HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin)
Subject: Re: Paul Johnson (was Paglia)
Originator: mnemonic@eff.org
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 22:08:01 GMT

In article <1ikq4gINNa58@morrow.stanford.edu> francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir) writes:
>Mike Godwin writes:
>
>	Roger Lustig writes:
>
>		Whatever.
>
>	In these four lines, Roger sums up Paul Johnson's book perfectly.
>
>Oh my God! We're not back to those back-scratching, log-rolling days of
>yore are we? 


Great posting, Fido!


--Mike




-- 
Mike Godwin,    |"I'm waiting for the one-man revolution
mnemonic@eff.org| The only one that's coming."
(617) 864-0665  |                           
EFF, Cambridge  |                   --Robert Frost 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr)
Subject: Re: Paul Johnson (was Paglia)
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Sat, 9 Jan 1993 07:23:02 GMT

In article <1993Jan9.030430.5598@Princeton.EDU> roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig) writes:
}>Consider Rousseau saying that people are born free but live in chains
}>and his proposed remedies for that.  Did he include by not living in
}>chains not being obliged to take care of one's children.  Most people
}>would not take that as part of his meaning just from reading his
}>writings.
}
}Well?  Did he include that?  You tell me, John.  
}
}I suspect that, if confronted with this contradiction, he would have 
}admitted that he had acted imporperly, even vilely, or at least pointed
}out that circumstance can make people do things other than the optimum.

Wrong.  He blamed society for not taking responsibility for his misconduct.

Time to sing a few choruses of "Only a Lad," eh?

Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! - Think Universally, Act Selfishly
starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu

"True greatness consists in the use of a powerful understanding to enlighten
oneself and others." - Francois Marie Arouet Voltaire
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin)
Subject: Re: Shouting at robots
Originator: mnemonic@eff.org
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 13:54:37 GMT

In article <1993Jan8.062733.3435@netcom.com> tmaddox@netcom.com (Tom Maddox) writes:
>If 
>not, I will agree to meet the winner at Cactus Taqueria (close by the 
>Rockridge BART station) and buy and carry to the winner's table a taco or 
>tostada of the winner's choice (I recommend the carne asada taco myself)
>along with a reasonable selection of side dishes and drinks.

Since I've tried a Big Mac and Fries, and I've also eaten with Tom Maddox
at the Cactus Taqueria, I speak from experience when I recommend the
latter.


--Mike


-- 
Mike Godwin,    |"I'm waiting for the one-man revolution
mnemonic@eff.org| The only one that's coming."
(617) 864-0665  |                           
EFF, Cambridge  |                   --Robert Frost 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
Subject: Re: Celebrating McGonagall
Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
	<JMC.93Jan2184022@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> <3JAN93.03253274@vax.clarku.edu>
	<1993Jan5.223131.15522@ecrc.de>
Date: 6 Jan 93 00:26:45

In article <1993Jan5.223131.15522@ecrc.de> sanjiva@ecrc.de (Sanjiva Prasad) writes:

   Um, excuse the ignorance, but is McGonagall the poet that a Certain British
   TV Program once did a feature on?  The Scots poet who wrote such masterpieces
   as  "If ye lend me fiyve bob till Thursdae..." ?


   --
   Sanjiva Prasad,  Guest Magus				E-mail: sanjiva@ecrc.de
 
I'll stick my neck out.  Although I have had very little exposure to
MacGonagall, I'd nevertheless be quite surprised if he wrote any such
thing.  It doesn't fit my MacGonagall image.

--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

Xref: sparky rec.arts.books:24003 sci.environment:14299
From: cramer@optilink.COM (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,sci.environment
Subject: Re: Education and the Environment by Gregory A. Smith
Date: 5 Jan 93 17:53:52 GMT
Organization: Optilink Corporation, Petaluma, CA

In article <1993Jan4.192632.16294@beaver.cs.washington.edu>, pauld@cs.washington.edu (Paul Barton-Davis) writes:
> In article <1992Dec30.060453.29924@netcom.com> dani@netcom.com (Dani Zweig) writes:
# #As it is, I gather from your review that the author is calling on us to
# #train students to share his opinions.
# 
# Rather, the author is recognising that all education is in part
# "training to share opinions", and that we have a choice about what
# those opinions are. 
# 
# It would be nice if all education consisted merely of the skills that
# adults use to discern information and ideas about the world;
# unfortunately nobody has any idea how to teach such skills to children
# without also passing along some opinions on the way; Smith's point is
# that the choice of opinions (and there is no choice that we have a
# choice) is important.

Of course, the difference between a person with intellectual
integrity, and the average leftist college professor, is that
if you have confidence that your OPINION is correct, you provide
the student with all the facts and differing interpretations of
those facts, and let them make the decision themselves.  To
their credit, most of my history professors have operated on this
model so rigidly that I don't know what their politics are.  To
the discredit of many of the professors in other departments at
Sonoma State, this seems to be a quirk of the history department
ONLY.
-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
"When freedom destroys order, order will destroy freedom." -- Eric Hoffer
Not a goal, just a statement of reality.
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: s1mbm@isuvax.iastate.edu (michael bruce mcdonald)
Subject: Re: CP or not PC (is that a question?)
Reply-To: s1mbm@isuvax.iastate.edu
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 13:57:46 GMT

In article <1ih5o5INNel4@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu>, bh419@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Ted B Samsel) writes:
>
>  I think that Camille Paglia's greatest strength is her 
>opposition to the so-called "risk free" society. Earlier I
>mentioned a deconstruction of the Western by an English professor
>at Duke. The Western, to her, was a reaction to the "humanism"
>inherent in the social agenda of the latter half of the 19th
>century. Perhaps now is the time for another such spin-off of
>genre with all of the overly-protective social "agendeers" who
>harp on total protection from any concievable mode of harm.
>  I guess since I grew up with the draft over my head I feel that
>the lack of institutionalized "threat" has given the younguns
>carte blanche to develop their own institutionalized threats to
>themselves and society.
>  Just an observation.....
>-- 
>Ted....


I wonder who the proponents of a "risk free" society might *be* that
you're thinking of . . . I frankly have never met any of the sort of
folks you're talking about.

As someone who does have an agenda in favor of a more egalitarian society,
I remain in favor of things like finding substitutions for sexist terms
like "Man," not in order to *protect* anyone or save them from risks,
but rather out of a desire to help future generations live without the
ridiculous assumption that to be a man is to be somehow closer to the
normative instance of what a human being *is* because of the proximity
of the word that describes *me* to that which describes the *species*.

There, as far as the net goes, I've just taken a risk.  I'm frankly sick
of all the "pc" labeling that substitutes for discourse on the net.
Maybe your post had nothing to do with such issues, but that's just the
problem:  I have no idea what you *were* talking about.

michael mcdonald
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: The Gold Bug Variations
From: zaphod@dion.gac.edu (William Voelker)
Date: 5 Jan 1993 16:48:21 GMT
Organization: Gustavus Adolphus College
NNTP-Posting-Host: dion.gac.edu

I read this book over Christmas and found it to be one of the best-written  
books in years.  Comments?  Comparisons? (I find it to be a 90's version  
of _The_Recognitions_ by Wm. Gaddis)  

William J. Voelker
zaphod@nic.gac.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: msmorris@watsci.UWaterloo.ca (Mike Morris)
Subject: Gynecology and Literary Demerit
Organization: University of Waterloo
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 05:08:11 GMT

                                    Monday, the 4th of January, 1993

So far tonight's reading hasn't yielded us anything quite so delectable
as Galeotto occasioned Paolo and Francesca, but we both ended up laughing
so hard we were in tears over:
      Borroughcliffe died in three days; and was carried
      back and interred by the side of his friend, in the
      very hut which had so often resounded with their
      humours and festivities! We have been thus particular
      in relating the sequel of the lives of these rival
      chieftains, because, from their want of connexion
      with any kind heart of the other sex, no widows and
      orphans were left to lament their several ends, and
      furthermore, as they were both mortal, and might be
      expected to die at a suitable period, and yet did not
      terminate their career until each had attained the mature
      age of three-score, the reader can find no just grounds
      of dissatisfaction at being allowed this deep glance
      into the womb of fate.
                 [James Fenimore Cooper, _The Pilot_, Ch. 35, p. 419
                 in Library of America edition ``Sea Tales'']

                 Mike Morris
          (msmorris@watsci.uwaterloo.ca)
From: miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: A very short campus novel
Date: 10 Jan 93 14:20:19 GMT
Article-I.D.: kuhub.1993Jan10.082019.46275
Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services

Academics are like accountants.  
They know the value of the treasure,
and its location.  But it does not belong to them.

-Ken
-- 
miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu | Graecis ac barbaris, sapientibus et
opinions are my own      | insipientibus debitor sum
From: francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: fictional or not, women, cross-dressing
Date: 8 Jan 1993 14:44:32 GMT
Organization: Stanford Exploration Project
NNTP-Posting-Host: oas.stanford.edu

Mike Godwin writes:

	Mark Taranto writes:

		But what about Shakespeare!  Nearly ALL of his women 
		dress as men (presumably because they were played by men).

	Strictly speaking, they were played by boys. Except perhaps for 
	Juliet's Nurse.

Strictly speaking, the Ingenue roles by boys and the Dame roles by men.
A relic of this tradition can be seen in the London and provincial
Pantomimes which are probably playing as I speak. Here the Dame roles
are given to 2nd echelon comedians -- perhaps it was always so.

It would be interesting to find out how many of the so-called boy roles
were occasionally played by girls playing boys playing girls. I think
*ORLANDO* may have something to say here. A nice book to read right now;
there's a wonderful scene wherein the Thames has frozen over.

						RABworm

PS. The redoubtable Heather Henderson has a wonderful short story where a
woman dresses as a .... but I mustn't give the tale away. Watch out for 
publication.

FM
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: veatch@cs.toronto.edu (Tim Veatch)
Subject: Re: Mangled Song Lyrics
Organization: University of Toronto
Distribution: na
Date: 6 Jan 93 00:49:57 GMT


My high school friend's sister (about age 15 at the time) came up
with the following for Chic's `Freak Out'....

The beginning of the song starts out:

        Ahhhhhh...Freak out!

She thought it was:

        Ahhhhhh...Pretty Cow!

You try it; it fits okay!
(I guess you had to be there.)
Xref: sparky rec.arts.books:24189 rec.arts.sf.written:17118
From: Whitten@Fwva.Saic.Com (David Whitten)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: OZ books?
Date: Thu, 07 Jan 1993 17:24:46 GMT
Organization: Science Applications Int'l, Corp. - Computer systems operation

I'm wondering if there are people who are interested in the OZ books
written by Frank L. Baum.
 
I know there is a fan organization somewhere, but I believe it is an 
organization not on the net.
 
I am looking for a definitive list of all OZ books as well as physical
or electronic copies of such. (Including those not written by Baum)
 
I read somewhere recently that the original Baum OZ books have gone into the 
public domain and would like to hear confirmation of this if possible.
 
PS: I am posting this to rec.arts.sf.written since I have a vague memory
of some S.F. publisher reprinting some of them within the last ten years...
 
Please post a followup or send email.
Thanks.
 
David (whitten@fwva.saic.com) US:(619)535-7764 [I don't speak as a company rep.]
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: Paul Johnson (was Paglia)
Originator: news@nimaster
Reply-To: roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig)
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Sat, 9 Jan 1993 02:59:46 GMT

In article <93008.161215U48073@uicvm.uic.edu> Cole Kendall <U48073@uicvm.uic.edu> writes:
>In article <1993Jan8.201223.16236@eff.org>, mnemonic@eff.org (Mike Godwin) says:
>>In article <1993Jan8.181604.8821@Princeton.EDU> roger@astro.princeton.edu     r
>>(Roger Lustig) writes:

>>>Horseshit.  Johnson told us nothing new about any of these people.  He
>>>did, however, pluck out certain aspects of the lives of these people,
>>>ostensibly to prove some point about the value of their work and about
>>>a larger class of people.

>>In these four lines, Roger sums up Paul Johnson's book perfectly.

(Gee, Mike, does that include the first bit?  8-)  )

>I disagree.  Call me naive, but I was unaware of some of the more
>egregious differences between what some of these notables preached
>and what they did.  I agree that some of Johnson's subjects, e.g.
>Mailer, are well known for their behaviors and their words can
>be evaluated with some sense of who is speaking.  But in other cases,
>e.g. Rousseau and Marx, it is important to know the person behind
>the words.

Why?  Critique of Marx's method is sufficient, don't you think?  What 
do we learn from scrutiny of his family life?  

For a better critique, try Jon Elster.

Roger

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: nickles@sage.cc.purdue.edu (John A. Nickles)
Subject: Re: Woosterspeak
Organization: Purdue University Computing Center
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 19:47:47 GMT

In article <C0Jttz.DMG@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk> jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin) writes:
>
>A columnist in the New Statesman last year pointed to a passage in one of
>Wodehouse's books ("The Code of the Woosters", I think) that was actually
>anti-Nazi in the only way that fitted in their framework: Hitler is accused
>of having absolutely terrible dress sense.
>


The actual incident was more compelling than that : Bertie is attacking the
villianous Spode

"You think you hear the Voice of the People shouting "Heil Spode!" What
the Voice of the People is shouting is "Brown Footer Bags? Have you ever 
seen anything more ridiculous in all your puff?"

Spode is supposed to stand for Mosely, the leader of the Brown Shirts.
What Wodehouse was attacking in his own inimitable style was the Fascist
idea that "the People" are behind them onehundred percent (rather like the
family values debate in our own election.) Speaking of Nazis and dress sense:


The view of the Angler's Rest was that Hitler was at the crossroads. It
was no time for shilly-shalling. "Something must be done" said a Scotch and
Lemon. "Either a man has a mustache or he does not. Let it grow or shave it
off. There can be no middle course".

As an additional ironic historical footnote 
JOY IN THE MORNING was written in a Nazi detention camp.

John A. Nickles
Standard Disclaimer:
"I know all about Eulaie Soers!"
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,sci.logic
From: rcrowley@donne.zso.dec.com (Rebecca Crowley)
Subject: Re: Doctrines of Maybe: 7 truth values
Followup-To: rec.arts.books,sci.logic
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8]
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 1993 20:52:42 GMT

Joseph O'Rourke (orourke@sophia.smith.edu) wrote:
: I read [*] that an ancient Hindu sect, the Jains, rejected the law of
: the excluded middle and instead believed in seven truth values,
: yielding their Doctrines of Maybe.  Anyone know how they characterized
: these seven shades of truth?

: [*] in "The Creators" by Daniel J. Boorstin.

I can't give a source for this.  I thought it was from S.I. Hayakawa's
_Language in Thought and Action_, but I can't find it in my copy.
Nevertheless, at some point in high school (probably around 10th grade),
I copied the following into a blue notebook:

7 Categories of Jainan Logic

Maybe it is.
Maybe it is not.
Maybe it is, it is not.
Maybe it is indeterminate.
Maybe it is and also indeterminate.
Maybe it is not and also indeterminate.
Maybe it is and it is not and also indeterminate.

It is conceivable I got this out of Capra's _The Tao of Physics_ or
whatever, but I got rid of that book a long time ago.  Short of
that, I can't even speculate where this came from -- my history text
that year was a double binder of readings (I had an interesting teacher)
photocopied from various texts, magazines, etc.  It could have come
from any of those, so I've really got no clue.  If anyone else knows
how to track down this stuff, I'd be interested in hearing about
it.

--
Rebecca Crowley	 --  spreading memes in .sigs  --  Standard Disclaimers Apply	
	    Safety or self-determination.  Choose one.  NOW.
	rcrowley@zso.dec.com	selene@blegga.cac.washington.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: sanjiva@ecrc.de (Sanjiva Prasad)
Subject: Meaning shifts (was Re: academic settings)
Reply-To: sanjiva@ecrc.de (Sanjiva Prasad)
Organization: European Computer-Industry Research Centre, Munich
Distribution: rec
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 16:11:38 GMT

In article <10JAN199320002764@pavo.concordia.ca> c_mcdon@pavo.concordia.ca (MCDONNELL, CATHERINE) writes:
>That's _Decline and Fall_, in which the mild-mannered hero ends up
>in jail due to a comedy of errors. On brooding about the situation,
>he says to himself: "...anyone who has been to an English public
>school will always feel comparatively at home in prison. It is the
>people brought up in the gay imtimacy of the slums, Paul learned,
>who find prison so soul-destroying."

How words change their meanings!  Nowadays "gay intimacy" is more
associated with English public schools and Waugh than with slums.  
(Nudge, nudge, knowing wink, say no more, know wot I mean, say no more)

Any idea when the usage of the word "fag" (in the Tom Brown/Harry Flashman
sense) and the practice of fagging in public schools finally died out? During
Dr Arnold's time or later?

-
--
Sanjiva Prasad,  Guest Magus				E-mail: sanjiva@ecrc.de
European Computer Industry Research Centre		Off: +49 89 92 69 91 58
Arabellastrasse 17					Fax: +49 89 92 69 91 70
8000 Muenchen 81, Germany				Res: +49 89 16 33 59
From: francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: The Wall Street Journal (was: 1992 in Review)
Date: 5 Jan 1993 04:15:46 GMT
Organization: Stanford Exploration Project
NNTP-Posting-Host: oas.stanford.edu

Heather Henderson writes:

	The Wall Street Journal: Not Just Boring Stock Market Garbage.

The WSJ values persons sufficiently that they are line drawn rather
than photographed. It indicates a contempt for hi-tech that I find
entirely admirable. In London, The Financial Times is a useful news
source.

						RABworm
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr)
Subject: Re: Paglia (was: Cross-Writing)
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Sat, 9 Jan 1993 07:04:15 GMT

In article <1ik2fqINN28q@morrow.stanford.edu> francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir) writes:
}
}Time and distance have a way of smoothing things out. In the days of my 
}youth, and unless you were a true believer in all that Victor Gollancz
}put out, Russell was a laughing-stock of his owm making.

Which is precisely the impression I got from Johnson's piece on him in
Intellectuals.  However, Johnson compares Russell favorably to Lytton
Strachey (as I recall) in Modern Times, which I'm almost done with.


Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! - Think Universally, Act Selfishly
starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu

"True greatness consists in the use of a powerful understanding to enlighten
oneself and others." - Francois Marie Arouet Voltaire
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: sterbenc@ivhs.mot.com (Joe Sterbenc)
Subject: McGrath's "Spider": Gaaaaaaah!
Organization: MOTOROLA 
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 16:28:42 GMT
Followup-To: rec.arts.books

What a CREEPY book.

I was shivering most of last night when I finished it. Thanks a lot
Mr. McGrath. You jerk :).

=====
Joe Sterbenc - Intelligent Vehicle Highway Systems - Motorola
All opinions are my own, but can be rented for reasonable rates
sterbenc@ivhs.mot.com
=====
From: adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (adolphson)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Subject: Re: Paglia (was: Cross-Writing)
Date: 6 Jan 1993 15:36:07 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: mizar.usc.edu

In article <1ifpocINN5kv@aludra.usc.edu> 
rhogan@aludra.usc.edu (Ron Hogan) writes:

> In certain cases, though, the writer's personality is totally infused
> with the writing, and Camille Paglia's _Sexual_Personae_ is exactly
> what I have in mind.  If a writer is going to survey WestCiv/WestLit
> and dismiss Sterne with a casual, "I don't see why people think
> Tristam Shandy is funny" (again, I'm paraphrasing; my copy of SP is
> on the East Coast, and I'm on the West), that to me represents a blatant
> positioning of her own opinion as the arbitrer of truth.

What Paglia wrote is not that she doesn't "why people think
Tristam Shandy is funny", but rather that Sterne's habit of
drawing attention to the artifice of art on every other page
belabors the obvious and is a very *male* thing, which she 
finds tiresome. 

Arne
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books
From: tmaddox@netcom.com (Tom Maddox)
Subject: Re: SF + PC
Organization: Netcom Online Communications Services (408-241-9760 login: guest)
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 06:19:41 GMT

In article <JMC.93Jan4235352@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU [Scrooge 
McDuck] writes:

>Bah, humbug.  Science graduates write as well as graduates in English,
>and include far less nonsense in what they write.

>The literacy level
>of the PMLA isn't as high as that of _Science_ or _Nature_.

	I find myself wondering what the esteemed Prof. McDuck means by this.
Surely the literacy level among (a) editors, (b) writers, and (c) readers 
of all three magazines is *very* close to one hundred per cent.  

	Perhaps he simply means that he prefers to read the latter two
magazines, in which case he should simply say so.  Particularly since, as
a "science graduate" he doubtlessly writes very well.

 
-- 
				Tom Maddox
		    	    tmaddox@netcom.com
	"That's a bird bone chair, Bob.  I don't know if I should sit there."
				Tom Waits