Hi all 
In response to my post I received this:

> You make some good points. What I often find offensive is the way the "experts" talk down to the low, ignorant masses who read and sometimes comment. This has evolved into a forum whereby the genuine keepers of the keys of knowledge are breaking their arms trying to pat themselves on the back. 

> They use long, dysfunctional diatribes employing high diction attempting to rise above their "true" peers.  Epistemological arrogance turns people off, and verbal diarrhea employed in efforts to "prove" superior knowledge has the opposite effect. They need their own secret society so that democracy cannot interfere with their efforts. 

> Darrow never spoke for more than fifteen minutes at a time, and that very infrequently. He explained it was because to do otherwise lost the attention of his audience, and thus the effectiveness of his arguments.  This would be appropriately applied to the truly knowledgeable "experts" on this forum.

¶

Honestly, I don't know what to make of this. Is this person agreeing with what I said or chastising me? I think I make it pretty clear when I post excerpts from papers I have read that the writing is the author's and not mine. I strive for readability, brevity, and all that. In scientific writing, the fine art of communication is often forgotten completely. 

Working as I do as a paid writer, I spend many many hours trying to condense complicated subjects into an entertaining, readable form. However, it is possible to boil things down too much. Supposedly, Einstein said "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." 

Guess what, he didn't say that. He said: "It can scarcely be denied that the supreme goal of all theory is to make the irreducible basic elements as simple and as few as possible without having to surrender the adequate representation of a single datum of experience." Is this an example of "Epistemological arrogance, and verbal diarrhea" ? 

He also never said anything about disappearing bees. 

Pete Bee

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