Comments on: Annals of Self-Hatred

By: Silicon valley Jim

Silicon valley Jim — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 22:08:09 +0000

How about leaving the coffeetable psychoanalysis out, and simply look at the facts. Either Finklestein raises some valid points about the use of Holocaust history in contemporary political debate, or he doesn’t. His family history should be irrelevent.

It may surprise you to find that I quite agree with you; I’m quite opposed to long-distance psychoanalysis, and I’ve made that point here myself before.

By: markus

markus — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 19:54:05 +0000

Another question: does anyone know what actually happened to Joan Peters? I wonder why she hasn’t been heard from since the publication of From Time Immemorial, over twenty years ago.

By: Silicon valley Jim

Silicon valley Jim — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 18:16:40 +0000

Of what “truths” did your live-in lawyer convince you?

The lawyer with whom I lived for twenty years was my father. His behavior, like that of many of my law school classmates (and some of the professors), convinced me that he believed that something was true if he said it confidently enough, often enough, and loud enough, and if he acted as if I had not made the arguments that I had. Three random contentions that I remember are that Northern Illinois University is one of America’s top engineering schools (I really don’t know, but it certainly doesn’t have that reputation), that one should wait until driving a car several miles before checking the air pressure in the tires (absolutely wrong), and that one should wait until a car’s engine has cooled down before changing the oil and filter (also absolutely wrong).

By: Kyda Sylvester

Kyda Sylvester — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 16:13:45 +0000

How very intriguing, SVJim. Of what “truths” did your live-in lawyer convince you?

By: Silicon valley Jim

Silicon valley Jim — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 14:17:40 +0000

Dershowitz understands that the best defense is offense in protecting his good name and scholarship, how come he can’t see that the same

offense is needed to defend our country?

He’s a lawyer.

Truth for a scientist (a real scientist, not, for example, a sociologist) is a hypothesis that has been experimentally tested, with controls, double-blind testing, etc.

Truth for many religions is something received without question from a self-designated class of holy men.

Truth for a lawyer is anything that he can convince you is true. I spent twenty years living with a lawyer and a year-plus in law school finding that out.

By: Kyda Sylvester

Kyda Sylvester — Sun, 10 Jul 2005 00:23:30 +0000

Although on most issues Alan Dershowitz and I wave to one another across a great cultural/philosophical divide, I think he's been pretty good wrt the GWOT. two examples

By: Katherine

Katherine — Sat, 09 Jul 2005 23:30:18 +0000

Erp,

Because he cannot ever connect.

By: Kyda Sylvester

Kyda Sylvester — Sat, 09 Jul 2005 23:20:29 +0000

Thanks, Richard; I didn’t think so. Strange that Finkelstein would take on Dershowitz over this, he’s a lawyer for pete’s sake. Some egos just know no bounds (something about which Dersh knows quite a bit as well).

By: erp

erp — Sat, 09 Jul 2005 20:37:43 +0000

Dershowitz understands that the best defense is offense in protecting his good name and scholarship, how come he can’t see that the same

offense is needed to defend our country?

By: Richard Nieporent

Richard Nieporent — Sat, 09 Jul 2005 20:20:50 +0000

Kyda, the answer is no. Plagiarism is taking material from another source without attribution. The fact that you use a few of the same quotes as someone else is not plagiarism. If that was not the case then you couldn’t write a book on the same topic as someone else because all of the source material was already used. As to whether he should have quoted Peters who quoted Twain the answer is again no. You are supposed to go back to the original source. Otherwise you would have to identify everyone in chronological order who made the same quote.