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Frank posted

> From another  list:
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4950876.stm

Fun article.  A bit bolder than Sumner's apparent "tweaking."

I do take offense to the suggestion, "give up chocolate for Lent and you are
taking a small step towards God's approval."  As any good Methodist knows,
it is not giving up something.  We already gave up dancing and gambling and
smoking and drinking and whoring. We eat,  then die of heart attacks.  The
real "key" to salvation is bringing a casserole to a family in time of
strife or loss.  The green-bean with cream-of-mushroom soup, topped with
French's canned "French Fried Onion Taste Toppers" casserole pleases God
very much in Indiana I am told.

"One casserole away from heaven."  Now that's a goal!  Why should one be
rewarded for temporarily giving up something they love but is bad for them,
when a Methodist or Baptist already gave it up and is *doing* something
positive (with the possible exception of the green-bean casserole)?
Cargo-cult religion. 

Back on topic, the old discussion of better refraction constants for dip,
distance to horizon, etc. seems to interest few on the list.  Interested in
taking it up on the experimental list?

Since the major players have weighed in with their opinions on the
experimental list, mine follows:

The internet was designed to be decentralized. Servers around the globe.
Packets going her and there.  A web that no one could bring down.  A great
concept until some high-school kid or college deviate develops a virus or
worm or... that brings a significant part of system crashing down.  I don't
feel that 1-2% of missed messages is a crash, but it is good to know that
list members know in advance there is a place to regroup if the primary
source fails for whatever reason.

Another perspective:  Some topics just don't seem to catch on or sustain
interest, although a couple of members have a keen interest.  We go
off-list, or drop it entirely (perhaps feeling we are clogging the in-box of
hundreds of folks that have already indicated they are not interested in the
topic via lack of participation in the discussion) when we would relish
continued exploration and input from others. Peer pressure.

It has been my experience that when the primary list has gone down,
one-on-one off-list discussion picks up.  When the primary list becomes
reliable again, one or the other suggested we go back on list.

Point being the alternative list might be a gathering spot for topics
without broad appeal.  A primary-list member can elect to opt out of the
alternative list, and therefore not use bandwidth/fill the mailbox with
topics of marginal interest.  Or sign up with an alternative e-mail address
to identify those messages. Or just hit "delete" for messages to that
address.

Either way, we all know were to run to if the giant worms attack our primary
trunk lines.

Gotta run now, the green-bean casserole is about to come out of the oven.
Bet it would taste good with a little vino verde ;-)

Bill

   

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