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  | Archive through April 25, 2004 | Jason Scott Mullins | 25 | 1 | 4-25-04 2:45 pm |
| Archive through April 26, 2004 | Gary Alan Weatherhea | 25 | 1 | 4-26-04 12:10 pm |
| Archive through April 27, 2004 | Natalie Severn | 25 | 1 | 4-27-04 9:55 am |
| Archive through April 28, 2004 | Scott Nelson | 25 | 1 | 4-28-04 10:18 am |
| Archive through April 29, 2004 | Glenn L Andersson | 25 | 1 | 4-29-04 5:10 pm |
| Archive through April 30, 2004 | Natalie Severn | 25 | 1 | 4-30-04 4:05 pm |
| Archive through May 01, 2004 | Jennifer D. Pegg | 25 | 1 | 5-01-04 7:38 am |
| Archive through May 01, 2004 | Jeffrey Bloomfied | 25 | 1 | 5-01-04 9:59 pm |
| Archive through May 02, 2004 | Jeff Hamm | 25 | 1 | 5-02-04 11:17 pm |
| Archive through May 03, 2004 | Natalie Severn | 25 | 1 | 5-03-04 4:15 pm |
| Archive through May 04, 2004 | D. Radka | 25 | 1 | 5-04-04 1:45 pm |
| Archive through May 05, 2004 | Jeff Hamm | 25 | 1 | 5-05-04 5:54 pm |
| Archive through May 10, 2004 | D. Radka | 25 | 1 | 5-10-04 8:54 pm |
| Archive through May 12, 2004 | Alan Sharp | 25 | 1 | 5-12-04 2:21 pm |
| Archive through May 13, 2004 | thomas schachner | 25 | 1 | 5-13-04 12:11 pm |
| Archive through May 14, 2004 | D. Radka | 25 | 1 | 5-14-04 9:32 pm |
| Archive through May 17, 2004 | hemustadoneit | 25 | 1 | 5-17-04 5:19 pm |
| Archive through May 28, 2004 | Stephen P. Ryder | 49 | 1 | 5-28-04 11:57 am |
| Archive through June 05, 2004 | D. Radka | 50 | 1 | 6-05-04 9:16 pm |
| Archive through June 14, 2004 | Ally | 50 | 1 | 6-14-04 8:08 am |
| Archive through June 21, 2004 | D. Radka | 50 | 1 | 6-21-04 11:50 am |
| Archive through July 04, 2004 | D. Radka | 50 | 1 | 7-04-04 8:29 pm |
| Archive through July 20, 2004 | Rosemary O'Ryan | 50 | 1 | 7-20-04 7:49 pm |
| Archive through July 31, 2004 | R.J. Palmer | 50 | 1 | 7-31-04 6:24 pm |
| Archive through August 07, 2004 | Jennifer D. Pegg | 50 | 1 | 8-07-04 5:41 am |
| Archive through August 11, 2004 | Jason Scott Mullins | 50 | 1 | 8-11-04 1:09 pm |
| Archive through September 02, 2004 | D. Radka | 50 | 1 | 9-02-04 5:35 pm |
| Archive through October 05, 2004 | D. Radka | 50 | 1 | 10-05-04 1:57 pm |
| Archive through October 25, 2004 | Lindsey Millar | 50 | 1 | 10-25-04 8:29 pm |
| Archive through November 22, 2004 | Glenn L Andersson | 50 | 1 | 11-22-04 8:15 am |
| Archive through December 05, 2004 | Richard Brian Nunwee | 50 | 1 | 12-05-04 4:01 pm |
| Archive through December 26, 2004 | Glenn L Andersson | 50 | 1 | 12-26-04 2:10 pm |
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Mephisto
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, December 29, 2004 - 2:04 pm: | 
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Hello Everyone,
Radka, I admire your stamina. I would have given up trying to explain the thesis a long time ago.
I see that the same core of obtuse individuals continue to provide the thread with comic relief, and the same group of astute people continue to ask relevant questions and pose interesting arguments.
In any event, I hope everyone enjoys what remains of the holiday season.
Sincerely,
Mephisto
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 28, 2004 - 6:35 pm: |
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Ms Comer asked Mr. Norder (Wednesday, December 22, 2004 - 10:05 am):
“Dan, What did you find when you checked out those psycho guys?”
Mr. Norder answered (Wednesday, December 22, 2004 - 12:32 pm):
“Well, it's been covered extensively several months back (and thus buried deep in the bowels of A?R archive hell), but the upshot is that this hypothetical unnamed killer David talks about in his theory features some psychopathic traits and some paranoid schizophrenic traits, but mostly just mustache-twirling cartoon villain traits.”
>>Mr. Norder has never posted anything with respect to an analytic description of the psychopathic personality type as discussed by psychiatrists. He cannot produce such a discussion, because he has performed little or no research on this subject, and is thoroughly ignorant of it. He has spent the last eight months making believe he has made this discussion by redirecting his readers’ attention to the archives, where no such discussion on his part appears. If he has ever posted a report out of the scientific literature analyzing my suspect on this web site as he alleges, then let him copy and paste it here now, giving his original posting reference. He is a hustler, a false showy poser, and an arrant, self-serving liar; he is now blowing off three people, Ms Comer, Mr. Nelson and myself, asking him to post his discussion. The above exchange with Ms Comer allows his readership to consider him, perhaps some of them for the first time, as he really is.
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 28, 2004 - 6:21 pm: |
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Ms Comer wrote:
“Checkable Details for the AR theory:
1) “find out what Epistemological means”
>>Epistemology is the philosophical study of the nature of knowledge. One example of a famous philosophical work concerning it is Plato’s “Theaetetus.” Many questions can be asked of this subject. Among them: What is knowledge? How do we know what we know? How can we discern when we think we know, but really don’t know? What kinds of knowledge are there, and how do they differ one from the other? What is the highest kind of knowledge? How can we establish the difference between knowledge and perception? Is perfect agreement between the perceiver and the object perceived a requirement for knowledge? Is this all that is entailed by knowledge? What is the origin of knowledge? Has its basic nature changed over the course of history? Is knowledge really an attribute or function of speech? A?R attempts to ask these questions with respect to Ripperology. What is the best way to study the Whitechapel murders? What are the criteria for knowledge in this field? In 1888, why did these things happen? Is there a single epistemological factor that can explain the whole of the empirical evidence? If so, what is it? How might all the disparate pieces and parts of knowledge we have about the case best be fitted together? With respect to all the ways of fitting the pieces together, how can we determine which way is best? A good place to start researching epistemology is the “Encyclopedia of Philosophy.”
2) “Review the works of psychologists Cleckley, Hare and Lykken to determine if the actions of JTR fit their definitions of a psychopath”
>>Highly recommended! In fact, required in order to understand what the beep I’m talking about in A?R. But the only person who’s done anything in this regard so far is Roger Palmer. You need to get to be very good indeed concerning psychopathy in order to understand the case evidence. This is nothing you can accomplish in a weekend or two, you have to devote several months of your spare time to it. You need to personally develop in this field, suffering ups and downs and many revisions to your understanding, in order to qualify. You need to develop your own mind, your own resources and abilities, in order to be able to reject everyone else’s approach to the case evidence but your own. You will know the solution to the case only when you can rely on yourself. This is what I did, and the benefits are delightful.
3) “Review other psychologists writings in case the three listed above are not mainstream or would not be universally agreed with.”
>>Haha! There is very little universal agreement in psychiatry. If you think you are going to find this to make your life easier, you are in for some surprises. Of many examples: The concept of the psychopath, albeit very useful in the disciplinary sense, has been sued into virtual nonexistence because of its reliance on criteria that can be seen as rather subjective or unscientific at certain points. It is one thing to say, for example, that someone has a rap sheet 20 pages long. This can be shown objectively. It is another to say that someone is shallow, or is incapable of understanding the meaning of love or irony. If you want to say the latter of someone, it is more difficult to support it in a court of law. So, the American Psychiatric Association has moved some of its chess pieces toward the former and away from the latter, folding the notion of the psychopath into the larger notion of Antisocial Personality Disorder for its official purposes. This is not to say that there is no referent group out there that corresponds just to psychopathy, however. Psychiatry is LOADED with sub-disciplines that appear to universally agree with one another, but then prove to do so only on the surface. We’re talking about the nature of the human soul. *** Cleckley, a humanistic psychiatrist, is to psychopathy what Moses is to the Jewish people. By personal contact with and exhaustive interviews of these people that led to his 15 expertly drawn case histories in “The Mask of Sanity,” he led the field out of the wilderness and asked the basic questions to establish an orderly beginning. Their names ought to be ensconced in hyperspace for all the Ripperologists on this web site; ONLY IF YOU KNOW THESE PEOPLE FIRST CAN YOU KNOW JACK THE RIPPER: Max, Roberta, Arnold, Tom, George, Pierre, Frank, Anna, Jack, Chester, Walter, Joe, Milt, Gregory and the nearly incredible, incomparable, unsurpassable Stanley. Hare took Cleckley as his starting point and developed a greater precision in attributing specific characteristics to these people, identifying specific brain wave differences between psychopaths and others. Cleckley’s work, as appended or corrected to some degree by Hare, constitutes identification of the key referent group. Lykken is an independent thinker not afraid to question the profession and develop alternatives. He is good at backtracking into possible causes of the psychopathic syndrome that serve to reinterpret Cleckley and Hare in certain ways, although he accepts the referent group they established. He is also a brain-wave sort of psychiatrist, even more so than Hare.
“4)See if we can determine when various people moved into and out of the Kosminski, Cohen, Lubnowski residence using extant records. Check if any member of these three families other than Aaron ever had a run in with the police or was treated for some form of mental illness.”
>>A lot of this work has already been done to the exhaustion of all known records, Scott Nelson being a key researcher. A psychopath may or may not have a history with the police or mental health authorities. Sometimes he doesn’t until some event in his life provides what he takes as a cause of action. *** Please note: Aaron never had a run-in with the police. He was not arrested.
”5) Check such biographical details of the three families as may be found to get any scrap of information about members. (Diaries, newspaper accounts, records in the local synagogue, old letters)
>>One word: Scott.
”6)Who first proposed a reward according to government records. Who agitated vigorously for it?”
>>The notion of a reward for the Whitechapel murderer originated in the little businesses of the district, among petit bourgeois types like shopkeepers. To them, the Ripper was bad for business. They set up the Mile End Vigilance Committee, elected George Lusk of their number to lead it, and established their own reward fund. Lusk then began agitation for the government to add greatly to that reward, and was helped along by the sensation that ensued with each successive murder. The reward made sense in a microeconomic sense, but not in the macroeconomic sense. The cost of the reward to the local shopkeepers was much less than the loss of business they experienced during the Terror, and if it would work, they’d make out. But once you start compromising the legal system by getting the government into it, there may be damage to the basic relationships that hold people together and in their places. Lusk was chasing an illusion.
7) “Check books on tailoring to see what the upside down V meant and other symbols”
>>Good luck! Tailoring does not, or does not always have a firmly established symbols lexicon. The master tailor personally is often the prime organizational element of the trade. Tailors teach one another how to use symbols as they come up in the trade, and different masters may have different takes on what each symbol means. A group of people in a given locale might all use the same symbols, or they might not. It is not so simple a matter as you suggest, but there are universals, or near-universals in the field. An arrow is an arrow, and in the simplest sense it merely points at something. A broken line, especially when used in conjunction with an unbroken line, indicates discontinuity. “(“ could be perceived as half of “()”. As long as you understand what the boss wants you to do with a given garment, you know the language.
”8) Check to see if any of the members of the three families were involved in tailoring. (Did tailors have a union, organization or guild?)”
>>Woolf Abrahams was a tailor, Morris Lubnowski a boot riveter. However, to accept even this as the official gospel is unwise. Lots of people moved into and out of different trades. There were various tailors, builders, horsy-type people, porters, etc. in Whitechapel, and you basically sometimes worked where you found the opportunity. If your uncle got a contract to produce 30 uniforms for the police department due next month, then you were a tailor for a while. Later you might be a carter. I don’t think you’re necessarily going to pick up any checkable details here. Scott knows what there is to know.
”9) See if Levy left any diaries, letters, etc. What stories have come down in his family?”
>>This is like thinking that when you get to Birmingham you’re going to see a sign that says “This is Birmingham.” There may be a sign for you, there probably won’t be. More than likely, none of the people who knew the identity of the murderer ever said or wrote a word about it. They likely kept it a profound secret, afraid of the repercussions to them and their families. The covering up of psychopathic behaviors by the families of these people is often described in psychiatric literature.
”10) See if the three families have descendants alive today. Have any stories come down?”
>>None that I am aware of.
“10)Check to find out if the cry of "Lipski" in 1888 London meant, "be quiet or you will bring the Gentiles down on us" (A book on the Lipski murder?)”
>>The cry “Lipski!” brings down social sanction on the Jewish people for the crimes of Israel Lipski, one of their number. Originally gentiles who wished to blame Jews and keep them in their place used it. But it is an expletive that sits out there, and is familiar to most everyone in the social system. It can have variations of meaning depending on who uses it, to whom it is addressed, under what circumstances, etc. The murderer uses it in the context of Berner Street to point out the possibility of this social sanction to be brought down on the witnesses Schwartz and the Pipe man. He is pointing to social sanctions to which they are or may be subject as Jewish witnesses. This corresponds directly to the notion of the sanctioned Jewish witnesses in Duke Street as depicted in the graffitus later that evening.
“11)Research bilateral language disorder”
>>Good idea. Also have a look at semantic aphasia. Both are the sort of thing that can happen in people whose brains don’t adequately partition to maximize “bandwidth.”
”12) Look at Kosminski's committal papers”
>>Good idea. Compare the handwriting on the Lusk letter to that of anyone signing Aaron in. Perhaps a long shot, but if there is a match, let’s have a parade in Whitechapel!
Thanks for an excellent, thoughtful post, Diana.
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, December 29, 2004 - 3:18 pm: |
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mvario wrote:
1. “{D. Radka wrote:} ">>Had a look at A?R in the Dissertations section? It identifies all the reasons behind the murders quite logically." {mvario responded:} I just did. Okay, that's sort of what I was trying to say only more succinctly...{D. Radka wrote:} "externalization of consciousness counterintuitive to the understanding of normal people, but typical of the syndrome of psychopathy" {mvario wrote:} I think the Ripper was a psychopath, but I think a lot of "normal people" are much more entralled with a grand tale of a killer with a motive that "makes sense" be it greed, jealousy, duty, or a grand conspiracy, even if it doesn't really fit all the facts (just jam that square peg in that round hole, it looks better). To a lot of people it "makes a better story".”
>>This is a great post, one of the most laudable I’ve read on this web site. I can’t tell you how long and hard I’ve tried to get readers to apply reasoned perspective to the case evidence, and here a new poster comes along with the matter quite under his belt! It goes to show there are people who are ready for the sort of thing A?R is, and there are people who aren’t.
I’ve spent the last eight months fielding questions from people who think I am the one who has “written a novel” or “crafted a story” that is “too good to be true” and therefore “doesn’t follow from the case evidence.” But mvario takes an opposite position. When he says…
“…I think a lot of "normal people" are much more entralled with a grand tale of a killer with a motive that "makes sense" be it greed, jealousy, duty, or a grand conspiracy, even if it doesn't really fit all the facts (just jam that square peg in that round hole, it looks better). To a lot of people it "makes a better story".”
…he couldn’t be more on target. Most of my critics simply transfer their own bad habits to me in their imagination, and then criticize me for them as their whipping boy. It isn’t THEY who want the Ripper to be conventionally understandable, it’s ME. Most people are locked by their habits into that world that makes sense to them, so when they are confronted with a situation that turbulates their settled water, that tiny little zone they project around them that “makes sense” to them, they immediately find someone to blame for what they perceive as a mess. (As Mr. Norder opines, ‘“Items that just don't make sense don't need to be checked because even if they turn out to be true they are still meaningless.” In other words, truth and meaning are what makes sense to Joe Average. Whatever doesn’t, don’t concern yourself with it. Keep your little bubble of conventional truths and meanings inflated.) When people say that A?R is a bizarre tale that doesn’t deduce from its premises, what they mean is they can’t find a recognizable story line in it to fit their preconceived notions. But folks, anyone who’d do what JtR did isn’t going to fit our normal view of motivations. In that he does things that none of us would ever think of doing, he’s going to be motivated in ways that we probably aren’t going to comfortably recognize or appreciate.
You’ve got a career in Ripperology ahead of you if you want it, mvario. Thank you for your perspective.
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Jennifer D. Pegg
Assistant Commissioner
Username: Jdpegg
Post Number: 1546
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2005 - 7:55 am: |
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JT Mephsito,
hello to you!!
Jenni
ps the five word rule
"I wanna really really really wanna zigazig ah"
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2005 - 3:40 pm: |
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I’d like to make available, if I may, a listing of the principal fallacies of judgment for the benefit of readers. It will prove useful in evaluating arguments for and against A?R. Taken from “Introduction to Logic” by Irving M. Copi, sixth edition.
(1) Argumentum ad Baculum (appeal to force)
(2) Argumentum ad Hominem (abusive)
(3) Argumentum ad Hominem (circumstantial)
(4) Argumentum ad Ignorantiam (argument from ignorance)
(5) Argumentum ad Misericordiam (appeal to pity)
(6) Argumentum ad Populum
(7) Argumentum ad Verecundiam (appeal to authority)
(8) Accident
(9) Converse Accident (hasty generalization)
(10) False Cause
(11) Petitio Principii (begging the question)
(12) Complex Question
(13) Ignoratio Elenchi (irrelevant conclusion)
(14) Equivocation
(15) Amphiboly
(16) Accent
(17) Composition
(18) Division
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Mephisto
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2005 - 6:57 pm: |
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Well,back at ya Jen.
Mephisto |
Mephisto
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Sunday, January 02, 2005 - 2:47 am: |
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Mr. Norder,
On Wednesday, December 15, 2004, you wrote: "Frankly, I'm always too busy now to waste my time pointing out the mistakes you made, because I (and several other people) have already done so many times, while you just go on in denial as if nobody said anything".
Actually Mr. Norder, Radka isn't in denial, because you haven't "pointed out" any mistakes he may, or may not have made. You've simply identified the theoretical concepts you don't agree with. You aren't qualified to offer anything more than a blue-collar opinion re: psychological issues. Moreover, your arguments are scattered and disconnected. Why don't you just focus on one issue, and argue the hell out of it. Provide us with some verifiable sources, and let us judge for ourselves whether or not you proved or "pointed out" anything of merit. I suggest that you start with the framework of the thesis, e.g.: How well does Radka present his arguments within the context of his central theme, i.e., the "epistemological center"? And your claim that Radka didn't originate the concept of Jack the Ripper as psychopath, is irrelevant to the matter at hand (Paraphrase, Norder: 2004). The fact remains that his thesis has been published at this website. If someone wishes to claim that Radka's thesis is based on his or her intellectual property, then I'm sure that he or she will do so. Thus far, no one has come forth to make that claim, and you haven't exactly knocked over any buildings trying to identify the originator of the idea, nor have you attempted to verify if the claims of the "several other people" you refer to are reliable. I think Larry Barbie's insight regarding secondary source verification explains my point: "For example I am certain that the signature of the Medical Attendant at Inquest is Jenkins; however, I know this from other sources, and not from reading this document. Here the signature is illegible. The significance of this is that what information I claim comes from the certificate, means just that. It can be verified by other researchers who read the certificate, and not have to consult other sources to confirm any of my statements or contentions" (Barbee: Dissertations: http://casebook.org/dissertations/dst-carrieb.html). At this point, all you've offered the readers is hearsay; show me da money Mr. Norder. Quote the paragraph, or paragraphs, including the author, date, and publication where the original idea was first described. If another Casebook reader has already made the same claim, and you didn't verify his or her accuracy, then you're just quoting hearsay.
You also wrote: "Can you truthfully say that the only reason nobody (i.e., someone of note in this field) has commented on your theory in print is that they are being uncharacteristically silent on something that might be noteworthy but want to go research psychopaths first?"
Well Mr. Norder, it looks like you've answered your own question here. You are describing how these folks became "someone of note in this field" in the first place. They have chosen to withhold their comments, until they have adequately researched the complexities of psychopathy. Wouldn't you agree that this method is preferable to making unsubstantiated claims, and doing the research during the discussion?
You wrote: "Do you really hold out hope that someone of note in this field will out of the blue decide that your theory is worth taking notice of as something other than a joke?" (My italics)
There are a number of problems with your thinking here Mr. Norder ({inter alia}): First off, you are extremely vague. What are the criteria that qualify one for notoriety in Ripperology? Who are these people of note you keep mentioning, and why would they rub shoulders with you? Are you implying that you are one of these people of note?
Your statement assumes that your opinion is objective, or has some value beyond this website. I think the tone of your diatribe makes your bias abundantly clear. You seem to think that ridiculing Radka's work with anonymous sources passes for principled commentary. Sorry, but it doesn't. Noteworthy Ripperologist Stan Russo had this to say about unbiased criticism: "Maybe you're right. No wait a minute, you are most definately wrong and your biases against Cornwell and her ridiculous theory about Sickert cloud your judgment" (Russo: Wednesday, November 10, 2004 - 8:43 pm ../4922/13375.html"../4926/12250.html" target=_top>../4926/12250.html"ff0000">Mephisto
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2005 - 10:07 pm: |
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ooo--EDITED VERSION
Friends,
I believe that “N. Statter” (posted on Thursday, December 23, 2004 - 6:38 pm) and “Mort Goldman” (posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 9:09 pm) are fictitious entities. These two new unregistered “posters” both have sonorous names, and both appear in the same queue.
1. “N. Statter” says: “This whole debate is so confusing. Does Radka really claim to have come up with the original idea that the Ripper was a psychopath? If so he is sadly wrong - it was suggested tens of years ago.”
>>I have been very clear in giving the credit for the original idea that JtR may have been a psychopath to Cleckley, Hare and Lykken. My claim for myself is not that I originated the idea, but that I was first to use it as an epistemological center to solve the case based on its empirical evidence. In a nutshell, my logical position is that if it is possible to understand the entire case evidence by a single idea (psychopathy), then that idea is also the fundamental cause of the case evidence. This is why I call it the epistemological center. This is my essential contribution to the field of Ripperology.
2. “Mort Goldman” says: “Mr.Radka says Mr. Norder said...."You claim that no one of note in the field considers A?R as anything but a joke, when in fact they do not make this comment about it." However,Mr. Norder did not say that.
He said...."Please, David. Do you really hold out hope that someone of note in this field will out of the blue decide that your theory is worth taking notice of as something other than a joke?” There is a significant difference in what Mr. Norder said and what Mr. Radka says he said.”
>>No, there is NO DIFFERENCE WHATEVER. Mr. Norder clearly claims that significant Ripperologists consider A?R a joke, and clearly and typically he presents NO EVIDENCE to support this claim, just as I say above. If Paul Begg, Martin Fido, Donald Rumbelow, Phillip Sugden or another author of similar significance to the field has written that A?R is a joke, then refer to the writing here.
3. “I'd wager ALL the major researchers,authors,and aficinados of the Jack The Ripper murders, with the obvious exception of Mr. Andersson, have perused the content of Mr.Radka's ideas on these boards. Their absence...their total absence...after 1100 posts speaks volumes.”
>>To my knowledge, correct me if I’m wrong, the only significant or halfway significant authors of the field that have EVER posted here are Begg, Fido, Evans (who has quit the place), and Harris (who is deceased.) Begg I’ve heard through the grapevine (not directly from him) apparently doesn’t like to post here because of the character of some of the posters, and Fido has done so only very sporadically over the years. Whittington-Egan, Sugden, Warren, Rumbelow and the rest of any significance have never appeared. So why should they now? You are attempting to attribute motivations to people with no evidence or other information concerning what their motivations may be.
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Friday, December 31, 2004 - 11:29 pm: |
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1. “I am no criminologist and no psychologist, but experience makes me wary of "Agatha Christie"-type approaches to murder cases. I am sure that people DO plan their killings, but a plan of the apparent sophistication outlined by Mr Radka - involving a desire to be recognised in the home; throwing suspicion on another; seeking to have witnesses act in certain ways and manipulate official rewards (I take it I have understood what is proposed in the paper) is both anachronistic and unlikely to reflect the pre-occupations of an immigrant Jew in the London of 1888.”
>>I believe you may misunderstand. I don’t have an Agatha Christie approach, but a philosophical, rationalistic one. I do not examine clues like Agatha, but instead the documented evidence and the ideas it represents. *** Clearly you misunderstand with respect to motivation. The psychopath did not develop any sophisticated plans in his murder series, but ricocheted from one typical project to the next, as he perceived opportunities.
2. “This is not to say that I reject Kosminski as a suspect (he would be among my suggestions for JtR) or that I disagree with some of what Mr Radka suggests (JH Levy is my candidate for the key witness).”
>>I am clear that Aaron Kosminski had nothing to do with the murders.
3. “I also find new and interesting insights into the "tailor's language" inscribed into Eddowes' dead flesh. But NO, I do not find it credible that a C19th individual, from the background concerned, would develop a plan of this nature, put it into effect, seek to control each element (the explanation of the Double Event is unbelievable).”
>>In what sense? Essentially, the psychopath is taking various antisocial actions toward his narcissistic interests on territory very familiar to him. What is so hard to believe about that? Before you say that I write anachronistically, i.e. that a nineteenth century person would do these things, remember that the extreme sensation generated by his previous actions had made him a twentieth century media event. We have a bit of the twentieth century taking place in the nineteenth here, just as with the Apollo moon landings of the 1960s we had a bit of the twenty-first century taking place in the twentieth. Under the right conditions, this kind of thing occasionally happens.
3. “There are REAL questions as to whether Stride was a Ripper victim at all, so to build a theory around a set number of victims is rather unwise. equally, to argue back that Stride MUST have been a victim of JtR because the theory demands it would be false logic. (I don't think Mr Radka does argue the latter, I simply cover both approaches here.)”
>>False logic in what sense? My theory is consistent with respect to the empirical case evidence (Schwartz, the Duke Street sighting, the marks on Eddowes’ face, the graffitus, the Lusk letter, etc.) Nothing about the Stride case is inconsistent with the rest of the case evidence, if you accept my basic reasoning about the evidence taken as a whole. Serious doubt about Stride is entertained only if you want to consider the lack of mutilations or the cowboy-style attack as inconsistent with JtR’s modus operandi, but A?R has logical explanations for these things. Additionally, only Walter Dew of many detectives disagreed with considering Stride a Ripper victim.
4. “I also cannot give credence to the idea that the murderer decides to leave a message and then goes off to find chalk and scouts around for a convenient place to write his graffito. JtR (whoever he was) was cannier than that I think.”
>>You’re really not paying attention, Mr. Hill. I clearly say that the graffitus was prompted by the Duke Street sighting--one Jew he knew walking with two others he didn’t—which could not have been predicted beforehand. This is why he needed to obtain chalk AFTER killing Eddowes.
5. “neither do I think Mr Radka's explanation of the word "Juwes" any more convincing than Knight's largely discredited masonic interpretation.”
If you don’t like my explanation of the term Juwes, dump it. The meaning of the graffitus is the same either way.
6. “Sorry Mr Radka, I respect your efforts, but after careful consideration, I am unconvinced by an approach which relies upon "pure reason" to solve this crime. As others have said, simplicity should be the keyword and what you have offered is just too elaborate for me.”
>>It the simplest technique I can imagine. If it is possible for me to understand the whole of the case evidence by a single idea (psychopathy), then that idea was the cause of the case evidence. This is the most elemental notion I can think of.
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D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 05, 2005 - 1:19 am: |
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ooo—EDITED VERSION
Friends,
This post is a new departure: it is designed to detect logical fallacies and false premises. (Please refer to: Irving M. Copi, “Introduction to Logic,” New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1982, beginning on page 98.)
Mr. Norder wrote:
1. “Yeah, and odd how most of those people who got crucified for posting their theories were ones who decided to go into personal attacks instead of rational discussion and ended up getting banned (as David almost has been as several occasions). Lots of people present theories here, only the ones who refuse to debate the logic end up being ridiculed as badly as those people were.”
>>False premise: “David almost has been {banned} on several occasions.” I have not been. I haven’t received any emails telling me a ban is under consideration with respect to me for several years, long before the Summary was published. Please supply evidence to justify your assertion.
False premise: I do not “refuse to debate the logic” of my theory. I have been doing so on hundreds of well-considered posts since April 2004. Please supply specific evidence on what logical elements of my theory I have been asked to address but have not.
Argumentum ad Populum: ~Posters who are ridiculed here have been banned here. Since David is ridiculed here, he should be (and almost has been) banned as well.~ This is an appeal to the crowd. It tries to get the reader to conclude that people should be banned because they are not liked, not because they commit an offense against the rules of the web site. Since David should be and is not liked, he should be banned.
Fallacy of False Cause: ~Posters who have been ridiculed here THEREFORE have been banned here.~ In fact, posters who were banned broke the posting rules, the ridicule in the court of public opinion had nothing to do with their being banned.
False premise: ~David makes personal attacks.~ I do not. If my posts contained personal attacks as defined by the rules of the owners of this web site, they would not have been advanced from the queue. Personal attacks are not permitted here.
Fallacy of Composition: ~David is not liked here.~ A few posters apparently don’t like me, but that doesn’t mean that the posters of the web site taken as a whole don’t.
Argumentum ad Hominem (abusive): ~The arguments of someone who is banned (or almost banned) are untrustworthy.~ In fact, an argument is untrustworthy only because its premises are false or its conclusions invalid.
2. “Actually, the problem here is that most of what David claims simply cannot be checked because of the way David rationalizes things. For example, the people who use the term "Juwes" as an abbreviation for a Christian youth group say it wasn't coined until the 1960s.”
>>Fallacy of Composition: ~Mr. Benji Weibe, a member of a German Mennonite organization, told us that HIS PARTICULAR ORGANIZATION did not begin to use the term until the 1960s. This doesn’t mean the term had not been used previously in the German language taken as a whole, and that it necessarily was not in use in the 1880s there.
Fallacy of Composition: One example of “how David rationalizes things” does not speak for the whole of the A?R theory. If a theory may have non-fatal mistakes in it, it still may be correct.
3. “David says that they are wrong, the killer obviously either knew of the term or just created it on the spot in his mind. You can't check what was in his hypothetical killer's head. The part that's checked already shows him wrong, and the rest of it so illogical that it shouldn't be considered.”
>>False premise: {The A?R theory holds that} “The killer …just created {the term Juwes as a contraction for jugendwerk} on the spot in his mind.” I have no such position. The use of the term “Juwes” to refer to Christian youth groups or Sunday School pupils is well documented in Germany.
False premise: ~The A?R theory attempts to pronounce upon what was in the killer’s head.~ It does not. It does not make a claim for what the killer was thinking. All it does is follow the empirical evidence in a manner faithful and logically consistent with an epistemological center.
Fallacy of Converse Accident (hasty generalization): Mr. Norder generalizes hastily from an unusual, untypical case to other cases. Assuming “Juwes” is wrong, a generalization that the other logical elements of the A?R theory are therefore also wrong or “illogical” is invalid.
Fallacy of Complex Question: “The part that's checked already shows him wrong, and the rest of it so illogical that it shouldn't be considered.” They key word is “already.” Mr. Norder assumes that a definite answer has ALREADY been given to a prior question that has not been properly asked, debated or critically verified; in fact Mr. Norder answers the prior question for us invalidly, not having proved that the term “Juwe” as a contraction of “jugendwerk” referring to Christian youth groups was not yet in use in the 1880s. As Copi says: “…when the…prior question is correctly answered, the second…one simply dissolves” (page 109.)
4. “Ditto for the facial mutilations being tailor's symbols. David started out claiming they were specific symbols with specific meanings, but then admitted he didn't find them in a book but invented them up himself in his own head and just assumes the killer did so as well to mean the exact same things.”
>>Fallacy of Ignoratio Elenchi (irrelevant conclusion): ~The premise is established that the tailor’s symbols are presented as having specific meanings as such. These meanings would be verified if they were to be found in a tailor’s lexicon of symbols. They were not found in such a lexicon. Therefore they have no specific meaning, and what A?R claims they mean on Eddowes’ face is refuted as illogical.~ Mr. Norder here draws an irrelevant conclusion. Just because the symbols may not be tailor’s symbols does not mean they have no intelligible meaning on Eddowes’ face. Such meanings were determined from a context-sensitive analysis of the empirical case evidence; no lexicon of tailor’s symbols is required for this.
>>False premise: I did not “invent {the meanings of the tailor’s symbols} up in my head.” I determined them logically from the context of the empirical case evidence, as the Summary clearly shows. I do not attempt to divine what was in the killer’s head, I follow the empirical case evidence instead.
5. “So we can check and recheck and it all comes down to some piece of fiction David came up with and claims the killer did as well yet nobody else ever came up with. (Of course then David avoids the obvious implications behind the concept that this hypothetical psychopath's mental process works the same as David's own brain does.)”
>>False premise: ~A?R attempts to divine what the killer thought.~ A?R does not, it attempts to follow the evidence instead.
False premise: ~A?R is a work of fiction.~ It is not; it logically follows the empirical case evidence, interpreting it according to a critically estimable logical center. No fiction is involved.
6. “The same goes for just about everything David has claimed. What he says about psychopaths contradicts what the leading experts say, so he comes up with his own checklist of what *he* considers to be psychopathic traits, even though he has no background in the field and people who do say he's nuts.”
>>Fallacy of Converse Accident (hasty generalization): ”The same goes for just about everything David has claimed.” Hastily generalizes from a few unusual, untypical cases to the majority of the cases, without analyzing or even explaining them.
False premise: “What {David} says about psychopaths contradicts what the leading experts say…” What I say about psychopaths fully agrees with Cleckley’s Clinical Profile, Hare’s Psychopathy Checklist-Revised and the American Psychiatric Institute’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, Fourth Edition, as I cite and extensively document in the September archive above. Mr. Norder has not acknowledged the existence of these posts of mine.
Fallacy of Ignoratio Elenchi (irrelevant conclusion): “David comes up with his own checklist of what he considers to be psychopathic traits.” The unstated conclusion is that I did this for the purpose of inappropriately speaking on behalf of the psychiatric profession, illicitly forcing it to agree to my interpretation of psychopathy. This refers to my post of Monday, October 04, 2004 - 6:17 pm., in which I offer a reader’s study checklist of my own design. However, I did not use or cite this checklist of mine to predicate conformity of the A?R theory to the psychiatric field’s understanding of psychopaths. I directly annotated only the PCL-R and the DSM-IV for that, which are generally accepted instruments of the psychiatric profession and its principles.
False premise: ~People with backgrounds {in psychology} say my interpretation of psychopathy is wrong.~ No, they don’t. No evidence has been presented to establish this charge. Please give citations we can verify, if you have any.
7. “The problem with your approach, Diana, is you are assuming that all theories are equally valid unless proven wrong. But you can't prove a negative, because there is always room for someone to try to rationalize evidence against his or her theory away with some highly unlikely but unprovable point. Just look at the soundly destroyed Royal Conspiracy, with a supposed Catholic marriage with no Catholics in it, a killer who was proven to be elsewhere, and other facts that are just plain wrong. Yet some people still cling desperately on, just as David is doing here.”
>>False premise: ~Diana Comer is a person who assumes that all theories are equally valid unless proven wrong.~ Nothing about what Diana posted would indicate such a supposition on her part. All she did was list various items she wanted to check into with respect to determining the value of the A?R theory.
Argumentum ad Ignorantiam (argument from ignorance): ~All theories are equally valid unless proven wrong.~ Validity and proof are operations of logic. All theories are subject to logical analysis, which can determine them to be true or false, valid or invalid. There is no presumption of validity or invalidity in the field of logic. There is such a provision in the law, however, where an accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty. This is possibly the source of Mr. Norder’s confusion.
Argumentum ad Ignorantiam (argument from ignorance): “You can’t prove a negative.” You can’t disprove one, either. It works both ways.
False premise: “There is always room for someone to try to rationalize evidence against his or her theory away with some highly unlikely but unprovable point.” There is in fact no room for this if the empirical data are brought together in a logical, rational way. The errors would be shown and the theory proved invalid. Mr. Norder is at his disordered and self-contradictory worst in this passage. PLEASE GIVE WHAT HE SAYS A GOOD READ. He directly states that: (1) It is ALWAYS possible for someone to slip highly unlikely arguments by the public if he is good at rationalizing them and they can’t be proven invalid, and (2) Stephen Knight tried to do this and was “soundly destroyed.” If (1) is correct, (2) cannot be. But (2) is correct, therefore (1) is proven to not validly lead to (2). But Mr. Norder says (1) does validly lead to (2). Therefore Mr. Norder here thinks in a tangled, topsy-turvy manner.
8. “What we should do instead is ask for people with theories to provide their own evidence, real solid evidence, instead of flimsy hypotheticals and bizarre notions.”
>>False premise: What Mr. Norder describes and claims that A?R doesn’t do in fact is exactly what it uniquely does. It analyzes the real empirical evidence of the case from beginning to end. It causally explains it logically and rationally. A?R isn’t talking about an alleged marriage between two people unrelated to the case that never really happened, it’s talking about the graffitus, the Lusk letter, the Duke Street sighting, the Lord Mayor’s procession, etc., etc. No one has ever been able to effectively grapple with and make sense of all these things before me.
9. “Some authors try, then come to a point where no evidence remains to go any farther and admit that. Others, the vast majority I'd say, have convinced themselves and don't mind twisting things all over the place of even falsifying evidence (presenting imaginary tailor's symbols as if they were real, for instance, but the idea that the word "Juwes" is Masonic term is another famous one). These people try to make their cases up out of nothing and then attack people who dare to point out the parts that are wrong. These people should be dismissed as cranks -- as they have been these days in this field -- until such time as they come back with real evidence and a willingness to discuss things rationally.”
>>Argumentum ad Hominem (abusive): ~Presenting imaginary tailor’s symbols as if they were real and “Juwes” as if it were a Masonic term {constitutes} falsifying evidence.~ It does not. It interprets the evidence, adequately or not. Falsifying evidence would involve knowingly making empirically inaccurate statements, such as claiming that JtR killed three women on the night of the double event instead of two, and concocting a phony third crime scene to justify the assertion. Mr. Norder abuses Mr. Knight and I by fallaciously accusing us of falsifying evidence. Someone who falsifies evidence would not be considered trustworthy.
Fallacy of Equivocation: “Twisting things all over the place.” Use of this phrase is ambiguous. It sounds like a serious charge to the casual reader, but doesn’t mean anything, because it could mean almost anything.
False premise: “These people...attack people who dare to point out the parts that are wrong.” If I made personal attacks on Mr. Norder, they’d not pass through the queue. Personal attacks are not allowed on this web site. I point out how much of what he writes is fallacious instead.
Fallacy of False Cause: Applies to this piece taken as a whole. Because interpretation of “Juwes” as a Masonic term on Knight’s part and interpretation of the marks on Eddowes’ face as tailor’s symbols on Radka’s do not constitute “falsification of evidence,” these are not reasons, taken in themselves, to consider the respective authors untrustworthy “cranks.”
10. “{Addressing Mr. Nelson} You know, the funny thing is you were trying to be sarcastic, and yet it was the only sensible thing you've said on this thread. I think your major problem here is you have a suspect or family in mind and don't like people criticizing David's theory because he happens to share some of the same ideas.”
>>Argumentum ad Hominem (circumstantial): A classic example of this fallacy. ~Because Scott’s circumstance is that “…{David} happens to share some of the ideas” of {Scott’s} theories, therefore what Scott says about the A?R theory cannot be trusted.~ The conclusion does not follow validly from the premise.
11. “The problem is that David's theory itself is illogical claptrap. One can throw out a ridiculous argument (as David's clearly is) without throwing out a suspect. For example, if I were to say that the sky is blue because it leeches the ink out of old newspapers, that argument is clearly nuts, and can be proven so (it was blue before newspapers were around, etc.). But that doesn't change the fact that the sky is blue.”
>>Fallacy of Ignoratio Elenchi (irrelevant conclusion): As Copi says: “The fallacy of “ignoratio elenchi” is committed when an argument purporting to establish a particular conclusion is directed to proving a different conclusion” (page 110.) Mr. Norder’s argument above is: ~Because the A?R theory allegedly is “illogical claptrap,” its starting point, the epistemological center of psychopathy, and its conclusion, my suspect list of Woolf Abrahams, Morris Lubnowski or some other Kosminski familiar in contact with Aaron during the Terror, should not be credited to me as the case solution. Although these suspects may very possibly have done these murders, and although I was the first person to say they did and explain in detail why the murders happened, I am not the solver of the Whitechapel murders. Even if one of my suspects is someday empirically proven to have been JtR, I couldn’t claim the solution as mine.~ However, Mr. Norder’s argument is not relevant to the conclusion offered. I was the first to copyright the correct solution and an explanation of same, and publish them. Therefore the above unique solution belongs to me, and if it were to be empirically proven correct, I would be the solver of the Whitechapel murders on those counts.
12. “Of course we don't know who the Ripper was, but his real identity remains whether or not David makes up some bizarre egotistical fantasy he invented up. By all means, Scott, if you think he have a good theory, run with it, but you don't do yourself any service by linking yourself to someone who is the laughing stock of the field.”
>>Argumentum ad Baculum (appeal to force): ~Because Mr. Norder’s opinions concerning A?R represent those of influential Ripperologists who have made Mr. Radka the “laughingstock” of the field, Mr. Nelson would receive the same treatment by accepting A?R publicly.~ But this consideration has nothing to do with the merit of the A?R theory.
False premise: Influential Ripperologists have made Mr. Radka the laughingstock of the field. There is no evidence of this. Please give such citations we can verify, if you have them.
Fallacy of Complex Question: Mr. Norder implies widespread previous acceptance that (1) A?R is a bizarre theory, and (2) I am egotistical. He then implies that if you accept (1) and (2), you accept that the theory is a fantasy. But even if A?R may seem bizarre to many people, that may arise from my explanations of the motivations of the murderer being paradoxical and outside the envelope of meaning habitually accepted by most people. And even if I am an egotistical man, that wouldn’t logically preclude me from arguing rationally.
13. “Of course what's even more problematic for David is that even if you accept his layman's understanding of psychopathy as 100% accurate, the points in his dissertation still don't come anywhere near close to following logically from the premise. A?R is more like a fever-induced bad dream than a coherent theory, which makes it simple for David to tack something on or leave something off when arguing about it, because there's no connection between any of the parts except for his imagination and ego.”
>>False premise: “…even if you accept his layman's understanding of psychopathy as 100% accurate, the points in his dissertation still don't come anywhere near close to following logically from the premise.” Let’s get what Mr. Norder says straight: The premise is psychopathy, my views on psychopathy are 100% accurate, and the theory still doesn’t come close to following from the premise. This seems self-contradictory to me. I can clearly demonstrate that I show the murderer reacting in a purely psychopathic way throughout my explanations of his actions. If I know what I’m talking about in terms of psychopathy, then I’ve successfully got the whole of the evidence predicated on psychopathy. All of what I say about the murderer’s actions can be traced to my annotations of the PCL-R and the DSM-IV in the archives, which annotations are 100% correct according to Mr. Norder above. That doesn’t mean that this or that statement of mine concerning what the murderer did here or there is necessarily correct in or by itself. No particular explanation of the empirical evidence I make is necessarily correct in or by itself as a piece or a shard. The correctness of the A?R theory is a matter of the subsuming of ALL of what I say the murderer did, according to the empirical evidence and its chronology, under the center holistically.
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John V. Omlor
Chief Inspector
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 976
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 8:57 am: |
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Hey ! Copi was the book I used when I taught logic as a grad. student (an embarrassing number of years ago).
And here it is on the Casebook being used by David to such a delightfully excessive degree as to provide me with a genuine morning chuckle.
Sincere thanks, David. That was all very cute and brought back fond memories in this wounded old man.
--John
PS: Fallacy in this post of mine -- don't even bother looking, the whole post is irrelevant. |
D. Radka
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 11:12 pm: |
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Ian wrote:
1. “…The "tiresome boaster" (spot on AIP) with the oh so high intellect, simply can't understand why we don't eat out of his hands and swallow his Summary and view of psychology hook-line-and-sinker.”
>>No, no, Ian. I don’t fell that way at all. You are sucking up on a simplistic misunderstanding of my attitudes that you’ll find on another web site, a default of people who aren’t capable of gentlemanly dealings. I am not unhappy that people “don’t eat out of my hands.’ Just the opposite, I am unhappy they don’t think for themselves. What benefit would it give me if people “swallowed my Summary?” What benefit does it give any philosopher that people just accept what he writes? Doesn’t a philosopher want to stimulate thought and discussion instead? Doesn’t he want criticism? Isn’t he his own guinea pig?
2. “He's so up-close-and-personal with his Summary/theory that he seems to have lost all rational reasoning (viz. conspiracy theory based on a one liner you wrote, calling posters here his "readership", the intent to diss Howard in that post and drag up events from long past(I also saw it before it was pulled by Spry), comparing himself to Loenardo da Vinci, Nietzsche et al, previously he's compared himself to Plato and Hegel, claiming it's an important thread based on the volume of messages where quantity more than quality counts).”
>>Well, I’m an innovator in Ripperology, just as Leonardo was in various other respects. I speak from being in a similar position, as was he. You vulgarize what I say when you imply that I’m putting myself on his level of intelligence and accomplishment, however. I’m not saying that at all. You miss the point. I’m an innovator. *** I hope Howard someday does to you what he did to me. Then maybe you’ll realize something. *** I do not claim this thread is important based on the number of messages it has. However, I do rather enjoy pointing out for the benefit if Mr. Brown and Mr. Norder, who stated repeatedly that it would terminate at about the 200 level, what the tally count is (now nearing 1,200.) They tried to cut my head off, but it’s still on. I think you would enjoy doing it too under the same circumstances.
3. “I think, if anything, he is not revered here as the solver of the case but... well... in all honesty pitied as the sad little man he seems to be.”
>>And this view of me as a sad little man is based on—exactly what? Haven’t I stood up for what I believe in? Haven’t I made many patient explanations, giving of my time and energy? Don’t I have friends? What problem is it that you think I have, Ian?
3. “I understand he's spent 7 years on the summary and it must be a crushing blow that the "plebs" have the audacity to actually raise questions and criticise it.”
>>I’m still looking for some worthy critics here. What the plebs say on a public posting forum, however, is a different matter than what the plebs say.
4. “No one but he is fighting his corner, he is alone, it's commendable that he is still fighting the fight, but nevertheless, it can't be doing him much good that he's so far convinced no-one and is just p*ssing against the wind.”
>>Ian, I don’t care about convincing anybody. I don’t need anyone to fight in my corner. I just want to be able to do my work, advancing culture and knowledge. As long as I’m left to do that, I’m doing what I want to do. What the plebs say on a public posting forum is a different matter than what the plebs say.
5. “Even Mephisto avoided commenting on the Summary itself, he strictly limited himself to the methodology and the psyhcopathy aspects as far as I remember; it would have been interesting to watch him debate the actual conclusions reached in the Summary.”
>>You think I’m worried about that? I’d be happy to debate him. He is a gentleman, a characteristic sorely missing among my plebian “critics.”
6. “David, laudable thought it may be to fight like a terrier in support of your theory, you surely must understand that your personal jibes and digs at posters reflects not only on you but on your summary also?”
>>People have jibed and dug at me for eight months, Ian, you among them. Why do you think the shoe is only on my foot? Why do you think you deserve so much better from me than you’ve served me?
7. “Critics on the boards are rude, crude, stoopid, etc but everyone see your replies and what you say colours their opinion not only of you but of the Summary. It's sad to say but even I have a hard time separating the message from the messenger and I suspect I'm no different from the rest of the crowd.”
>>I’m never a member of a crowd, Ian. I have no crowd sense. When I’m in Fenway Park watching the Red Sox along with 35,000 other people, I’m still just David Radka, no more no less. I don’t default my identity over to the mass at all. I don’t sympathize with the crowd. I’ve got no idea where they’re going and why. The only times I’m led by the crowd is when I can’t really see that it’s a crowd that’s leading me. Once I lost about $8,000 on a stock, and later I realized I’d been buying it based on what everyone else was doing at the time. But I don’t know or care about what you are doing in the crowd, Ian.
8. “You may not like it and I can't understand how a simple cause/effect like this isn't and wasn't apparent to you and why (even though some of the attacks against you/the Summary were vicious at times) you didn't take the moral high ground for the sake of your Summary.”
>>The moral high ground is the thinker is left to do his thinking and make his contribution. He usually has to give the plebs a baloney story to get them to leave him alone in life. That is morality, as I understand it. Immorality is plebs getting rambunctious, worried about their little problems, and making it hard to hear yourself think.
9. “The Summary? It's a neat _story_ which covers _some_ of the case evidence, makes _HUGE_ logical jumps about marks on faces with no reasons _why_ anyone would ever think they were tailoring marks conveying a message to a butcher, _HUGE_ stretches of the imagination that the psychopath has THREE separate motives one after the other to help glue the story together, as you know I could go on, and you will deny it in your usual terrier like posting style, but, you should remember that a long, long, time ago there were probably some open minds on this thread and _you_ lost _your_ potential readership by _your_ outrageous, arrogant, boastful behaviour.”
>>I owe my readers my best, but I’m not out to collect many readers. I don’t like composers who write a symphony to please the people. I like one strong in his or her own musical aesthetic, and if I want to follow that, I follow it. Ottorino Resphigi didn’t write “The Pines of Rome” for me, but that work lifts me out of myself. What it meant to him is not really what it means to me. You seem to think that because you are not pleased, I should do something. *** You are way too empirical to comprehend Jack the Ripper, Ian. Empiricism is like the tree trunk in Sumatra you’re holding onto when the tsunami hits. You don’t comprehend this, because you weren’t raised to. What’s wrong with writing to a butcher, using your imagination, having three motivations? Use your head, think for yourself, and don’t worry about what I won’t do for you. You’ll be better off.
10. “Do I await your answer? No. You won't convince me and you already "answered" those questions to _your_ satisfaction previously, unfortunately _I_ still have the questions.”
>>Philosophers don’t care about convincing people so much. They care about—I don’t know—getting at something, maybe.
11. “The open minds moved on and only the dissenters are left. I am a dissenter and I raised a few issues I had, but, I don't raise issues any more since there's no point really, I, like the rest, are probably those who read out of plain curiousity to see just how low this thread can sink.”
>>You sound like you have an antisocial tinge to you. But nobody pollutes me by what they write here.
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Mephisto
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Friday, January 07, 2005 - 5:12 pm: |
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Hi Jen,
I have a question for you: Do you wanna really really really wanna zigazig ah, or is this just a stage you're going through?
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R.J. Palmer
Chief Inspector
Username: Rjpalmer
Post Number: 520
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, January 08, 2005 - 11:41 am: |
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'Empiricism is like the tree trunk in Sumatra | | | |
