
topics" as you seem to imply. He has papers on different areas
although some of the titles looked somewhat similar. Very few people,
I repeat very few people, do not do that. When anyone develops insight
about a particular area, (s)he normally goes to the full extent to
explore all the related topics. But, coming back to the point, why do
you think all these papers were published in quite reputed journals if
they did not contribute significantly ?


Second point :
	Contribution to ME does not necessarily mean that it can be
used to build a structure. There are lots of theoretical issues
involved which need to be solved if mechanical engineering or for that
matter any subject wants to advance. Some people are good at theory,
they try to solve theory related problems.  Some are motivated by
practical real life problems, they use those theories, suitably modify
them and come up with practical solutions. Both are important. There is
nothing wrong in doing theory oriented research. Very few people are
equally interested in doing both types of research.

	Aside, you will find papers mostly of theroretical 
nature if you go through journals like Applied Mechanics,
Acta Mechanica, ASME Transactions and so on where in order
to get accepted theoretical contribution is a must.


Nilanjan


Xref: sparky sci.research.careers:800 soc.culture.canada:6145
From: thood@corvus.matrox.com (Thomas Hood)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers,soc.culture.canada
Subject: Illuminating Fabricant quotation
Date: 27 Aug 92 20:09:37 GMT
Organization: Matrox Ltd.

Just highlighting something...

Original Subject: Re: Fraud and extortion at Concordia University (Canada) (part III)

bai@msiadmin.cit.cornell.edu (Dov Bai-MSI Visitor) writes:

>To: addressees of my first letter
>From: V.I. Fabrikant
>
>Dear Colleague:
>
>2. The University, as well as "persons affected" are very welcome to sue me 
>for libel. May be, this is the only way for the truth to come out. 
>Someone has asked me if I am afraid that the "persons affected" might hire
>someone to stage my "accidental death" or to frame me in some kind of a crime. 
>Well, I am no longer afraid of anything or anybody. We all have to die one
>day. Whenever I die, I shall die an honest person. I just wonder, how many
>administrators can say the same about themselves. Gandhi considered jail 
>as a must for an honest person. I am prepared for that too. 
>I just regret that I put up with all this filth for twelve years. 
>Make no mistake, I am dead serious in what I am doing. I can not fight 
>all the crooks in the world, but I shall not rest until the bogus 
>scientists in this university are exposed and the Justice is served. 
>
>Someone told me that I should have waited quietly till I get the tenure, and
>then start fighting. Well, that might be more prudent, but that would not be
>me. I do not fight from hiding, I fight in the open, and face to face. [...]


--
Thomas Hood                                                    thood@matrox.com
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: erc@unislc.uucp (Ed Carp)
Subject: Re: Fabrikant and Concordia ME's response
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5
Organization: Unisys Corporation SLC
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 00:31:22 GMT

gordon e. banks (geb@dsl.pitt.edu) wrote:

: I don't know about Canada, but here they would not have any
: standing in court to have him committed against his will.

Again, Gordon shows what he does not know <sigh>.  In the USA, anyone can
get a court order committing anyone for (I think the time period is) 72
hours for psych ob., providing they have enough evidence, (depositions,
sworn testimony by known reliable persons, etc.).  What country *do* you
live in, Gordon?
-- 
Ed Carp, N7EKG     erc@apple.com                801/538-0177
"This is the final task I will ever give you, and it  goes  on  forever.   Act
happy, feel happy, be happy, without a reason in the world. Then you can love,
and do what you will."           -- Dan Millman, "Way Of The Peaceful Warrior"
Xref: sparky sci.research.careers:873 soc.culture.canada:6182