From: HADCRJAM@admin.uh.edu (MILLER, JIMMY A.)
Subject: Re: WHO OWNS WHO?...or is it whom?...or what?
Organization: University of Houston Administrative Computing
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 19:30:06 GMT
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.20

In <16oeikINNatq@hpsdde.sdd.hp.com> regard@sdd.hp.com writes:

> In article <1992Aug15.031011.14692@menudo.uh.edu> HADCRJAM@admin.uh.edu (MILLER, JIMMY A.) writes:
> 
> >  Now here's the killer:  Someone says, "ruin your life."  What do you think
> >of?  Your version of ruin.  I think of mine.  Gordon thinks of his.  What
> >if one of these versions cannot happen, or is unlikely to happen?  Well, then
> >somebody's just gotten the wrong idea of what might happen BASED ON THIER
> >OWN INTERPRETATION OF "RUIN".
> 
> You know what, Jim?  I figure their version of 'ruin' is adequate for them.
> I figure their assessment of the risk is adequate for them.  I figure the
> likelihood of X happening is something THEY will assess for THEMSELVES, and
> they don't need my impression of it's likelihood in order for THEM to make
> THEIR OWN decisions.
> 
> Get it?  Are you finally getting it?

  I beg to differ.  It is you who fail to see the plain simplicity of my state-
ment, for whatever reasons. Since it is WE, here, in this forum, running around
making statements, then it behooves US to provide MORE EXACT knowledge so that
those INDIVIDUAL DECISIONS you harp on so much will be accurate ones.  You 
enjoy saying "THEY will assess for THEMSELVES", but what if they ask US?  Then
we'd better be be damn specific and just throw out words that can mean many
things to many people.  OUR impressions of likelihood MAY be important to
them (they may not, too).  Your laisez-faire attitude is not only shameful
but quite dangerous.

> It's a fact that if you get in a car and drive, there is some statistical
> likelihood that you will be involved in an accident.  If someone somewhere
> decides that that risk is great enough, and may RUIN THEIR LIFE, then *my*
> assessment of that likelihood means diddly.  They are deciding about their
> own actions, and my determinations mean squat.

  Unless you're using your determinations to persuade someone of your point, be
it mine, yours, or Gordon's.  Then they matter a great deal.  You cannot ignore
that fact.  If I say pregnancy is not that dangerous, I'd better have something
to back it up.  If Gordon (or you) says otherwise, they YOU better have some-
thing to back it up.  Like it or not, it does matter.

> >  Sometimes, leaving someone to make their own interpretation of your words is
> >not the wonderful thing you seem to feel it is.
> 
> You don't have a choice, Jim.  You don't get to determine what ANYTHING means
> to ANYBODY.
> Adrienne Regard

  That does not abrogate our responsibility to make things as clear as possible
so that THEY know what it is that WE mean.  Whether they or not they listen is
the choice THEY get to make.  Best to err on the side of caution.  Someone
out there may actually give a damn what we say.

  
semper fi,

Jammer Jim Miller 
Texas A&M University '89 and '91
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