Subject: Re: Newbie - 2 MORE Small problems?
From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.net>
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 2002 03:01:34 GMT
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <3224804504056965@naggum.net>

* Thomas Bushnell, BSG
| Scheme is usually represented as one dialect of Lisp.  comp.lang.lisp
| *predates* Common Lisp, however.  It seems to me that comp.lang.lisp
| should therefore be for all Lisps (and principally for those in
| current use, of course).

  The nature and process of newsgroup splits dictates that if you get a
  forum for yourself, you do _not_ bother the general community.

  comp.lang.scheme decided to make have own community, and they should be
  happy there instead of wanting _two_: One for your own little pet
  language, and for the the general "Lisp" that you refuse to recognize
  that you are no longer a member of by virtue of your own forum.

  The same goes for Dylan, but we have _thankfully_ been relieved of D*lan
  propaganda, lately.

| Well, I wasn't insulted, I just said it seemed like you wanted an
| argument--which seems true indeed.

  I respond to your accusation that I want an insult battle.  Do not use a
  rejection of your position as proof that it was true.  Such dishonesty is
  usually reserved for extreme and ultra-conservative politicians, not
  people who have honest intentions with what they do.

  Some people I have argued against in the past have a very serious problem
  seeing a difference between my arguing against what they argue for and my
  arguing for what they argue against.  I suggest you think this over and
  make sure you know what people are actually arguing for and against.  If
  you have a philosoophy background, this difference should be _really_
  easy to see.

| You seem to have a common pattern here: you post something really
| provocative, you accuse someone else of trolling when you were the first
| really provocative poster, etc, etc.

  Really?  I wrote:

> set! is bad form.  setf is not.  Just another one of those differences
> between real Lisps like Common Lisp and toy lisps like Scheme.

  after _you_ had opened up for a comparison between Common Lisp and Scheme
  with a goddamn smiley, but when I joke back, you find it "really
  provocative", and _you_ insult me with something so stupid as this:

| Ah, so this is an insult battle.  Not interested here.

  Could it _possibly_ be that you were the first to go hostile here, and
  that you are so blind to your own actions that you are _never_ at fault?

  There are a lot of people out there who have deep psychological barriers
  to accepting that they behave badly in some way and who defend themselves
  by accusing the other party of everything that could possibly apply to
  themselves, and who even play the stupid mirror game, but the refusal to
  consider that the other party is at fault is _not_ the moronic argument
  that one is not.  You have to think in such terms to even arrive at the
  idea that that is what other people do.  If you are only used to such
  people, I pity you, but a _little_ room for a balanced view of things
  _should_ be available even in the most prejudiced who really need to
  regard themselves as "good guys" _all_ the time.

  The biggest, if not the _only_, problem on USENET is that people need to
  defend themselves, usually because someone thinks that they defend
  themselves best by accusing somebody of something completely outlandish
  that they never expressed, implied, or opened up to be inferred.

| I haven't said any "venomous crap" against "the real Lisp" (which is, of
| course, Maclisp) :).  I haven't said anything venomous against that other
| PL/I Lisp (you know, Common Lisp).

  Why is _this_ not "really provocative"?  You are in a forum where people
  are interested in Common Lisp in particular, yet you go on and on with
  your stupid insults towards Common Lisp, but as soon as I have a little
  fun with your toy lanauge, you find it "really provocative" and go nuts?
  Are you for real?

| Actually, the first edition of Common Lisp was a really nifty
| achievement, but the later stuff is baffling to me.  It's an issue of
| style though, unlike many, I don't have any particular zealoutry to
| convince everyone that my way is the only true way.

  "Actually" is usually reserved for facts, not biased opinions.

  Regardless of what you _feel_, it is probably smart to avoid provoking
  people in the forum where people expressly congegrate to enjoy what you
  do not.  This is why I poke fun at Scheme and XML and Perl and C++ _here_
  -- not in their newsgroups.  Do you grasp this difference?  Can you
  _quit_ being so sensitive about your stupid toy language when you are not
  in _its_ particular forum and community?  Of _course_ people have a right
  to think Scheme sucks here -- you guys got your own newsgroup so you
  could discuss Scheme without fighting with real Lispers.

///
-- 
  In a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none.
  In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.