Re: well then
Dr Maggie Hellstrom, Lund 
Thu, 19 Mar 1998 15:41:38 +0100 (MET)

Oooopppsss...

It seems I inadvertently stepped on some toes - I humbly apologize, for that was 
not my intention. In any case, I was only expressing _my_ views, totally 
independently of other list members, and I dare say this was done following the 
frank style of discussion normally adhered in this forum... Most of the time I 
like to be a bit provocative, but I was not in any way suggesting people should 
stop posting and/or subscribing to the list! In retrospect, maybe I should have 
avoided nitpicking about spelling and such - it was more a reflection of my own 
efforts to express myself correctly... Personally, I have considerable respect 
for the written language; I think it (and the intended reader!) deserves 
attention to details - such as spelling, grammar, and style! 

What I wanted to convey in my previous posting was exactly what Randall so 
elegantly rephrased... Namely, that trying to "simultaneously" follow an 
abundance of different ideas often leads to a null result - people become 
exhausted, disenchanted and non-creative. I've seen this happen many times in my 
own field of research: some (professors) have a zillion of ideas and tell their 
grad students and research associates to follow them all. Since the people doing 
the work are mere Humans (at least in most cases!?), they are soon too tired and 
fed up to care about what is happening, and what could have led to brilliant 
advances simply gets lost in paperwork or is forgotten...   

Maggie

(who'll shut up for a while as to avoid awakening pre-Reformation Passions in 
her fellow list members...)

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"Everybody sets out to do something, but no one does what he sets out to do."
 -- George Moore