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Re: Maskelyne and Harrison
From: Frank Reed
Date: 2008 Sep 10, 07:23 -0400
From: Frank Reed
Date: 2008 Sep 10, 07:23 -0400
George, you wrote: "But he wasn't writing it to persuade his critics. He was giving evidence, to Parliament, on a technical matter, and from his account was bending over backwards to be scrupulously fair to Harrison, in every respect. It may be, perhaps, that being written by Maskelyne's himself, it was a self-serving account to make him look reasonable, but his words to Parliament were on public record." LOL. Of course it was self-serving. :-) What else would it be? And: "but that doesn't exclude bias and hostility being shown elsewhere on other occasions." I'm glad that's clear. There were many people who were Maskelyne's CONTEMPORARIES who believed that he was biased. There is a remaining interesting question in all of this. What would have happened differently if Maskelyne, and Halley, e.g., before him, had been more charitable to the 'mechanics' (the name used to describe the advocates of the time-keepers in historical accounts)? -FER --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Navigation List archive: www.fer3.com/arc To post, email NavList@fer3.com To , email NavList-@fer3.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---