From: Gene McAloon 

On Tue, 02 Dec 2003 12:39:33 +1200, dmhills{at}attglobal.net (Don Hills) wrote:

>>A preposterous statement. Personal attacks on Canopus were so common they
were
>>almost a daily occurrence and had no effect whatsoever on what was being
argued
>>or the worth of the argument.
>
>Then he shoots himself in the foot by agreeing with Phil's statement:
>
>>In Canopus, anyone who whined about a personal attack was thought to be doing
so
>>because he was bereft of a decent argument.
>
>I expect Gene will disagree with this analysis, or maybe he'll be contrarian
>enough not to.

Of course I disagree with your analysis. How can I not when you have got it
all wrong?

Phil said that those who used personal attacks were dismissed in Canopus as
not having a decent argument and thus engaged in personal attacks. That is
the standard criticism usually made of those who engage in personal
attacks. Conventional wisdom, you might call it.

The beauty of Canopus, as I said, was that it was precisely those who complained
about others engaging in personal attacks were themselves thought to
complain about such attacks because they hadn't the arguments to do
anything but complain
about such attacks.

Got it now?  It really isn't all that difficult after all.

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