ragnarhedin

The answer to your (Hal’s) question ”where would a work like the Iliad fit into Rand's division of art into the Romantic and the Naturalistic” is that she did not so divide art. These are nineteenth-century schools, and Ayn Rand regarded it as anachronistic to apply the terms to earlier works of art. This is why she classified Shakespeare not as ”a Naturalist,” but as the ”spiritual father, in modern history” of Naturalism. (The Romantic Manifesto) In regard to Homer, she definitely regarded him as an exponent of determinism, not an upholder of volition, for much the same reasons you give. (She discusses this in one of her university radio interviews from the 1960s. I think it is for sale by the Ayn Rand Bookstore.) Yet she did not regard Homer as a ”Naturalist,” and she recognized the heroic stature of his characters. The line of hers that I remember, quoting from memory, is ”If a man is in chains, he may still be a hero – but he is not free.” In general, it is a mistake to reduce Romanticism to merely ”an idealized vision of man’s greatness.” There is a lot more to Romanticism than that – as the case of Homer shows.

Thoyd Loki makes a valid point about the use of quotation marks to indicate that a word is used in an ironic sense, as in "The 'debate' resulted in three cracked heads." But what is his point in this connection? Since he seems to imply that Stephen Speicher *is* my nemesis, it makes no sense for him to distance himself from the literal meaning of the word. By contrast, it would make perfect sense if *I*used the word ironically, as in "Thoyd Loki seems to think that I regard Stephen Speicher as my 'nemesis.'"

Betsy Speicher writes: "We certainly DID object and the matter was dealt with privately between us and the forum moderators and administrators." If that is true, I apologize. I did not know that. I still think that it was perfectly obvious what the moderator had done in the case of your husband: deleted the content and substituted the paragraph of the moderating guidelines that explained his action. Of course, the rest of us are unable to judge the wisdom of his decision; we are only debating the *form*. But that form was hardly confusing in any substantial way. It may be debated, but is not a cause for high drama.

Thoyd Loki writes: "Funny, no posts since April 30th. Why now, and why this topic?" Because I don't like lynch mobs, and I think people are unjustly condemnatory of the moderator, who has more or less followed established practice, as far as I can judge from my own experience. The moderating practices may obviously be debated, but this is being done in a far too emotionalist way. "How did you happen to peak back so soon after your 'nemesis' left? What timing!" Well, I have not been waiting for Stephen Speicher to leave so that I could dare to post again. (By the way, "nemesis" is standard English and does not need quotation marks. In this case, it might leave the implication that it is a quote from me, which it is not.)

The outrage against the moderator here seems a bit overblown. He is not instituting any new practice on this forum. In fact, last April I had an exchange with Stephen Speicher. In one post, I quoted a sentence of his and made a short reply. The moderator, RadCap, evidently found my reply to violate the rules, because he deleted it, but let my post stand with Mr. Speicher's quote and the moderator's addendum "Content edited by RadCap." In other words, much the same that has now happened to Mr. Speicher. Neither Mr. Speicher nor his wife had any objections whatsoever at the time.

Content edited by RadCap This person has been removed

Stephen Speicher wrote: I replied: Stephen Speiher replied (his "question number one"): (Further, all of his other questions to me are of the same order.) This seems to me like something straight out of a Monthy Python skit, but I am apparently not allowed to describe it as "dumb." So let me just repeat very slowly: no - there - is - no - important - distinction - between - these - synonyms - but - that - is - not - the - point.

Thanks, bub.

Hey, the most important work of Ayn Rand literary scholarship ever has recently been published, and you guys are all busy discussing "Kill Bill"! What's up with that?

(1) The point is not so much any distinction between 'instantaneously,' 'immediate,' and 'no time delay,' but whether it is implied by the wider context of the sentences that, say, a series of motions could take place in no time. A phrase like "instantaneously redounds throughout the whole" could be interpreted this way, and was therefore changed. Or so I assume - I am certainly not speaking for David Harriman. 2) The purpose of my thought experiment was to illustrate that there is very little physics we can deduce from philosophical axioms alone. I am therefore not going to entertain detailed questions about the physical properties of my scenario. The question is not, How could this be the case? I have no idea how or whether it could be the case. It probably isn't. If one knows something of physics, one might well be in a position to say it certainly isn't. But one cannot sit and deduce this stuff from axioms. On that basis, one can merely rule out that which directly contradicts the axioms. And it really has to be direct and obvious. (3) I have no idea how this relates to the DDC experiments. That would be physics, not metaphysics. Maybe the change in one particle effects the "little stuff" in a way that causes a change in another particle somewhere else. Maybe the "little stuff" is really the "big stuff." And maybe not. And maybe physics can prove that this could not be the case. But not metaphysics. (4) I can't answer for Harriman on anything. But there is nothing in his considered statement that implies either that there could be magical "action-at-a-distance," if this means that some entity can have direct causal efficacy where it is not, OR that there could be motion without time, or anything that that one could rule out by A is A.

The personal accusation made against Stephen Speicher was not unwarranted. I explained why "providing an accurate quotation" constitutes misrepresentation. It does so because Speicher knows perfectly well that the "accurate quotation" he provided was a formulation quickly emended by the author. He also knows very well that there is indeed a "meaningful distinction" between the quotes. There is a good reason why the original formulation was emended; it is the same reason why Speicher likes to quote it. The first formulation could be taken to imply that something moves from A to B in no time, which is of course impossible, whereas Harriman's actual position is that we cannot rule out on metaphysical grounds that action at A can cause a change at B without something moving between them - as when A and B are different points of an entity which starts moving. Speicher likes to argue against the former position, which is easy. He then pretends he has disproven the second position, and when challenged on this, he refers back to his arguments against the first position and claims that these have not been rebutted. Well, of course they haven't, since they're right. But they're irrelevant.

Stephen Speicher writes: David Harriman published his article on the Objective Science web site on November 13, 2001. The very next day, he emended the section Speicher quotes above, presumably because he thought it was imprecise and did not fully reflect his views. The emended version was the quote I gave in my post. It is all documented here: http://www.objectivescience.com/articles/dh_tew.htm Stephen Speicher knows all of this perfectly well. He deliberately misrepresents Harriman's views. His describing the formulation he quotes as Harriman's "original words" is meant to insulate him from any charge of dishonesty by being "technically correct." Well, draw your own conclusions. As for the rest of his post, Speicher gives no arguments from metaphysics why an entity cannot move as a whole, or why Harriman is incorrect. Cracks about "The Philosophy of Teeter-Totterism" is not enough.

I have a comment regarding the Harriman quote discussed in this thread. I would agree that it is absurd that the action of an entity at one location could cause a change in another entity at another location, without something "going on in between." If this is what is meant by "non-locality" and "action at a distance," I can see why one would rule it out. It would be magic. But the Harriman quote, or at least his example, deals with the case of a single entity that is set in motion. And here there is no "action at a distance" if one part starts moving simultaneously with another. An entity is not at a distance from itself. Remember that we get the very concept of "action" from watching entities like teeter-totters move. And indeed, to our eyes, it does seem as if both ends are set in motion at once. There is no apparent "causal process" involving the impact on one end "redounding throughout the whole" across time. The entity just starts moving (as far as we can tell by sense perception alone), and the cause is grasped as the perceivable impact on one end. It is from observations like these that we also get the concepts/axioms of identity and causality. To attempt to deduce from these that there must be a causal process across time internal to the entity - a process not perceivable by us and not part of the basis for our original grasp of identity, action and causality, is pure rationalism. And it is reversing the hierarchical order of "entity" and "action." Maybe the ether is one big entity, and an impact here on earth causes an instantaneous change in the next galaxy - a change in the *same* entity. Tortuous deductions from axioms cannot tell us one way or the other.

It should be made clear that the "DNC Convention Program" is something that has been circulating on the web, and is not the work of the Peikoffs. Only he "GOP Program" is.

Brian Leiter, a philosophy and law professor at the University of Texas at Austin (and a leftist), has published on his blog Amy and Leonard Peikoff's "GOP Converntion Program." Worth a look. http://webapp.utexas.edu/blogs/bleiter/

R. Christian Ross's posts to this thread are breathtaking in their brazen dishonesty - but I suppose that's what one should expect from Branden's gofer. He tells us that "Rand did eventually tell Frank that she was cheating on him with a man almost half his age." This is clearly a lie. If one is to trust anything in the accounts written by Barbara Branden and Nathaniel Branden, Ayn Rand never cheated on her husband, but informed him (and Branden's wife) in advance of the commencement of the affair, and sought their consent. There was no dishonesty involved whatsoever. (I don't trust much in the Brandens' memoirs, but this much I can belive). Then, in the sixties, Branden started his secret affair with the woman who later became his second wife. For several years, he lied to Ayn Rand about his feelings for her and about his being in love with someone else. He swore he did not have an affair with the woman he was in fact having an affair with. And all these lies came in the context of long discussions with Ayn Rand about the state of *their* romantic relationship. When Ayn Rand found out what a miserable lying creep he was, she slapped his face and ordered him out of her life. It should be clear to anyone who has read Ayn Rand's novels that this is exactly what she *would* do to a man who systematically deceived her across years, causing her enormous and totally unnecessary mental confusion and pain. Yet we are told by Mr. Ross, and by both of the Brandens in their memoirs, that Miss Rand's reaction was a case of "hell hath no fury like a woman scorned." (Branden also implied this at the time, in a totally dishonest postscript to the public statement he circulated after the "break.") But if we can trust the Brandens on the big picture, Ayn Rand was not at all "a woman scorned" but had been in a long-standing relationship with Branden, who cheated on her and lied to her across years - whereupon *she* scorned *him*, as well she should have. Also, anyone who uses the phrase "a woman scorned" about any woman in any context whatever is necessarily an imbecile. As an explanation of or comment on human motivation, it would be too hackneyed and superficial for even a third-rate Naturalist. It's on the order of "Ah, the women, God bless them." To use this kind of trite bromide about someone as unconventional as *Ayn Rand* is ridiculous. In perfect keeping with his provincial-ladies'-tea-party perspective on human motivation is Mr. Ross's remarkable prissiness. Not only did Ayn Rand "cheat" on her husband, but she did so with a man "almost half his age"! Dear, dear! How scandalous! And I'll bet it wasn't the first time she "showed a special interest in a handsome young stranger, either." This kind of repressed, desiccated malice is what one would expect from Mrs. Keating in *The Fountainhead*, gossiping with a neighbor over the back fence. To see it from a grown man posting on this forum is disgusting.

I would say that the single particular that the proper noun "Objectivism" refers to is the philosophical *system* that Ayn Rand developed. I think she hints at this at the end of her statement in The Objectivist Forum ("If you should ask why I take all these precautions..."), but she does not say it explicitly there. But she was elsewhere very clear on the systematic unity of Objectivism. Any further epistemological issues involved here I shall leave to more competent commentators.

However, I am told that at the University of Virginia, they still refer to "Mr. Jefferson."

Capitalism Forever: Yes, you may be right about her view of Ronald Reagan. If so, I hope she got some comfort from it. As far as I'm concerned, though - although this is really a different issue - he was nothing compared to Margaret Thathcher.

And relative degrees of physical strength - which is what was referred to here, as one relevant factor - is not a matter of physiology? Who? Ronald Reagan? Don't be ridiculous. George Herbert Walker Bush? *She* had to provide him with backbone. ("This is no time to go wobbly.") And AR did not draw an absolute distinction between POTUS and the leaders of lesser countries. She regarded Golda Meir as a tragic figure for being a woman leading her country.

There will be an Objectivist conference in London in September (24-27). Among the speakers are John Ridpath, John Lewis, Tore Boeckmann, Rob Tracinski and Scott McConnell. Check it out at http://www.icognition.biz/iCon2004 If you know any Objectivists in Europe, it might be a good idea to alert them.

Yesterday I got my copy of "Essays on Ayn Rand's We the Living," edited by Robert Mayhew (Lexington Books 2004) - a crucially important new work of Ayn Rand scholarship. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It contains 16 essays, some very long, about the history of We the Living the book and its theater and movie adaptions, and about its literary techniques and philosophical meaning. Some highlights are: Shoshana Milgram's fascinating analysis of the influence of Victor Hugo on Ayn Rand's first novel - an analysis that goes far beyond the obvious; Jeff Britting telling the story of the theater production of WTL - I was especially amazed at the extent to which Ayn Rand was in effect a minor celebrity in New York in the 1930s; Robert Mayhew's account of the changes Ayn Rand made in the edited edition from 1959, focusing on her changes in sex scenes and the "Nietzschean passages"; Onkar Ghate's analysis of the death premise in WTL versus Atlas Shrugged, with a fascinating comparison of the characters of Pavel Syerov and Jim Taggart; Scott McConnel's new revelations about Ayn Rand's first real-life love and the model for the character of Leo, based on research in Russia; Tara Smith's insights into the psychology of life under dictatorship. And there's so much more! At 369 tightly packed pages, the book is a cornucopia of fresh analysis and information from a wide range of first-rate peole - each with a unique take and writing personality. It's simply a milestone in research on Ayn Rand's novels. For more information, see the publisher's web page: lexingtonbooks.com (search for" Mayhew"). Then order it from ARB or Amazon. Do I sound as if I'm writing sales copy? It's because reading this book gives a tremendous charge!

(I wrote the following letter to a young Objectivist some time ago, and have been told it is clarifying. Since this topic has been discussed on this forum lately, I thought I would post the letter here. I have changed the name of the original recipient of the letter in the text. Italics are missing in quotes and text.) Letter to a Young Objectivist By Anonymous Dear Anette, You ask me about David Kelley’s claim, in his 1990 tract against morality, Truth and Toleration, that Objectivism is an “open system.” I read his book when it was published, and I have re-read the relevant chapter now. I will be happy to comment. First some history. In a short article the year before his book was published, Kelley had written that Ayn Rand’s “system of ideas . . . is not a closed system.” In an essay answering this article, Leonard Peikoff wrote: “Yes, it is. Every philosophy, by the nature of the subject, is immutable. New implications, applications, integrations can always be discovered; but the essence of the system-–its fundamental principles and their consequences in every branch-–is laid down once and of all by the philosophy’s author.” Objectivism, he writes, “is the name of Ayn Rand’s achievement” and its “‘official, authorized doctrine’ . . . remains unchanged and untouched in Ayn Rand’s books; it is not affected by any interpreters.” This is the view that Kelley argues against in the last chapter of his book. But before we examine his arguments, let us hear from the horse’s mouth. Two years before her death, Ayn Rand wrote: “If you wonder why I am so particular about protecting the integrity of the term ‘Objectivism,’ my reason is that ‘Objectivism’ is the name I have given to my philosophy-—therefore, anyone using that name for some philosophical hodgepodge of his own, without my knowledge or consent, is guilty of the fraudulent presumption of trying to put thoughts into my brain (or of trying to pass his thinking off as mine—-an attempt which fails, for obvious reasons). . . What is the proper policy on this issue? If you agree with some tenets of Objectivism, but disagree with others, do no call yourself an Objectivist; give proper authorship credit for the parts you agree with—-and then indulge in any flights of fancy you wish, on your own.” Kelley does not agree that this is the proper policy. He wants to discard Ayn Rand’s use of “Objectivism” as a proper noun for her philosophy and turn it into a generic noun designating a broad philosophical tendency (not one that exists, but one that he envisions will arise in the future), on the order of “Platonism” and “Aristotelianism.” Except that he does not put it in terms of discarding Ayn Rand’s usage. He does not say: “Ayn Rand wrote Atlas Shrugged, she developed the philosophy of Objectivism, in order to protect its integrity she gave her system a proper name of her own choosing, she popularized this name and made it famous and respected among thousands of people-—but to hell with that! I have my own ideas about how the term should be used, and I see no reason to respect her wishes.” Kelley does not openly state this; if he had, he would have revealed himself as a complete psychopath. In fact, Kelley makes no reference whatever to the above statement by Ayn Rand (or to any other ones along similar lines), instead leveling his polemic against “Peikoff’s account of the philosophy,” as if it were an open question what Ayn Rand herself thought on the issue or what she intended by giving her philosophy its name. He does, however, address the more fundamental question of whether she had any right in the first place to name her philosophy. ”An argument that lies close to the surface in Peikoff’s essay,” he writes, is that Ayn Rand “is the author of Objectivism in the same sense that she is the author of Atlas Shrugged. She is accordingly free to stipulate the content of the term.” To add to or detract from Objectivism, therefore, would be “like the efforts of the mediocrities in The Fountainhead who claimed the right to disfigure Roark’s buildings.” This is essentially right: as a creator, Ayn Rand was entitled to name her creations, whether a novel or a philosophy. Note, however, that Kelley smuggles his own presuppositions into his manner of describing what he is arguing against, when he talks about Ayn Rand “stipulating the content of the term.” This has a ring of the arbitrary, but in fact a proper noun by its nature refers directly and exclusively to whatever particular it names, and all that is involved in assigning one is choosing an appropriate word for a properly identified particular. But Kelley wants to argue that a philosophy is not the kind of particular that can be assigned a proper noun. His arguments are weak in the extreme. He writes that unlike a novel, which is “the concrete embodiment of an idea by a specific author,” a philosophy “is a body of theoretical knowledge about reality.” This is true, but why is it relevant? Objectivism, after all, is not just “ideas and such,” it is a specific body of knowledge developed by a specific philosopher, as presented in concrete books, speeches, etc. Well, this is in essence what Kelley denies. He writes about “a philosophy” that “as a body of knowledge, a grasp of certain facts in reality, its content is determined by the nature of those facts, including their relationships and implications, not by anyone’s stipulation.” This is a remarkable statement, and a preposterous one. It contains one element of truth—-that Ayn Rand, in developing her philosophy, was governed by the nature of the facts she observed (this is why her philosophy is true). But she was not “determined by the nature of those facts” to develop her system. She had to do it, and the result was her achievement. Moreover, when she had done it, the result was something specific and concrete: a systematic set of specific philosophical identifications, communicated to the world in concrete words and sentences. This philosophical system was not something pre-existing “out there” in reality, which merely happened to have been discovered (in part) by Ayn Rand. Rather, it was her achievement, an achievement with an identity of its own and whose contents and boundaries were determined by her-—by what she had and had not identified. But Kelley will have none of this. Note that he is not merely objecting to Ayn Rand’s assigning to her philosophy a proper noun – he is denying, at least by implication, the very existence of a specific, delimited philosophy (or systematic set of philosophical truths) developed by Ayn Rand. The “content” of a philosophy, according to his view, is to be determined not by the factual matter of what a given philosopher has and has not discovered (which would be heer “stipulation”), but by “the facts” (whatever this means). According to Kelley, the reason why it is inappropriate to assign the term “Objectivism” specifically to Ayn Rand’s philosophical system, is that there really is no such thing, and never was. But there was and is, which is why it was right for Ayn Rand to choose proper noun, and why it is right for us to respect her wishes. What are some of Kelley’s other arguments for why we should regard Objectivism as an open system? He spends two pages documenting the existence of such terms as “Platonism,” “Aristotelianism” and “Kantianism,” which do name broad historical schools encompassing many different thinkers with varying views, and then he asserts that the very existence of these terms and schools “provide the most obvious evidence against Peikoff’s claims”--when it provides no such evidence at all. That, say, “Platonism” is not a proper noun in as restrictive a sense as “Objectivism” is, tells us nothing about how we should view the term “Objectivism.” How would you react if I said that “Anette” cannot refer to you specifically, since there is in the language the word “redhead,” which refers not only to you, but to many other redheaded girls? Kelley then argues at length for the trivial point that much work needs to be done by Objectivist philosophers. Such work, he says, “will not be a matter of adding blocks to a monolithic structure, with everyone in full agreement at every step.” But who would deny this? Obviously, an Objectivist philosopher can disagree with other Objectivist philosophers, apart from Ayn Rand. A closed system, Kelley asserts, is defined by “articles of faith,” and internal debates are “typically settles by a ruling from some authority.” Defined by whom? After all, it is not as if this phrase is in common parlance. And while this “definition” may be true of Leninism and Catholicism, it has no apparent relevance to Objectivism as a closed system, i.e., to the issue of “Objectivism” as a proper noun for Ayn Rand’s philosophy. Kelley, however, seems to think it has. His one remaining argument against regarding Objectivism as a closed system is that a thinker “will not function with double vision, . . . keeping one eye on reality and the other on Ayn Rand’s texts. This approach would be inconsistent with any philosophy of reason.” Why? Apart from the tendentious ridiculousness of Kelley’s metaphor--one eye on reality and one on a book--why shouldn’t an Objectivist thinker both look first-hand at reality and at the same time relate and (if possible) integrate his observations, identifications, conclusions to what he has learned from Ayn Rand? Isn’t this precisely what one would expect an Objectivist thinker to do? No, implies Kelley. A rational and independent mind is one “whose only concern is the truth” and who “admits no obligation to accept [Ayn Rand] as an authority.” For Kelley, apparently, an “Objectivist thinker” not only need not agree with all of Ayn Rand’s philosophy, he need not even accept her as an authority on philosophical matters, relate his own ideas to hers, or, if he finds himself in disagreement with her, give the matter any thought whatever. Any concern with how one’s own observations and conclusions relate to a body of “authorized doctrine,” Kelley implies, “leaves us with two alternatives.” We may either “trim our mental sails” to ensure consistency with Ayn Rand’s writings “at all cost,” or we “may remain loyal to our perception of the facts, and be prepared to announce that we are not Objectivists, should we find ourselves in disagreement with even the least fundamental of her philosophical ideas.” The result of such a policy, Kelley concludes, is that “to be Objectivists . . . we must abandon rationality; to be rational, we must be ready at any moment to abandon Objectivism.” But this conclusion does not follow. First, to accept Ayn Rand as an authority in philosophy, and to relate one’s own perception of reality to her system, is not equivalent to treating “consistency with her writings as a value to be achieved at all cost, trimming [one’s] mental sails to ensure that result.” This latter policy would be a complete abandonment of Objectivism, which no one has advocated, and Kelley is arguing against a preposterous straw man. One should relate one’s own perception of reality to the “authorized doctrine” of Objectivism only because doing so is a tremendous intellectual benefit and provides a powerful wind in one’s mental sails. There is no question of “abandoning rationality to be an Objectivist.” Does this then mean that “to be rational, we must be ready at any moment to abandon Objectivism”? No—since the underlying premise of this conclusion is pure skepticism. To be rational, we must be prepared to abandon any idea, theory or “authorized doctrine”-—if and when we become rationally convinced of its falsehood. But this does not mean that we must be “ready at any moment” to abandon any idea-—as if it is a logical possibility that we may stumble upon contradictory evidence around the next corner. There is such a thing as being rationally convinced, even certain, of something, in which case, contrary to what Kelley implies, one need not live in constant fear of new evidence. Perhaps Kelley thinks that Objectivism is in a special category here. After all, if in order to be an Objectivist one must agree with all of Ayn Rand’s philosophical ideas, “even the least fundamental,” one could not be confident in one’s status as an Objectivist until one had become certain of the truth of the totality of Objectivism. Maybe this is a superhuman task? But note that Ayn Rand’s philosophical corpus is not enormous. Kelley himself comments that “her philosophical essays . . . would fit comfortably within a single volume.” This is not to say that it is easy or quick to master her philosophy--but it can be done. Also, Kelley sets up the problem in the most tendentious way, making the most trivial-sounding case of disagreement (“with even the least fundamental of her philosophical ideas”) lead to the most drastic consequences (“abandon Objectivism.”) I cannot speak for Dr. Peikoff, but it seems to me that if a disagreement really were trivial, one would not have to stop calling oneself an Objectivist. The question of what is or is not trivial could of course be controversial—-as could the question of whether something was or was not a disagreement—-but these are discussions that could well be conducted within the framework of the principle of Objectivism as a closed system. In short, Anette, the answer to your question is that there is no validity to Kelley’s position. It is nothing but a slipshod rationalization for Kelley’s establishment of an institution that would provide him with a sinecure and a coterie of acolytes.

Well, I don't agree with that as a principle, which saves us from ending up in complete agreement.

My apologies to Richard Halley, insofar as my reply to him was far too rude. I can see now what made him originally reply to me as he did. However, if one reads the quote he gives from "About a Woman President" in context, AR makes it clear that by "inferiority" she means intellectual and moral inferiority. Elsewhere, she talks explicitly of masculine romantic or sexual superiority - based ultimately such things as superior physical strength, which implies that women have inferior strength (which they do). Another relevant issue is superior/inferior control during intercourse. I'm hesitant to get involved in a purely sexological discussion. But the point is that such matters are the foundation of AR's views on sex, masculinity, femininity, etc. In this sense, it is indeed a matter of superiority-inferiority, and of the related issue of dominance and submission. One may agree with her analysis or disagree, but I do sense, in some attempts to explain her view, a tendency to speak in vague, poetic generalities which miss the specificity of AR's views. (That said, I agree that words like "pabulum" are not conducive to polite discussion, and I retract it for that reason.)