At 23:49 04/09/98 +1200, J. Maxwell Legg wrote:
>I'm not a christian-fundamentalist, a racist or a simpleton and I didn't send
>the URL to further this propaganda. Yes it could be better written and better
>argued but I hope extropians can look further than obvious untruths to see
>what else rings true. After all, the Net is full of truths hidden amongst
>dialectics of this sort but if you aren't immune to it and it makes you sick
>then you'll never be able to find out what one enemy knows about another.
I didn't accuse you of being any of those things, and I am happy to believe you when you say you are none of them, and happy to apologize if I gave any other impression of you.
The issue, it seems to me, is that I, without a great deal of academic economic knowledge, find it impossible to take information from such a tract with any degree of confidence in its reliability or worth. Since I do not find myself in a position to self-critique the piece I can only doubt its veracity based on its subtext and the author's (lack of) credentials. Thus, as piece intended to support your argument, I suspect that for people like me it is misleading, whilst for people with a pre-existing economic background it is risible.
That said, the most important piece of this mail is my apology to you, if any have considered my earlier post to be attributing very undesirable attributes to you. That was never my intention.
Sarah