Number 88 : September 1997 |
As usual, we start off by welcoming new members to the SIG, so .... welcome to :-
A particular welcome to Paul Cadman, our youngest member (at 14), and welcome back to Sheila Blanchard, who founded the SIG and is a former Mensa SIGs Officer. Also welcome to Ivan Parrott - good to see you at the ISPE picnic the other day !
It was good to hear from Vijai over the ‘phone. One point Vijai raised was of the uniformity of the presentation of Commensal. He suggested that the alternative method of producing the newsletter - ie. pasting together the contributions as received - does add a variety of presentation and allows some of the personality of the contributors to come through. However, in my view, it does also detract from legibility, produces an ugly mess, and takes longer; but each of us has a different aesthetic sense (I almost found myself agreeing with PLL there !). I could vary the font occasionally, add graphics here & there - any strong views ? When I asked this question in C84, the response, such as it was, seemed to be that format was irrelevant in a philosophical newsletter.
Another point on the conduct of the newsletter - Alan Carr raises the issue of "endless replies". This seemed also to be the case when I first joined the SIG four years or so ago - though then, I seem to remember, we had "out of the blue" replies to articles several issues after they first appeared. Two things here; firstly, the cut and thrust of debate is, in my view, just about the main reason for the existence of the SIG. People write in because they want to hear others’ responses to their opinions. However, a long catena of replies is rather difficult to follow, especially for new members, so this must be balanced by new material. Which reminds me; there are a few of you out there whose first thoughts have yet to be heard ! You will note that this issue consists predominately of replies.
While we’re on this subject, thanks to Ron Kermode for his suggestion about cross-referencing comments on previous Commensals. I’ve added these references, hopefully accurately, where the authors have not done so themselves.
Thanks to you all for not going overboard or being discouraged by C87’s editorial - there was a flood of post over the couple of weeks following publication, but not on that issue. Those of you who contribute are obviously keen to continue the debates !
I have to admit to a few bloopers in the last edition.
Firstly, there were rather too many typos, in the sense of correctly spelled words out of context. This was due to my scanner & spell-checker being let loose with inadequate quality control from me. Occasionally, this method produces valid but inappropriate words which I have to be extra-diligent to spot. By way of mitigation, could I ask those of you who send me typescripts to use a large font (11pt+) and, where a ribbon is used, use a decent one ? Otherwise my scanner has a difficult time and I end up having to re-type half of the article. This is both extremely tedious and has potentially dire consequences for the sense of the argument. A latest favourite is "nave" instead of "have". C87 saw modem appear for modern in one of PLL’s articles !
Secondly, apologies to Anthony Owens for my curmudgeonly dismissal of his entertaining "Sopha" suggestion for re-naming Commensal. Sorry, missed the point completely ! Also, to Rick Street for ill considered remarks about photons.
Thanks to all of you who’ve contributed to this issue of Commensal. As usual, thanks for your patience to those of you who wrote to me some weeks back and have had to await this rather belated C88 to receive a reply. Partly because of a tendency to bloop, partly because I’m always behind schedule and partly because contributions now seem to have reached a critical mass, I had decided to go easy on my own commentary on articles received, except on a selective basis. However, looking back over C88, I do still seem to have written rather a lot.
Finally, the closing date for submissions to the November 1997 edition of Commensal is 15th October.
Best wishes,
Theo