Hi, James!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:

JB>  I'll just make a cursory reply for today.


           And I'll do the same, before I hit you with my next message....  :-))



JB>  I'm a little foggy, this Alan is the fictional
JB>  character, who was described by two "articles"
JB>  from different authors.


           Alan Breck Stewart was a real person & so was Colin
Campbell... but I didn't know that when I read the novel.  The event
reported in the two articles, i.e. the murder of Colin Campbell, is widely
recognized as an actual event.  The Stewarts & the Campbells were
(basically) on opposite sides in a civil war which was going on in Scotland
at the time.  The novelist used the names of both men & the idea that
there was no love lost between the Stewarts & the Campbells in his
work... but if anybody knows who killed Colin Campbell they're not telling.
 :-)



JB>  Maybe the story isn't the story, but how
JB>  two newspaper articles can elicit different
JB>  impressions of the same story.


           Exactly....  :-)



JB>  Article A told us this tax collector was shot
JB>  dead, and article B tells us he had some muscle
JB>  with him, when he was shot dead?


           Right.  The unknown assailant was apparently lurking in the
woods, at the top of a hill.  I imagine s/he would probably have
high-tailed it as soon as the intended target had been hit in order to get
a head start on the soldiers... and the safest place for Colin Campbell's
nephew to be was with his corpse!  The nephew doesn't come across as such a
hero if we know about the soldiers....  ;-)



JB>  Just what I was about to say, when this stuff was
JB>  swirling around in my subconscious, "P" was stand
JB>  for "person" (I did mention I needed a soak, right?|-)
JB>  but I had the "J" for "judgemental" (Ya, I added
JB>  the "mental" part. Smart remarks not required.)


           Okay, I see this needs a bit more explanation!  Here's a continuum:

              never... seldom... sometimes... often... always

Here's another continuum:

              1.......................................... 100

And here's another:

              perception........................... judgement


I tend toward the "perception" end of the scale.  I try to report
objectively on what I've observed... and I've deliberately chosen as an
example something which happened a long time ago in Scotland because it
doesn't matter to me who's right or wrong.  Folks whose reasoning style is
more toward the "judgement" end of the scale sound more like the
author of Article #1 than the author of Article #2.  I can see... now that
I understand the theory of preferred reasoning styles... why I had so many
students who couldn't grasp the idea of objective reporting.  Some people
will swear they don't hear any negativity in adjectives like
"stupid" and "cowardly"... but watch what happens when
others describe them that way!  Author #1 is an extreme example I chose for
educational purposes.  While those who tend toward the "J" end of
the scale can be judgemental, in the sense that they often editorialize
& criticize as Author #1 did, they're not all that extreme....  :-)



JB>  I was thinking, even a Judge needs to acknowledge
JB>  a personal side.


           Yes.  I realize Author #2 may have his own opinions about who's
right & who's wrong... and he may influence our opinions by what he
chooses to tell us or not tell us about what happened.  But in court cases,
judges often spend some time reviewing all the available evidence before
handing down a verdict....  :-)




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+