Re: Fact, opinion or just BUNK?

[ornstn@inforamp.net (Ronald Orenstein)]

>When I was a kid of age 9-13 seeking knowledge in the library, nobody was
>there to guide me through the BUNK to the GOOD STUFF. I learned to do this on
>my own, after having sifted through and even believed for a while a fair
>amount of BUNK. (Such as Velikovsky's books and George Adamski's _Inside the
>Flying Saucers_, both of which were on the library's science shelf, not the
>BUNK shelf.) It's part of growing up. What is perhaps most unfortunate is
>that there are often too few accessible counter-BUNK books available; I'm
>doing my share to produce counter-BUNK material, but finding publishers for
>GOOD STUFF is tough.

I had the same experience.
>
>Everything I post here is something that has some validity (except the puns
>and yokks--they are outside the "validity purview"). If it turns out to be
>wrong later, that's fine. It's part of my learning process.

I think you are taking this more personally than it was intended, and are
missing Ken's point here (and as he is a schoolteacher I think he knows
whereof he speaks).  All I was trying to say originally was that if we post
statements that we know are not widely accepted or are the subject of
controversy, we should say so.  I do not think it takes that much more
effort to say "Deinonychus was, in my opinion, secondarily flightless" than
it does to say "Deinonychus was secondarily flightless" - and I think that
you certainly know enough to tell when such a qualifier is warranted.  This
doesn't mean that your opinion is bunk - it may well be right - but in that
it does not represent the orthodox or most widely accepted view I think it
needs the qualifier.
--
Ronald I. Orenstein                           Phone: (905) 820-7886 (home)
International Wildlife Coalition              Fax/Modem: (905) 569-0116 (home)
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