From: Hal Finney (hal@finney.org)
Date: Sat May 25 2002 - 12:24:12 MDT
Wei writes:
> On Thu, May 23, 2002 at 11:43:10PM -0700, Hal Finney wrote:
> > It strikes me as bizarre that you would respond in your "open letter"
> > to Gina in such a superficially friendly and open way, but completely
> > ignore the main issue of contention between you. If you were actually
> > feeling as friendly as your tone suggested, wouldn't it be honest to
> > openly address the issues which Gina has raised above?
>
> I have to say I'm more sympathetic to Lee Corbin's situation than you are.
> What if you were in his shoes? Suppose you came to the conclusion that a
> very popular philosophical position is incorrect. After explaining your
> ideas on the Extropians mailing list, you're met with emotional responses
> expressing revulsion and distress and calls for censorship, and trying to
> defend your ideas only seems to cause more emotional distress. What would
> you do?
I have had some discussion with Lee about this issue off list and I
understand better what he was trying to accomplish. In his shoes I
would not have expressed myself in that way, but of course we all have
different communication styles. I would probably have told Gina that
I was sorry that my ideas were causing her such distress, that this was
certainly not my intent, but that I do have sincere reasons for holding
the beliefs that I do, and that I had hoped this list would be a forum
which was suitable for discussing such ideas.
However it is not fair for me to expect Lee to communicate in the
same way I would and to judge him on that basis. Therefore I want to
apologize to Lee for calling his message insincere and manipulative.
This was based on my personal reaction to his message, but based on our
off-list discussion I now think I was mistaken.
Hal
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