perm filename OUTGO.MSG[1,JMC]25 blob
sn#863261 filedate 1988-11-06 generic text, type C, neo UTF8
COMMENT ⊗ VALID 00074 PAGES
C REC PAGE DESCRIPTION
C00001 00001
C00008 00002 ∂04-Oct-88 1618 JMC re: Visit Oct 4.
C00009 00003 ∂04-Oct-88 1621 JMC re: a follow up appointment?
C00010 00004 ∂04-Oct-88 1622 JMC re: Shuttle landing
C00011 00005 ∂04-Oct-88 1624 JMC re: edi
C00012 00006 ∂04-Oct-88 1641 JMC re: Schwartz
C00015 00007 ∂04-Oct-88 1642 JMC reply to message
C00016 00008 ∂04-Oct-88 1647 JMC re: Franklin Speller
C00017 00009 ∂04-Oct-88 1648 JMC Osaka
C00018 00010 ∂05-Oct-88 1533 JMC re: a follow up appointment?
C00019 00011 ∂05-Oct-88 1546 JMC re: a follow up appointment?
C00020 00012 ∂05-Oct-88 1639 JMC lunch
C00021 00013 ∂05-Oct-88 2259 JMC noise reduction project
C00022 00014 ∂06-Oct-88 0917 JMC re: triangles
C00023 00015 ∂06-Oct-88 0953 JMC photos
C00024 00016 ∂06-Oct-88 1006 JMC reply to message
C00025 00017 ∂06-Oct-88 1614 JMC re: noise reduction project
C00026 00018 ∂07-Oct-88 1649 JMC
C00027 00019 ∂07-Oct-88 1649 JMC
C00028 00020 ∂07-Oct-88 2342 JMC re: CSD-CF Rates for 1988-89
C00029 00021 ∂08-Oct-88 0015 JMC SAIL disk rates
C00030 00022 ∂08-Oct-88 1539 JMC re: CSD-CF Rates for 1988-89
C00031 00023 ∂08-Oct-88 1839 JMC disk rates
C00032 00024 ∂09-Oct-88 1357 Mailer disk use charges
C00038 00025 ∂10-Oct-88 0836 JMC re: JPL Paper
C00039 00026 ∂10-Oct-88 1452 JMC re: as you're not here and your door is closed
C00040 00027 ∂10-Oct-88 1544 JMC toner cartridges for Imagen
C00042 00028 ∂10-Oct-88 2320 JMC
C00043 00029 ∂10-Oct-88 2338 JMC
C00044 00030 ∂11-Oct-88 1103 Mailer the Presidential race
C00053 00031 ∂11-Oct-88 1358 JMC re: toner cartridges
C00054 00032 ∂11-Oct-88 1500 JMC your computer
C00055 00033 ∂11-Oct-88 1542 JMC re: Reply
C00056 00034 ∂12-Oct-88 0951 Mailer re: JMC's campaign analysis
C00059 00035 ∂12-Oct-88 1018 JMC re: bias
C00061 00036 ∂12-Oct-88 1445 Mailer presidential race
C00066 00037 ∂12-Oct-88 2348 JMC re: Your travel expenses, IFIP China.
C00067 00038 ∂12-Oct-88 2352 Mailer re: Government campaign financing (was presidential race)
C00069 00039 ∂13-Oct-88 1055 Mailer re: Alex Cockburn quote
C00070 00040 ∂13-Oct-88 1347 JMC
C00071 00041 ∂13-Oct-88 1359 Mailer October surprise
C00072 00042 ∂13-Oct-88 2138 JMC reply to message
C00073 00043 ∂13-Oct-88 2146 JMC re: Cockburn
C00074 00044 ∂13-Oct-88 2356 JMC re: Noon Saturday
C00075 00045 ∂14-Oct-88 1000 JMC
C00076 00046 ∂14-Oct-88 1411 JMC re: October surprise
C00077 00047 ∂14-Oct-88 1415 JMC re: 3rd party candidates
C00078 00048 ∂14-Oct-88 1428 JMC
C00079 00049 ∂14-Oct-88 1430 JMC re: 3rd party candidates
C00080 00050 ∂14-Oct-88 1656 JMC
C00081 00051 ∂14-Oct-88 2025 Mailer Indians of Brazil
C00083 00052 ∂14-Oct-88 2134 JMC re: triangles
C00084 00053 ∂14-Oct-88 2144 JMC re: the regular tetrahedron
C00085 00054 ∂14-Oct-88 2315 Mailer insurance initiatives
C00087 00055 ∂15-Oct-88 1121 JMC re: hello
C00088 00056 ∂16-Oct-88 1535 JMC re: briefly
C00089 00057 ∂16-Oct-88 1541 JMC re: briefly
C00091 00058 ∂16-Oct-88 1543 Mailer re: new anti-cigarette tax tactic (prop 99)
C00092 00059 ∂17-Oct-88 0916 JMC re: hello
C00093 00060 ∂17-Oct-88 0940 JMC re: hello
C00094 00061 ∂17-Oct-88 1338 JMC re: 3rd party candidates
C00095 00062 ∂17-Oct-88 1339 JMC re: Thesis
C00096 00063 ∂17-Oct-88 1418 JMC re: hello
C00097 00064 ∂17-Oct-88 1521 JMC
C00098 00065 ∂17-Oct-88 1651 JMC re: kr'89 panel
C00099 00066 ∂17-Oct-88 2102 JMC re: SSP-lunch
C00100 00067 ∂17-Oct-88 2114 Mailer re: insurance initiatives
C00102 00068 ∂18-Oct-88 1011 JMC re: this is closed form?
C00103 00069 ∂18-Oct-88 1212 Mailer re: Vote No on bond issues
C00104 00070 ∂18-Oct-88 1423 Mailer October surprise
C00105 00071 ∂18-Oct-88 1449 JMC scanners
C00106 00072 ∂18-Oct-88 1545 JMC Rota article
C00110 00073 ∂18-Oct-88 1606 Mailer re: Taxing "Smokers", Prop 99
C00117 00074 ∂18-Oct-88 1607 JMC re: Tenured Faculty Meeting
C00118 ENDMK
C⊗;
∂04-Oct-88 1618 JMC re: Visit Oct 4.
To: jundt@SIERRA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 28 Sep 1988 19:40:22 PDT.]
Sorry to have missed your brother-in-law. I just got back from
New York.
∂04-Oct-88 1621 JMC re: a follow up appointment?
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 28 Sep 88 22:59:24-PDT.]
>Stoyan, Herbert Information Sciences
* University of Konstanz
* PO-Box 5560
* D-775 Konstanz 1
* Federal Republic of Germany
* tel: 07531-88-3593
* home: Kapplerbergstr. 73
* D-7753 Allensbach
* tel: 07533-3408
* (Ursula, Roland, Norman)
Probably tomorrow or Thursday, oct 5 or 6. Please phone.
∂04-Oct-88 1622 JMC re: Shuttle landing
To: andy@POLYA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 29 Sep 88 10:29:58 PDT.]
Thanks for thinking of me. I was in the East. Also I have
no suitable contacts.
∂04-Oct-88 1624 JMC re: edi
To: JK
[In reply to message rcvd 29-Sep-88 14:27-PT.]
No. From my point of view it isn't in good enough shape, but maybe
we can work on it tomorrow, and see if they can still take it.
∂04-Oct-88 1641 JMC re: Schwartz
To: boyer@CS.UTEXAS.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 30 Sep 88 09:40:54 CDT.]
Thanks for the message. As it happened, I was in Washington Friday
for Carolyn's show-and-tell with Schwartz, and he told me about this.
It looks plausible.
∂04-Oct-88 1642 JMC reply to message
To: CN.MCS@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 30 Sep 88 13:50:04 PDT.]
I'll press him.
∂04-Oct-88 1647 JMC re: Franklin Speller
To: MPS
[In reply to message rcvd 04-Oct-88 15:33-PT.]
Tell them I don't want it. It isn't good enough yet.
∂04-Oct-88 1648 JMC Osaka
To: RC.STA@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
I have to address a meeting in Dallas on the 16th, so it doesn't
look likely, but given the time difference, maybe it can be done.
I just called my travel agent, and it can be done. I have to leave
Osaka on the 15th at 6:30pm.
------- End undelivered message -------
∂05-Oct-88 1533 JMC re: a follow up appointment?
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 5 Oct 88 15:30:02-PDT.]
Friday is no good. This afternoon or tomorrow is possible. Next
week is also possible.
∂05-Oct-88 1546 JMC re: a follow up appointment?
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed 5 Oct 88 15:44:21-PDT.]
Make it 11am Monday, but email me telephone numbers in case I have
to postpone it.
∂05-Oct-88 1639 JMC lunch
To: helen@PSYCH.Stanford.EDU
This Saturday doesn't work, because I'm taking Timothy to Great
America; it's the last day of the season. How about the
following Saturday or dinner some time next week? I usually
eat dinner out.
∂05-Oct-88 2259 JMC noise reduction project
To: CLT
The SCHOA (Stanford Campus Home Owners Association) is asking for
project suggestions, including environmental. I would suggest
a noise reduction project if you were also willing to take part.
I have in mind better enforcement of rules on noisy machinery
and more rules if needed.
∂06-Oct-88 0917 JMC re: triangles
To: beeson@UCSCD.UCSC.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 6 Oct 88 07:53:03 PDT.]
I have no intuition or mathematics to add to what you have discovered.
∂06-Oct-88 0953 JMC photos
To: MPS
The Inamori people want more pictures. Please search the files.
Very few of my pictures at home include me.
∂06-Oct-88 1006 JMC reply to message
To: MPS
[In reply to message rcvd 06-Oct-88 09:59-PT.]
Look in files for folders labelled photographs. My flight from
Osaka is at 6:30pm, so 12-3 looks ok.
∂06-Oct-88 1614 JMC re: noise reduction project
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 06-Oct-88 16:12-PT.]
OK, I'll contact SCHOA. If we run it, we can control the number
of committee meetings.
∂07-Oct-88 1649 JMC
To: JK
f91(x) ← if x > 100 then x-10 else f(f(x+11))
∂07-Oct-88 1649 JMC
To: JK
That's f91 for all three f's.
∂07-Oct-88 2342 JMC re: CSD-CF Rates for 1988-89
To: ball@Polya.Stanford.EDU, Faculty@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
CC: Facil@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message from ball@polya.Stanford.EDU sent Fri, 7 Oct 88 09:09:01 PDT.]
I regard the proposed unjustified increases in disk rates having no
relation to costs as grossly discriminatory against me and the way I
have been using the SAIL computer for the last 20 years. To whom in
the Controller's office can I protest?
∂08-Oct-88 0015 JMC SAIL disk rates
To: nilsson@TENAYA.Stanford.EDU
The CSD-CF committee or Jim Ball or somebody has decided on disk
rates that are driving me off the computer system that I created
22 years ago. Unless this is changed, I am going to start some
major form of non-co-operation with CSD.
∂08-Oct-88 1539 JMC re: CSD-CF Rates for 1988-89
To: ARK
[In reply to message rcvd 08-Oct-88 12:06-PT.]
Then I don't understand why the message referred to an increase in
disk rates. Or did I misread it?
∂08-Oct-88 1839 JMC disk rates
To: faculty@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
While disk charges on SAIL are still grossly too high, I misunderstood
a reference to charges on Polya increasing as referring to SAIL. On
SAIL they decreased. My apologies.
∂09-Oct-88 1357 Mailer disk use charges
To: faculty@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU, su-computers@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Let me explain why I was angry by what I thought was an
increase in SAIL charges for disk use, and why I think the
present charges are bad policy.
1. The charges are way out of line with costs for disk file -
by a factor larger than 10 and perhaps larger than 100. SAIL's
present (somewhat reduced) charges of $2.75 per megabit month
would pay for RAM chips to store the files in two months and for
buying disk units in one month.
2. The rationale of the policy of high disk charges is to get
approximately one third of the income from login time, one third
from compute charges and one third from disk use. From a purely
administrative point of view, this rule of thumb makes as much
sense as any other rule of thumb.
3. It is also true that an individual can assure himself of keeping
down his disk charges by pruning files regularly and by judicious use
of archival computers and tape. Moralists like the idea of rewarding
virtue and punishing sin, and maybe some people imagine that keeping
unnecessary files is just the kind of minor sin that is appropriately
punished by the charge algorithm.
4. So what's wrong with it?
I invented the idea of time-shared computing in 1957 - first
memo January 1959 and first publication 1960. The idea is
that an individual should do his computing at his leisure,
sitting at a terminal in his own office or home and that the
operating system should insure that when he was thinking
the system was fully available to others, and when he was
ready to compute he should get prompt service. Specifically
included in the idea was a feature, first proposed in 1945
by Vannevar Bush in his (non-computer) Memex article, that
a person should keep all his personal files in the machine.
It seemed to me then that this meant that as soon as technology
made it possible, a person should be able to keep a copy of all
he ever wrote permanently on-line as well as all his correspondence
to the extent to which the correspondence was capturable in
computer memory.
By the early 1970s, disk technology had advanced to the point
where this was economically feasible, and I adopted it as a personal policy.
I deviated from it a few times when there was a big delay in
getting new disks at SAIL. I would dearly like to get those
old files back, but at present prices I can't afford even my
present files.
I would like everyone to be able to adopt the same policy of
keeping a permanent record on-line of everything he has ever
typed into a computer.
At present the Computer Science Department doesn't even allow
for keeping technical reports and PhD theses on-line. This
is because disk charge policy is determined by administrative
convenience assisted by a lack of imagination. There are too
many young fogeys in the Department, who, two months after
learning how things are done, imagine that they have been
done this way from eternity and will continue to be done
this way for eternity.
It is of a piece with the fact that the ACM is five to ten
years behind the American Mathematical Society in the use
of computers in publication.
5. Of course, CSD-CF has to recover its costs. These costs
are primarily personnel costs associated with the variety
of computer systems maintained. There is only a tiny
co-efficient directly proportional to the amount of disk
file. A better algorithm is required that will make it
possible and normal to maintain large personal files.
∂10-Oct-88 0836 JMC re: JPL Paper
To: thomason@B.GP.CS.CMU.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 9 Oct 1988 20:21:27 EDT.]
No more prizes, but more work for this prize. I finished
the Kyoto prize popular lecture, but I'm supposed to
write up my technical lecture also. However, they haven't
specified a deadline for that. The TEX part will be easy;
that's how I work. Maybe I can make the Dec 1 date if
I can put off writing up the technical lecture till after
I give it.
∂10-Oct-88 1452 JMC re: as you're not here and your door is closed
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 10 Oct 88 11:09:09-PDT.]
Wrong. I was merely late, although I had forgotten through misfiling.
Best is to telephone me when you are in a position to come over
right away. 3-4430. Not this afternoon, unless you want to come
to my house 857-0872.
∂10-Oct-88 1544 JMC toner cartridges for Imagen
To: tom@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
The toner cartridge for the Imagen at home ran out and I replaced
it by the spare provided when the Imagen was installed. The
spare was out-of-date and should have been used by March 1988.
However, it seems to be working ok. Because the Imagen is used
slowly I would like to postpone getting another cartridge until
this one is nearly exhausted, but I don't want to take a chance
on running out. The cartridge is labelled 92285A EP-Cartridge,
color: black and is made by Hewlett-Packard. It is also
labelled Code: R34-0002-004. If this is the same cartridge
as is used by the Imagens in MJH, I'll not worry, but will
suppose that it is a regularly used supply.
∂10-Oct-88 2320 JMC
To: CLT
I'll continue with Hazel's lessons.
∂10-Oct-88 2338 JMC
To: MS@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
CC: CLT@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Unfortunately, we can't come to Sendai this trip.
∂11-Oct-88 1103 Mailer the Presidential race
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Here's a try at analyzing what's going on. The key is in Dukakis's
acceptance speech at the Democratic convention. He said, ``The issue
is not ideology but competence.'' The Democrats have tried ideology
unsuccessfully several times. Indeed Democrat activists are mainly
motivated by ideology, and it is necessary to bow to ideology to win
the nomination as Dukakis successfully did.
For example, Dukakis blocked the Seabrook nuclear plant in New
Hampshire by refusing to make an evacuation plan for the bit of its 10
mile circle that extends into Massachusetts in spite of the report of
the Harvard professor he commissioned to look into the matter. This
got him the support of anti-nuclear activists nationwide without
disturbing the general public outside of New Hampshire, which he
doesn't expect to win anyway. He took an extreme stand against SDI in
the primaries and has fuzzed his position since. However, don't
worry, liberals. If he is elected he will appoint people in favor of
all liberal nostrums, e.g. ``comparable worth'', a proposal to decide
politically how much one job should pay relative to another. His
Harvard advisers advocate substantial unilateral disarmament, and
these people expect the relevant positions in a Dukakis
administration.
However, it was also necessary to avoid spelling out any
ideological concessions to the conservative sentiments of the voters,
because this would incite the rhetorical wrath of his ideological
constituencies. For example, conceding on comparable worth would
excite cries of betrayal from the feminist politicians.
The strategy of attacking the Republican vice-presidential
nominee, whoever he might be, was decided before the Democrats knew
who Bush would choose. The Democrats knew this would resonate in the
press.
The Republicans seem to have decided that the Democratic
strategy may win some votes but not enough to decide the election.
Therefore, Bush has concentrated on just a few of the issues that
divide Republicans from Democrats, e.g. the relation between the
criminal law reforms achieved by the ACLU and the Democrats and the
rate of crime. The Bush camp considers that a small margin of victory
is quite likely, and there is no reason to rock the boat by any
innovations. It looks like they're right.
A major motivation for choosing Quayle was to keep the
conservatives in line. This choice gives the conservatives someone in
a strong position for 1996, while requiring no policy commitments that
they can cash in in 1989. The conservatives, like all ideologically
motivated people, are quite disappointed in what their man in office
managed to accomplish. There has been no action on abortion, school
prayer, zapping the ideological use of Legal Services, and only a
little restraint on the growth of the part of the GNP taken by
Government. Also to many of them, the growth of the national debt is
more salient than the success of Reagan policies in reducing inflation
and unemployment and getting rid of the SS-20 missiles. Anyway they
were pacified by Quayle.
(My own opinion is that Reagan accomplished more for the
conservative agenda than any other politician would have been able to
do. Time and again he got programs through the Democrat House of
Representatives. Of course, his inattention cost a lot in many
matters where only the Executive part of the Government was involved.
Even this, however, blurred his conflicts with the House and may have
contributed to his success there. He has made fundamental changes in
how American politicians, journalists and even political scientists
view the world. For example, writers on all sides refer to the
"Soviet Empire", even though few use the adjective "evil".)
Anyway that's why we have a dull election campaign. Both
sides want it that way.
Many people would like a more interesting campaign with both
candidates hammering away at the genuine issues that divide them. For
example, they could debate SDI, debate whether the U.S. should make
unilateral concessions to Gorbachev in order to keep him in power,
debate whether the Sandinistas are good guys, debate comparable worth,
abortions and school prayer. I'm not sure this would be better for
the country, although it would be more interesting.
If this were done, whoever won would have ideological debts to
pay. Each constituency on the winning side would say that it was
their getting out the vote that won. The actual results would depend
on compromises in Congress, because no President has the power to
simply keep the policy promises that elected him.
Over the long haul the U.S. political system has been
more innovative than that of Europe with its sharper ideological
divisions among parties and with its long term individual
leaders of parties who succeed in imposing ideological discipline.
The reason is that when not distracted by personal interest,
our Congressmen are freer to make compromises in the interest
of the country. We don't have the permanent impasses that
afflict Italy for example.
∂11-Oct-88 1358 JMC re: toner cartridges
To: BALDWIN@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
CC: tom@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message from BALDWIN@Score.Stanford.EDU sent Tue 11 Oct 88 13:37:57-PDT.]
Thanks. What I need to know is whether continued availability is reasonably
assured, or should I get another now and take the risk that it will be
outdated when my present one runs out?
∂11-Oct-88 1500 JMC your computer
To: shoham@Score.Stanford.EDU
I have it in my office. If you like, I'll have your secretary
put it in your office.
∂11-Oct-88 1542 JMC re: Reply
To: barwise@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 11 Oct 88 15:41:20 PDT.]
This sounds like something I would like to do. Send it over, and
I'll estimate how long it will take me to reply.
∂12-Oct-88 0951 Mailer re: JMC's campaign analysis
To: KARP@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from KARP@SUMEX-AIM.Stanford.EDU sent Wed, 12 Oct 88 09:15:47 PDT.]
What Bush would do if elected is a substantial unknown compared to
what Dukakis would do. Dukakis has been a governor for some time,
and while he doubtless hoped for higher office, he could never have
given it high probability. Therefore, he probably showed most of
his qualities. Rather left wing Democrat moderated by experience.
Bush has been aimed at becoming President for a long time. As
Vice-President, he has supported Reagan. This is what the job
calls for, and it is also the strategy most likely to win
Reagan's support for his own campaign. He didn't get Reagan
to endorse him in the primaries, but it was clear he didn't
need it. In the main election Reagan has put more work into
supporting Bush than any recent President has put into his
successor's campaign.
Anyway Bush has been discrete, so what he would do as President
is rather unknown. Someone whose opinions I am inclined to
respect told me that he has good advisers, but I don't even
know who they are. They aren't my friends at Hoover, unless
these are very discreet. I don't like his anti-atheist remark;
it suggests a man with strong suppressed prejudices that the
Presidency might bring out. However, as MRC's moderate
messages suggests, we atheists probably don't have too
much to worry about. The problem might be elsewhere.
∂12-Oct-88 1018 JMC re: bias
To: KARP@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 12 Oct 88 10:05:15 PDT.]
I haven't been paying attention to the campaign as such. I don't
watch TV and usually skip the daily articles on what the
candidates said that day. There is legitimate criticism
of Dukakis's support of ACLU positions on restricting
the use of evidence and making more difficult the criteria
for questioning. Bush may have gone beyond what I would
consider legitimate in that direction, but I don't know
what temptations I would be subject to if I were running
for President. I would probably run an overly intellectual
campaign and lose.
∂12-Oct-88 1445 Mailer presidential race
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
The October Atlantic Monthly has articles by William F. Buckley
and Arthur Schlesinger in favor of Bush and Dukakis respectively.
Read these articles if you want something less superficial than
TV. I suspect that reading them will confirm you in the views
you already have.
As you might expect I found Buckley rather convincing and
Schlesinger weak and inclined to avoid certain issues. Two
examples:
Schlesinger praised Reagan for the INF treaty but wrote that
perhaps Reagan's trillion dollar military buildup was unnecessary
to achieve it. He didn't mention the installation of the
Pershings and cruise missiles in Europe, which were the trade-off
for the Soviet SS-20s that had been installed in the 1970s.
Schlesinger wrote that the Reagan Administration has enshrined
greed. Buckley wrote that the tax reduction has increased taxes
paid by the wealthy with the specific example of the capital
gains tax. Here we have the two men arguing past each other. I
have no idea how any Republican would answer the charge that
greed has been enshrined. The argument is entirely anecdotal.
Here's a counter-anecdote. The marginal federal income tax rate
has gone down from 70 percent to 28 percent. When it was 70
percent, the Federal Government essentially paid 70 percent of
any donation to charity, e.g. to Stanford University. Now it
pays 28 percent, and the donor pays the rest. One of the fears
of universities was that the reduction would greatly reduce
donations. As I understand it, donations have increased. This
suggests that the wealthy haven't become more greedy. Doubtless,
more anecdotes on the other side can be cited, but it's hard to
how either point could be proved. Buckley claims, citing an
incautious statement by J. K. Galbraith, that many liberals
believe that tax rates should be punitive on people with high
incomes. That seems somewhat plausible to me, but it's hard to
really know about people's motivations.
Anyway there's more substance in these articles than in a month of TV.
Here's a proposal to encourage greater voter attention to actual
issues.
Suppose the Federal Government agreed to pay for mailing a 60
page electoral magazine to all registered voters throughout the
country one month before the election. Each party would get 30
pages, which it could divide as it chose between its own initial
statement and refutation of the other side's statement. It would
be glossy, large print, and would contain such pictures the sides
chose to offer. Maybe the Feds could also finance the
distribution of two half hour videotapes, made by the two sides
under the same conditions, for the benefit of those who found
that format more acceptable. The two sides could still spend
their own and matching money on 30 second TV spots.
∂12-Oct-88 2348 JMC re: Your travel expenses, IFIP China.
To: YANG%NORUNIT.BITNET@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 12 Oct 88 13:04:43 ECT.]
I'll try again to find the ticket. If not I can supply a duplicate
bill from the travel agency and my certification that I have not
claimed reimbursement from any other source.
∂12-Oct-88 2352 Mailer re: Government campaign financing (was presidential race)
To: J.JBRENNER@Macbeth.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from J.JBRENNER@macbeth.stanford.edu sent Wed 12 Oct 88 21:54:51-PDT.]
Mr. Brenner is under a misapprehension. There is public financing
of Presidential campaigns at present - both in the primaries and
the election itself. The Government matches funds raised by
the candidates up to some maximum. The minor parties get less,
because the can raise less on their own. There are some trigger
conditions; perhaps a certain amount of money has to be raised
from each state.
∂13-Oct-88 1055 Mailer re: Alex Cockburn quote
To: roberts@POLYA.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from roberts@polya.stanford.edu sent 13 Oct 88 16:16:11 GMT.]
In addition to his other activities, Alexander Cockburn is the
Wall Street Journal's house leftist, i.e. he is one of their
rotating stable of commentators. Readers of the WSJ were much
amused a few months ago when he (slightly indierectly) accused
Gorbachev of selling out the Afghanistan communists. He used a
more delicate word than "communist", but I forget what it was.
∂13-Oct-88 1347 JMC
To: helen@PSYCH.Stanford.EDU
Noon Saturday, but where should I pick you up?
∂13-Oct-88 1359 Mailer October surprise
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
It looks like the traditional October surprise has arrived on schedule.
∂13-Oct-88 2138 JMC reply to message
To: RC.STA@FORSYTHE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 13 Oct 88 17:44:19 PDT.]
You can get my standard biography from my secretary, mps@sail.stanford.edu.
∂13-Oct-88 2146 JMC re: Cockburn
To: ilan@GANG-OF-FOUR.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 13 Oct 88 19:41:26 PDT.]
I'm curious, but maybe not enough to read the book. Does it have
a particular theme that you can state?
∂13-Oct-88 2356 JMC re: Noon Saturday
To: helen@PSYCH.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 13 Oct 88 23:50:23 PDT.]
Let it be so.
∂14-Oct-88 1000 JMC
To: MPS
Please send me a message saying when you will be gone.
∂14-Oct-88 1411 JMC re: October surprise
To: S.SALUT@LEAR.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri 14 Oct 88 14:00:50-PDT.]
That's not of sufficient magnitude to affect the election. I was
thinking of the charge that Reagan and Bush were plotting with
Iran before Reagan was elected. That's the sort of surprise that
the advocates of a losing candidate are supposed to try to bring
out in October. How often it actually happens, I don't know.
∂14-Oct-88 1415 JMC re: 3rd party candidates
To: P.EPSTEIN@GSB-WHY.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri 14 Oct 88 13:39:22-PDT.]
I thought Madison and Jefferson were allies. Also I think the
Republican Party started as a third party - or maybe the Whig
Party broke up before the Republican Party formed.
∂14-Oct-88 1428 JMC
To: MPS
ewert.1[let,jmc]
∂14-Oct-88 1430 JMC re: 3rd party candidates
To: P.EPSTEIN@GSB-WHY.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri 14 Oct 88 14:19:26-PDT.]
It's the Republicans that were new. 1856 was the first year they
had a candidate - John C. Fremont. Slogan: Free men, free soil, Fremont.
∂14-Oct-88 1656 JMC
To: CLT
ua 809 sf 1230 nov 7, arr osaka 5pm nov 8
nov 11 ua 810 osaka 630pm, 1045am for Carolyn
ua 810 osaka 630pm, arr 1045am, ua478 1240-609pm
∂14-Oct-88 2025 Mailer Indians of Brazil
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
"In Gorotire, a remote bluff in a bend of the Fresco River,
the case has become an occasion for deep tribal solidarity
among the close to 9,000 Kaiapo. The tribe is preparing an
uncommon show of strength for the day, Oct. 14, when Kube-i
must appear in court in Belem, a large city at the mouth of
the Amazon River. Plans call for several hundred warriors from
Gorotire and a dozen other Kaiapo villages to accompany him
on the 15-hour journey and dance and protest outside the court.
For days messages have been shooting back and forth over the
radio link among the vilages. Small planes must pick up warriors
from the most isolated communities and bring them to Gotorire,
where a dirt road begins."
- NYT October 14
∂14-Oct-88 2134 JMC re: triangles
To: beeson@UCSCD.UCSC.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 14 Oct 88 21:36:15 PDT.]
It looks good. I think about this last for a bit.
∂14-Oct-88 2144 JMC re: the regular tetrahedron
To: beeson@UCSCD.UCSC.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri, 14 Oct 88 21:39:31 PDT.]
That seems reasonable, but do you have any special reason for it?
∂14-Oct-88 2315 Mailer insurance initiatives
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
A conservative organization called Consumer Alert suggests
voting for Proposition 104 as the most sound and the
least radical. They don't seem to recommend NO votes
on the others, but it seems to be implied.
104 has, according to them, both good and
bad aspects. It limits "pain and suffering" awards and
contingency fees. It bars banks from getting into the
insurance business, which Consumer Alert regrets as
limiting competition. It is supported by the insurance
industry and Calif. STate Auto Association and opposed
by Ralph Nader, Calif. Trial Lawyers Association and
Common Cause. They have convinced me. I'll
leave their 4 page recommendation in the CS lounge.
∂15-Oct-88 1121 JMC re: hello
To: meyer@THEORY.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sat, 15 Oct 88 13:37:43 EDT.]
Got your messsage.
∂16-Oct-88 1535 JMC re: briefly
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun 16 Oct 88 14:22:09-PDT.]
Whatever format suits him suits me, but it occurs to me that each of
us might prepare 4 or 5 questions or issues that he would like the
other to discuss - written on half a page, so that it could be
distributed to the audience. I suppose the issue might be
``Can computer programs have beliefs and be intelligent.''
You should ask him about the formulation. Again, I expect to agree
to whatever he might propose.
∂16-Oct-88 1541 JMC re: briefly
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun 16 Oct 88 14:22:09-PDT.]
John McCarthy has worked on problems associated with the logic
approach to AI for 30 years and will discuss what has been
accomplished and what seem to be the next problems. This
involves representing by mathematical logical sentences what a
computer program should know about the common sense world in
general and about specific situations. What it can infer about
what actions will achieve its goals is determined by logical
inference including both logical deduction and formalized
nonmonotonic reasoning.
∂16-Oct-88 1543 Mailer re: new anti-cigarette tax tactic (prop 99)
To: rick@HANAUMA.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from rick@hanauma.stanford.edu sent Sun, 16 Oct 88 09:31:53 pdt.]
I think I voted for that one, but now I have second thoughts.
Is it just persecution of another minority - the smokers?
∂17-Oct-88 0916 JMC re: hello
To: meyer@THEORY.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 17 Oct 88 10:58:20 EDT.]
If you can pay travel expenses, yes, otherwise no.
∂17-Oct-88 0940 JMC re: hello
To: meyer@THEORY.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 17 Oct 88 12:27:02 EDT.]
I have a call in to someone in New York who may have Russell's address -
said to be in California.
∂17-Oct-88 1338 JMC re: 3rd party candidates
To: P.EPSTEIN@GSB-WHY.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 17 Oct 88 12:36:16-PDT.]
You're still confused. The Republican Party ran its first
candidate in 1856. In 1860, the Democrats( formerly the
Republican-Democratic Party) split on the slavery issue, and
Abraham Lincoln was elected as a Republican. This triggered the
Civil War, which started just before Lincoln took office in March
1861. After the war, which ended in April 1865, the Republicans
were dominant until about 1880, when Grover Cleveland was elected
as a Democrat.
∂17-Oct-88 1339 JMC re: Thesis
To: JSW@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message rcvd 17-Oct-88 11:50-PT.]
That will be fine. I expect to be in all afternoon.
∂17-Oct-88 1418 JMC re: hello
To: meyer@THEORY.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 17 Oct 88 14:32:13 EDT.]
Steve Russell, 415 578-1900, is the only one of that group I would
currently recommend. I haven't talked to him in some years, but
he did the first LISP interpreter, based on what I considered a
purely theoretical demonstration that a universal LISP function was
more compact and understandable than a universal Turing machine.
∂17-Oct-88 1521 JMC
To: CLT
Kornberg, who was away last week, called with more questions.
∂17-Oct-88 1651 JMC re: kr'89 panel
To: VAL
[In reply to message sent Tue, 11 Oct 88 17:45:16 edt.]
I agree with your answer.
∂17-Oct-88 2102 JMC re: SSP-lunch
To: HELEN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 17 Oct 88 12:07:18-PDT.]
I'll come to lunch Friday.
∂17-Oct-88 2114 Mailer re: insurance initiatives
To: pallas@POLYA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from pallas@polya.stanford.edu sent 17 Oct 88 16:37:31 GMT.]
Perhaps ideal conservatives against all change exist. I don't recall
meeting any. However, some of us ``conservatives'' are actually
reactionaries and remember a time before there were such enormous
personal injury verdicts. The limitations of pain and suffering
awards in Prop. 104 were attractions. No fault also seems worth
trying here. I put the issue of Consumer Alert in the CSD Lounge,
so you can see for yourself what it says.
∂18-Oct-88 1011 JMC re: this is closed form?
To: rwg@RUSSIAN.SPA.SYMBOLICS.COM
[In reply to message sent Tue, 18 Oct 88 03:19 PDT.]
What's your opinion of Mathematica?
∂18-Oct-88 1212 Mailer re: Vote No on bond issues
To: holstege@Polya.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from holstege@polya.stanford.edu sent 18 Oct 88 13:56:01 GMT.]
Mary Holstege's argument has convinced me that I should have voted
no on the bond issues. Alas, I voted yes (absentee) on a few of them.
∂18-Oct-88 1423 Mailer October surprise
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
There is a tradition in American politics that one side or the
other will present startling charges just beore the election.
The traditional name is the October surpris. It needs just
enough credibility to last through the elction. Here it is
October 18, and we have posters for Coverup right on schedule.
Line up, suckers. Dukakis has to decide whether to endorse it.
I gather that so far he has said nothing.
∂18-Oct-88 1449 JMC scanners
To: fkl@JESSICA.Stanford.EDU
Professor Alphonse Juilland, 321-7819, of the French Department would
like to be able to scan some French novels into a computer and
asked me about it. I got your name as the expert on such matters.
Would you phone him at the above home number? He works at home mostly.
∂18-Oct-88 1545 JMC Rota article
To: barwise@CSLI.Stanford.EDU
It just arrived today, and I've just read it. Are you sure you
want to publish it? It's rather bad history, journalism and
amateur philosophy. There is one aspect that puzzles me. It
is dated December 26, 1985. Subsequent to that date, Rota got
Los Alamos to sponsor a meeting on AI and a special issue of
Daedalus devoted to AI. Daedalus is the publication of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Rota took part both in
preparatory meetings in Boston and in the meeting at Los Alamos.
The special issue came out at the beginning of this year. Does
he really have nothing to add to his 1985 paper based on all these
meetings he attended, and the special issue he helped edit?
If you still want me to write a few pages of reply to it, I would
spend one page on listing some errors, and the rest on a de novo
treatment of Mathematics and AI, but the latter wouldn't be based
on his random remarks.
Incidentally, I would remark that if the Notices wants to go in
for science journalism, then it has to employ a ``fact checker''
like the New Yorker and other respectable publishers. I remember
being asked a large number of detailed questions by a New Yorker
fact checker when they published a Jeremy Bernstein profile of
Marvin Minsky.
A few errors:
Minsky's thesis was 1954, not 1953. His adviser was Albert
Tucker, not Lefschetz, and the readers included John Tukey, John
von Neumann and Lloyd Shapley. It was 400 pages not 1,000 pages.
It cost me a long distance call to verify these facts, but it
would have only been an intra-M.I.T. call for Rota.
Lefschetz was my adviser, but my thesis was 23 pages and on
differential equations. I mention it, because Lefschetz, who
was Department Chairman, may in later years have confused the
two of us.
The characterization of hackers is an exaggeration, and I'd bet
that the role of Feynman is misremembered. A call to Danny Hillis,
the head of Thinking Machines and who can and does write rather well
would establish some facts. Hillis is young, but not as young
as Rota says, and some of the people active in Thinking Machines
are older than Rota.
He might mention that Jack Schwartz is now Director of DARPA's
Information Science and Technology Office and hasn't been exactly
generous to AI.
Maybe Rota sent you the wrong manuscript. Surely he must think
all the effort he put into the Daedalus issue taught him something.
∂18-Oct-88 1606 Mailer re: Taxing "Smokers", Prop 99
To: rhw@SIERRA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
CC: "c.cole@macbeth"@SIERRA.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from rhw@sierra.stanford.edu sent Tue, 18 Oct 1988 15:15:48 PDT.]
The motive for 99 might be partly financial. The liberals are
discouraged about the prospects for repealing proposition 13 and
are looking for other sources.
I think initiatives are a good thing. If we look at what has been
passed, they aren't more harmful than what the legislature has
passed.
I favor the Gann initiative. As an AIDS victim, he has had a lot of
time to think about it, and it only proposes to treat AIDS as other
communicable diseases have been treated in the past. The opposition
is based on the idea that homosexuals have been oppressed, and since
AIDS mostly afflicts them, we should change past public health practice
in order to accomodate their preferences. While the homosexual
organizations oppose nonvoluntary AIDS testing, and aggressive contact
tracing, there is every reason to believe that these measures will
reduce the number of homosexuals who die of AIDS. Compulsory contact
tracing has greatly reduced other infectious diseases.
∂18-Oct-88 1607 JMC re: Tenured Faculty Meeting
To: BSCOTT@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 18 Oct 88 15:58:17-PDT.]
I intend to abstain.
∂18-Oct-88 2159 JMC Re: Rota article
To: VAL
∂18-Oct-88 2022 barwise@russell.Stanford.EDU Re: Rota article
Received: from russell.Stanford.EDU by SAIL.Stanford.EDU with TCP; 18 Oct 88 20:22:35 PDT
Received: from localhost by russell.Stanford.EDU (4.0/4.7); Tue, 18 Oct 88 20:24:58 PDT
To: JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
Subject: Re: Rota article
In-Reply-To: Your message of 18 Oct 88 15:45:00 PDT.
<l4sff@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Address: CSLI, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305 (415) 723-0110
Date: Tue, 18 Oct 88 20:24:56 PDT
From: Jon Barwise <barwise@russell.Stanford.EDU>
Oh, dear, sounds bad. I assumed he knew what he was talking about. I
guess I had better write him and either reject the paper (which is a
bit hard since I invited him to submit something) or at least suggest
that he improve it, update it, and check up on his facts.
Thanks. Why don't you forget this version.
Jon
∂18-Oct-88 2255 JMC re: Rota article
To: barwise@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 18 Oct 88 20:24:56 PDT.]
OK. If at some time it seems reasonable, I would be glad to write
a Notices article on mathematics and AI, emphasizing the extent to
which AI does and doesn't present problems of primary mathematical
interest.
∂19-Oct-88 0220 Mailer re: October surprise
To: les@GANG-OF-FOUR.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from les@gang-of-four.stanford.edu sent 19 Oct 88 08:46:43 GMT.]
Nothing like a good conspiracy theory. It would be interesting to
elaborate it. To begin with, are Jesse Jackson and Michael Dukakis
part of the conspiracy?
∂19-Oct-88 0240 JMC bicycling
To: elliott%slacv.bitnet@FORSYTHE.Stanford.EDU
I had other commitments for the last several weekends, but are you
cycling this Saturday? I've been around the loop twice recently.
∂19-Oct-88 0244 JMC bicycling
To: elliott%slacvm.bitnet@FORSYTHE.Stanford.EDU
I had other commitments for the last several weekends, but are you
and Sue cycling this Saturday? I've been around the loop twice recently.
∂19-Oct-88 1015 JMC re: hello
To: meyer@THEORY.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon, 17 Oct 88 14:32:13 EDT.]
Could someone make me a hotel reservation convenient to the celebration,
Tuesday and Wednesday nights?
∂19-Oct-88 1152 JMC re: bicycling
To: ELLIOTT%SLACVM.BITNET@FORSYTHE.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent 19 Oct 88 11:47 PST.]
That's a good time. Shall we meet at Foothill and Campus Drive again?
If you phone me at home just before you leave home, I'll get to the meeting
place on time.
∂19-Oct-88 1353 JMC re: qlisp for okuno
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 19-Oct-88 13:22-PT.]
That's too thin an argument. I would rather make the argument that
the Japanese are our allies, and they have done good work on LISP and
that collaboration with them is worthwhile.
∂19-Oct-88 1403 JMC PI Meeting
To: MPS
∂19-Oct-88 1333 pimeet@vax.darpa.mil PI Meeting
Received: from vax.darpa.mil by SAIL.Stanford.EDU with TCP; 19 Oct 88 13:33:13 PDT
Posted-Date: Wed 19 Oct 88 13:46:03-EDT
Received: by vax.darpa.mil (5.54/5.51)
id AA08113; Wed, 19 Oct 88 13:46:05 EDT
Date: Wed 19 Oct 88 13:46:03-EDT
From: Mark Pullen <PIMEET@vax.darpa.mil>
Subject: PI Meeting
To: ISTO-PI-LIST@vax.darpa.mil
Message-Id: <593286363.0.PIMEET@VAX.DARPA.MIL>
Mail-System-Version: <VAX-MM(217)+TOPSLIB(128)@VAX.DARPA.MIL>
Ladies and Gentlemen:
Just a reminder that the cut-off for hotel reservations at the Hyatt is
this Friday, October 21. Please be sure to take care of this soon.
Also, for those of you who were told that there were no rooms available
at the Hyatt and subsequently booked the Hilton, please feel free to
change your reservations to the Hyatt. There really is plenty of room!
Hyatt Reservations: 214/453-8400.
Juanita Walton
-------
∂19-Oct-88 1424 JMC re: qlisp for okuno
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 19-Oct-88 14:06-PT.]
We can mention it, but we should discuss it with Pullen, and even
better Schwartz, in Dallas.
∂19-Oct-88 1526 JMC re: hello
To: meyer@THEORY.LCS.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Wed, 19 Oct 88 14:13:12 EDT.]
I tracked down Fredkin in Japan, and I will be staying with him,
so I won't need a hotel reservation after all.
∂19-Oct-88 1526 JMC
To: ME
Boise hasn't responded since yesterday.
∂19-Oct-88 1730 JMC re: Dallas
To: MPS
[In reply to message rcvd 19-Oct-88 16:42-PT.]
Take the one without penalty to San Jose. The meeting in Dallas ends at noon.
∂19-Oct-88 2232 JMC ingenuity
To: CLT
Timothy wasn't sleepy and after I put him down reappeared and
demanded to sleep in my bed. I put him there, but he kept
coming back in the office. I finally got annoyed enough to
put him back in his own bed to the accompaniment of some tears.
Another ten minutes went by and he reappeared in a quiet mood
with his bottle and made a small speech saying the bottle was
empty and he wanted more milk. I agreed to that and said
"Come on downstairs". He replied, "I'll wait for you",
and I went down to heat some milk. When I came back up I
couldn't find him in my room or anywhere. Eventually
I discovered him in my bed absolutely quiet and flattened
out so much that I had missed him. He took the bottle and
has been quiet.
∂20-Oct-88 1004 Mailer re: Amazon rain forest destruction
To: rick@HANAUMA.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from rick@hanauma.stanford.edu sent Thu, 20 Oct 88 08:48:58 pdt.]
ABC News has the right to order anyone to do anything. Noncompliance
risks the ire of ABC News. The battle about destroying the forest
in Brazil is basically among Brazilians with ABC as a kibitzer.
∂20-Oct-88 1510 JMC place to sit
To: john@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
If there is a place for me to sit at CSLI, I would use it
occasionally, especially around the time of interesting
CSLI events but also as an escape from distractions.
∂20-Oct-88 1551 JMC re: some Symbolic System Forums Announcements
To: HOFFMAN@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 20 Oct 88 15:03:08-PDT.]
That's Sweet Hall.
∂20-Oct-88 1834 JMC
To: JK
How is the 91 function doing?
∂20-Oct-88 1840 Mailer At least some Marxist-Leninists are left.
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
a258 1819 20 Oct 88
By BRYNA BRENNAN
Associated Press Writer
MANAGUA, Nicaragua (AP) - Hurricane Joan left at least 11 people
dead in Venezuela and then sent tens of thousands of people fleeing
for safety as it closed in on Central America Thursday with heavy
rain and 105 mph winds.
.
.
.
President Daniel Ortega enacted an emergency law banning
communications media from reporting unauthorized news about the
hurricane.
.
.
.
∂20-Oct-88 1903 JMC reply to message
To: JK
[In reply to message rcvd 20-Oct-88 18:59-PT.]
What I would like to see first is the proof that there is such an
object satisfying the equation - remembering that if not all the
functions involved were continuous, there need not be any.
∂20-Oct-88 2315 JMC letter[1,jmc]
To: MPS
Please decorate beckma.4 and try to enter the letters you have
done for me in letter[1,jmc]. You told me you forgot some.
∂21-Oct-88 0922 JMC Japanese visa
To: CLT
The Japanese visa stamped in my passport is good for five years,
so I suppose yours is also, but you had better check it.
∂21-Oct-88 1427 JMC phone message
To: MPS
Monday morning, please phone the SE2 office 212 840-6595 and
tell them that the award I won is the Kyoto prize of the Inamori
Foundation.
∂21-Oct-88 1508 JMC dinner with Susie, etc.
To: CLT
Susie, Dan, Kitty Rose and Joseph will be here tonight. I plan to take
Timothy to dinner with them. Are you interested in coming?
∂22-Oct-88 1004 JMC re: Hazel
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 22-Oct-88 10:02-PT.]
It was done.
∂22-Oct-88 1314 JMC
To: CLT
Bonnie Britten-Straight, friend of Gunthers,
might be interested in renting our house for a while.
408 427-0181
∂22-Oct-88 1846 Mailer Quayle
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Quayle was recently defended as an effective Senator by Ted Kennedy.
Curiously, the latest Accuracy in Media attacks the media for attacking
Quayle and makes a comparison between Quayle's record and that of Jack
Kennedy up to the time Kennedy ran for President. It claims that Quayle
got more important bills passed and had better attendance. It remarks
that Kennedy had one accomplishment as Senator that Quayle didn't;
Kennedy wrote a best-selling book. How many BBoard readers have
read Kennedy's book?
∂22-Oct-88 2256 Mailer criticism of ACLU
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
The Oct 31 New Republic includes a critical article on the
ACLU's activities since 1973. It credits ACLU with its
early contributions to civil liberties and then accuses
the ACLU of ``hostility to the processes of constitutional
democracy. This hostility takes two forms: first, in
attempts to override democratic processes, and replace
them with judicial decrees, in ever larger spheres of
public life, and second, in attempts to expand individual
`rights' without regard for countervailing public
interests.''
The examples of ACLU positions specifically criticized
include (1) support for a court order requiring the
city of Richmond to award 30 percent of public works
contracts to minority firms. (2) opposition to laws
requiring informing parents of minors having abortions.
(3) a prisoners' rights lower court decision requiring
individual cells for prisoners and other things.
(4) claiming that a person's privacy was violated when
police in an airplane spotted marijuana plants and
later got a search warrant, the Joyce Brown case.
The writer also grumbles that he was refused access to
past annual reports when he visited ACLU headquarters.
This article doesn't mention ACLU's recent more specifically
political stands, e.g. on Nicaragua, with which Bush
surely disagrees and has the right to suggest that
Dukakis supports.
∂23-Oct-88 0927 JMC re: common knowledge
To: barwise@RUSSELL.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Sun, 23 Oct 88 08:44:55 PDT.]
The following paper includes axioms for common knowledge that has
the desired property. The basic forem of the axioms dates from
about 1960 but weren't published. I don't know that I made a
point of the observation, because I considered it obvious. If
that makes it too complicated for a reference, I don't mind.
{\bf McCarthy, John (1977)}:
``On The Model Theory of Knowledge'' (with M. Sato, S. Igarashi, and
T. Hayashi), {\it Proceedings of the Fifth International Joint Conference
on Artificial Intelligence}, M.I.T., Cambridge, Mass.
∂23-Oct-88 1217 Mailer The issue is competence not ideology
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
This slogan of Dukakis's acceptance speech is responsible for the
trivial nature of the campaign. The Democrats lost twice to
Reagan with ideological campaigns and now are trying to sneak
into office in disguise. Consider some issues.
1. comparable worth. This is perhaps NOW's chief issue,
but they have been silent. If Dukakis wins, they'll start
pounding the table.
2. the Supreme Court. The choice between (say) another
try at Bork and Lawrence Tribe would not be made by Dukakis on
the basis of who had better papers published in law reviews. It
would be made on the basis of ideology.
3. Nicaragua. The Democrats essentially got their way,
but those in favor of repeating the Carter Administration action
of giving $75 million to the Sandinistas will come out if Dukakis
is elected.
4. Nuclear energy. Dukakis prevented the Seabrook plant
from operating by claiming that the bit of its 10 mile zone that
extends into Massachusett can't be evacuated. However, he
doesn't mention this in the campaign.
All the various issue organizations that support the
Democrats are going along with the "competence" strategy and
keeping their mouths shut. This includes the AFL-CIO, Jackson,
NOW, NEA, ACLU, NAACP, the Institute of Policy Studies and all
manner of ideologically liberal academics. Even the BBOARD
liberals have laid off issues and concentrated on Quayle.
Of course, the liberal organizations will resume
publicity right after the election regardless of who wins. If
Dukakis wins, they'll claim their reward. If Dukakis loses,
they'll ascribe his loss to not advancing their claim. For
example, maybe NOW will claim that Dukakis lost his advantage
among women by not pushing comparable worth.
The only people who are pushing their views these days
are the anti-abortion activists. They just recently discovered
civil disobedience as a tactic and are getting a big kick out
of it. They couldn't stop even if it were adversely affecting
Bush, and it doesn't seem to be. I don't recall Bush even being
asked what he thinks of them. But then they don't ask Dukakis
either.
The Bush campaign has substantially gone along with this
approach. Why should they change when it seems that they're winning?
Right wing ideologists will also come out of the woodwork right
after the election.
The one hook Bush has used is to take advantage of one of
Dukakis's mistakes. It was Dukakis who first used the phrase
"card carrying member of the ACLU" to refer to himself. Bush
took it up. Journalists and academics who know about McCarthyism
in the 1950s have used it to counter-attack against Bush by
comparing his use of the phrase with Joe McCarthy's. It is
barely conceivable that the Bush campaign used the phrase
precisely in order to provoke this counter-attack which keeps the
phrase before the public. Remember that relatively few voters
have much memory of that period and even fewer fully share the
liberal mythology about it. The actual effect of keeping the
ACLU salient in the public mind is to cause people to evaluate
the candidates according to their memory of ACLU positions. Few
remember the ACLU defense of free speech that lasted through the
fifties, when the main victories were won. More remember the
ACLU positions since 1973 in favor of quotas and for what many
regard as extreme positions about what rights the Constitution
gives criminals.
By showing off their historical knowledge about what
"card-carrying" meant in the 1950s, the liberals have done some
of Bush's work for him. After the election we may find out
whether the Bush people anticipated this effect. If so, we can
be sure that someone will try to take credit for thinking of it.
Perhaps he will be able to command really high consulting fees
from the Democrats next time.
∂23-Oct-88 1804 JMC
To: rdz@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
No thanks. Ate too recently.
∂23-Oct-88 1907 Mailer re: criticism of ACLU
To: pallas@POLYA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from pallas@polya.stanford.edu sent 23 Oct 88 21:28:22 GMT.]
ACLU support didn't mean in any of the cases cited, the ACLU merely issuing
a press release. It involved, it was explicitly stated in some case
and I take it to be true in all, the ACLU filing a brief in the case,
i.e. spending its money. The case cited in the New Republic article
involve "among other claims" a slow elevator to the exercise area,
private cells, and access to a xerox machine in the prison library.
I didn't quote them before, because I don't know what the main claims
were.
Basically, I agree with Inder that a prisoner's rights should include
protection from violence by other prisoners. In the Texas case, however,
reducing the authority of the system to use prisoners to maintain
order, resulted in rule of the prisons by gangs and more than 50
intra-prison murders. Of course, the ACLU could say that if only
the state of Texas had given new prisons higher priority than new
schools, secure new prisons could have been built. I don't know
if ACLU was involved in the Texas case.
My purpose in citing the New Republic article was to show that
some people have substantive reasons for disagreeing with ACLU
and trying to connect political rivals with ACLU positions.
My guess is that the criticisms have merit, but I haven't remembered
enough of what I read previously to offer a tight argument.
Another major criticism is that ACLU has gone on to interpret
major left-right political disagreements as civil rights issues.
This lost them people like Thornburgh many years ago.
∂23-Oct-88 2234 JMC
To: suppes@CSLI.Stanford.EDU
Ershov, Andrei P. Computation Center, Novosibirsk 630090, USSR
(work in Novosibirsk: 8-3832 35 03 52) (home: 35 57 38)
Acad. A. P. Ershov, Chairman
USSR Council of Cybernetics
117333 Moscow, ul. Vavilova 40
USSR
∂24-Oct-88 1015 JMC
To: CLT
Frank Rosa, painter
408 985-2160 after 5pm
∂24-Oct-88 1016 JMC
To: CLT
notes[1,jmc] is an expanding file of notes of all kinds.
∂24-Oct-88 1028 JMC re: umbrella
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 24-Oct-88 10:24-PT.]
OK about Friedland. Is it time to harass Pullen? I will
be at Rockefeller University, Founders Hall tonight, at
Fred Seitz's office there tomorrow, and at Fredkin's
617 277-4444 Tuesday and Wednesday nights. Back Thursday
night.
∂24-Oct-88 1029 JMC
To: CLT
I unprotected notes.
∂24-Oct-88 1032 JMC re: pullen
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 24-Oct-88 10:31-PT.]
Wait on Okuno. This is better discussed in person.
∂27-Oct-88 2315 JMC re: Office Space at CSLI
To: BETSY@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 25 Oct 88 16:36:03-PDT.]
Those arrangements seem fine, and maybe I will coincide with my office
mates at some time. I'll pass on the terminal for the time being.
∂27-Oct-88 2319 JMC re: Alex Gorbis
To: littell@POLYA.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 27 Oct 88 10:47:41 PDT.]
I should be charged to the DARPA Formal Reasoning contract, i.e.
same as Lifschitz.
∂27-Oct-88 2321 JMC re: date of my exam
To: GLB
[In reply to message rcvd 25-Oct-88 17:41-PT.]
Nov 22 is ok with me.
∂28-Oct-88 1114 JMC Please phone
To: MPS
John Denning, 851-0121, and tell him that I will be teaching Epistemological
Problems of AI and Technological Opportunities for Humanity Winter Quarter.
∂28-Oct-88 1322 JMC re: goto
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 28-Oct-88 11:28-PT.]
ok.
∂28-Oct-88 1736 JMC re: PI Meeting - Speech
To: PIMEET@VAX.DARPA.MIL
[In reply to message sent Fri 28 Oct 88 20:30:05-EDT.]
LISP, Mathematical Logic and Artificial Intelligence
∂28-Oct-88 1740 JMC
To: VAL
suppes 321-6594.
∂28-Oct-88 1746 Mailer re: Warren Redlich on lawyers and stereotypes
To: ginsberg@POLYA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from ginsberg@polya.stanford.edu sent 29 Oct 88 00:26:19 GMT.]
Two years ago, I gave a keynote address to a conference on AI and
law. and met lots of lawyers there. When I remarked to Marvin
Minsky that there were lots a smart and creative people among
lawyers, he replied, "Yes, what a tragedy." I entirely agree
with Minsky. I have met many lawyers since, and I don't agree
with Crispin that they are bad people on the whole. However,
they have created a system that unnecessarily employs lots of
them. Two weeks ago I spent a day in Federal Court in New York
as an expert witness in a patent suit about video games. There
were 25 people in that court room, not one of whom was a
spectator, and each of whom seemed to be doing a professional job
in the system that has been created.
My opinion is that the Japanese are much better off with a less
developed legal system. The injustice against Koreans has nothing
to do with a lack of lawyers.
The patent lawyer with whom I dealt was a pleasant fellow and had
his initial education as an electrical engineer. I fear that he
found being a lawyer a more interesting job, although the country
would probably have been better off had he remained an engineer.
∂28-Oct-88 1811 Mailer re: Coverup ("October Surprise")
To: cheshire!conor@LABREA.STANFORD.EDU,
su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from cheshire!conor@labrea.stanford.edu sent 29 Oct 88 00:47:46 GMT.]
Someone at M.I.T., where I was this week, told me that the Boston
Globe, no friend of the right, had examined the allegations in
Coverup and decided they weren't worth pursuing.
∂30-Oct-88 1238 JMC re: Electronic mail
To: JSW@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message rcvd 30-Oct-88 03:59-PT.]
I'm glad of your interest but won't do more on the MAIL issue until
I get back from Japan. Let's talk about it.
∂30-Oct-88 2204 Mailer re: those whales
To: Crispin@SUMEX-AIM.Stanford.EDU, SU-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from Crispin@SUMEX-AIM.Stanford.EDU sent Sun, 30 Oct 88 20:12:59 PST.]
In 1952 it was considered A GOOD DEED to eat whale meat, and the
Bell Labs cafeteria served it. It was rather tough and I don't
recall it tasting particularly good, certainly not as good as beef.
As to "The humane thing to do would have been to dispatch the three of
them immediately", we could have an election on the subject of whom it would
be the humane thing to dispatch immediately. This would enliven matters,
since the presidential election seems to have reached a stage of boring
BBOARD readers. Any nomination speeches?
∂30-Oct-88 2309 JMC randomness
To: RPG
"An even worse example can be found in the 1985 LISP text by Gabriel [10]
which uses a = 17 and m = 251. Again, the multiplier is not a primitive
root of the modulus and the resulting period in this case is just 125."
∂31-Oct-88 1200 JMC reply to message
To: RPG
[In reply to message rcvd 31-Oct-88 10:33-PT.]
I suggest you don't bother. If I understand you correctly, since the
LISP benchmarks aren't genuine Monte Carlo problems, it doesn't matter
if the random number generator isn't too good. It might be worthwhile,
however, to take the advice in the article for the random number generator
in Lucid's Common Lisp.
∂31-Oct-88 1726 JMC
To: VAL
Everything is presumed to remain in the state in which it is.
- Leibniz's Principles of Topical Knowledge in his
An Introduction to a Secret Encyclopedia
∂31-Oct-88 1828 Mailer re: Crispin and Everyday Economics
To: berglund@POLYA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from berglund@polya.stanford.edu sent Mon, 31 Oct 88 15:11:29 PDT.]
Berglund is basically correct. In fact one company I know billed
expert consulting time at $2,000 per day. However, there is another
reason why lawyers and salesmen can sometimes command really
enormous incomes. This is because they are close to where money
changes hands. Whether a customer buys a $10 million computer
is a discrete event, and the salesman's contribution to it is
apparent. At least the company may well believe that without
this great salesman, the sale would have been lost. Likewise,
a company faced with a lawsuit may believe that having the
best lawyer makes several million dollars difference in
what they will have to pay.
Now engineers can make even more difference IN THE LONG RUN.
To take one example, John Backus's successful leadership of
the Fortran group, probably meant some billions of dollars
to IBM in the long run. However, there will never be any
precise evaluation of how much difference it made. Moreover,
the immediate effect of an engineer's invention on his employer
is a request to spend money to develop it. Therefore, engineers
may be often well paid, but unless they start their own companies,
they will never get the very large sums that some salesmen and
engineers get. IBM made Backus an IBM Fellow, which means he
does what he likes. That's better than most companies do, but
it's tiny compared to the differece he probably made in their
income. I invented Lisp in 1958-59, but I can't even
get a free Lisp machine out of the companies that make them.
I find that normal if ungrateful. Right now, of course, they're
losing money, and they probably think I should pay them.
∂31-Oct-88 2134 JMC
To: VAL
Whom shall I telephone at Ablex to find out the schedule?
∂31-Oct-88 2154 JMC re: AIList Digest V8 #117
To: AIList@AI.AI.MIT.EDU
[In reply to message sent Mon 31 Oct 1988 20:39-EST.]
AI as computer science and the scientific epistemology of the
common sense world.
Intelligence can be studied
(1) through the physiology of the brain,
(2) through psychology,
(3) through studying the tasks presented in the achievement of
goals in the common sense world.
No one of the approaches can be excluded by a priori arguments,
and I believe that all three will eventually succeed, but one
will succeed more quickly than the other two and will help mop up
the other two. I have left out sociology, because I think its
contribution will be peripheral.
AI is the third approach. It proceeds mainly in computer science
departments, and many of its methods are akin to other computer
science topics. It involves experimenting with computer programs
and sometimes hardware and rarely includes either psychological
or physiological experiments with humans or animals. It isn't
further from other computer science topics than they are from
each other and there are more and more hybrids of AI with
other CS topics all the time.
Perhaps Simon doesn't like the term AI, because his and Newell's
work involves a hybrid with psychology and has involved psychological
experiments as well as experimental computer programming. Surely
some people should pursue that mixture, which has sometimes
been fruitful, but most AI researchers stick to experimental
programming and also AI theory.
In my opinion the core of AI is the study of the common sense world
and how a system can find out how to achieve its goals. Achieving
goals in the common sense world involves a different kind of
information situation than science has had to deal with previously.
This fact causes most scientists to make mistakes in thinking about
it. Some pick an aspect of the world that permits a conventional
mathematical treatment and retreat into it. The result is that
their results often have only a metaphorical relation to intelligence.
Others demand differential equations and spend their time rejecting
approaches that don't have them.
Why does the common sense world demand a different approach? Here are
some reasons.
(1) Only partial information is available. It is partial not merely
quantitatively but also qualitatively. We don't know all the
relevant phenomena. Nevertheless, humans can often achieve goals
using this information, and there is no reason humans can't understand
the processes required to do it well enough to program them in computers.
(2) The concepts used in common sense reasoning have a qualitatively
approximate character. This is treated in my paper ``Ascribing
Mental Qualities to Machines.''
(3) The theories that can be obtained will not be fully predictive
of behavior. They will predict only when certain conditions are
met. Curiously, while many scientists demand fully predictive theories,
when they build digital hardware, they accept engineering specifications
that aren't fully predictive. For example, consider a flip-flop with
a J input, a K input and a clock input. The manufacturer specifies
what will happen if the clock is turned on for long enough and then
turned of provided exactly one of the J and K inputs remains high
during this period and the other remains low. The specifications
do not say what will happen if both are high or both are low or
if they change while the clock is turned on. The manufacturer
doesn't guarantee that all the flip-flops he sells will behave
in the same way under these conditions or that he won't change
without notice how they behave. All he guarantees is what
will happen when the flip-flop is used in accordance with the
``design rules''. Computer scientists are also quite properly
uninterested in non-standard usage. This contrasts with linear
circuit theory which in principle tells how a linear circuit will
respond to any input function of time. Newtonian and
non-relativistic quantum mechanics tell how particles respond to
arbitrary forces. Quantum field theory seems to be more picky.
Many programs have specified behavior only for inputs meeting
certain conditions, and some programming languages refrain
from specifying what will happen if certain conditions aren't
met. The implementer make the compiler do whatever is convenient
or even not figure out what will happen.
What we can learn about the common sense world is like what is
specified about the flip-flop, only even more limited.
Therefore, some people regard the common sense world as unfair
and refuse to do science about it.
∂01-Nov-88 1128 Mailer re: more "pro-animal" racism/nationalism
To: Crispin@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU, SU-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from Crispin@SUMEX-AIM.Stanford.EDU sent Tue, 1 Nov 88 10:49:14 PST.]
In my opinion, the eskimoes might just as well have eaten the whales
as they would have done 15 years ago. However, Crispin is wrong in
supposing that the motivation of the save-the-whales people and
the people who support the campaign against Koreans eating dogs
is racism. These people are against red-blooded American deer
hunters and alligator hunters also. The sentiment has its gradations,
ranging from objections to torturing animals for the fun of it too
objections to swatting mosquitoes and the Jains who make an effort
to avoid stepping on bugs. If there were a feasible way to avoid
millions of intestinal bacteria dying every time a person defecates,
some would favor that. Most people are in the middle, eating meat
but objecting to wanton cruelty to animals. Now that most of us
no longer face daily choices like that in beating a donkey or
not getting it to pull the cart to the field, we have, on the
average, become nicer to animals. We also don't have to kill our
own chickens. We do swat flies, but many draw the line at
boiling a lobster beginning with a live lobster in the pot.
The sentiment is motivated by fellow feeling for animals, derived
from fellow feeling for people. A dog's affection for his
master is an adaptation of the instincts of a puppy to follow its
mother, the instinct of a mother dog to not eat her puppies and
the instinct of a dog to defer to a pack leader. Our ancestors
killed dogs deficient in this modification. Similarly the master's
affection for his dog is an adaptation of our affection for children
or something like that.
However, the movements for animal rights involve another human
tendency, the tendency to see others as immoral and to attack
them in various ways. There is a lot of free floating aggressiveness
around that gets sopped up in various causes, each of which
combines some kind of fellow feeling with aggressiveness. Perhaps
the combination is related to our instincts to form tribes
that are hostile to other tribes. Racism is only one of the
manifestations of this instinct and probably not the most dangerous
one in America at the moment. At Stanford anti-racism has
done more damage recently.
Other movements that combine humanitarian instincts with tribal
hostility are feminism, the pro-abortion meovement, the anti-abortion
movement, anti-capitalism and environmentalism. This doesn't
prove that the goals of any particular cause is wrong, but all
of them have a tendency to fight alligators rather than drain
the swamp. Movements generated by causes also become careers
for their professionals.
Two final remarks:
1. The chief contribution of the peace movement to world peace has
probably been its tendency to divert people with a tendency to
violence into relatively peaceful forms of protest.
2. I worry about the possible end of the cold war between the U.S.
and the Soviet Union. The combative tendencies of the countries
of Western Europe have been diverted into arming against the Soviet
Union, but this hasn't led to war. Perhaps an arms race against
a foe too distant or frightening to attack is the most peaceful
mode of existence present day human political organization permits.
This suggests world government as a means of preventing war, but
my opinion, alas, is that world government would be, in the long
run, a much greater disaster for humanity than even nuclear war.
∂01-Nov-88 1213 JMC 857-0672
To: CLT
We can keep it. We need to phone the Business office a week before
we move.
∂01-Nov-88 1219 JMC re: getting ahold of Dr. John Sowa
To: iris@CIVE.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue, 1 Nov 88 12:01:55 pst.]
He's a friend of Gio Wiederhold who would probably have his current
email address. If he doesn't have it, I have an old one I can find
for you.
∂01-Nov-88 1223 JMC Please find out
To: MPS
whether there was a PhD student named Dany Guindi and what
connection I had with him. He gave me as a reference, and
I don't remember him at all.
∂01-Nov-88 1321 Mailer anti-racism
To: su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
Reading the November 1 Stanford Daily confirms my impression that
``anti-racism'' has become the basis one more form of oppressive
moralism --- what Mencken called ``wowserism''. I fear that we
will have required courses on ``other cultures'' which will
amount to indoctrination with the students pressured into
parrotting the views of the professors in order to get good
grades. I fear we will even see instances of students being
required to give acceptable analyses of the concealed racist
views of conservative candidates for office. The left, led at
present by Jackson Democrats and the dominant part of the
academic community including Stanford, has shown no capacity for
distinguishing opposition to its own political agenda from
racism.
∂01-Nov-88 1511 JMC re: anti-racism
To: G.GSB@MACBETH.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 1 Nov 88 14:55:12-PST.]
I am replying just to you, because I don't see an indication in your
message that it was also to su-etc and I don't see it in our su-etc.
If there is something I don't understand about how bboard replies
work at Macbeth, I'd like to know.
I fear indoctrination for several reasons.
1. The motivation of the proposals for required courses is that people
don't have the beliefs they should.
2. Many of the people demanding required courses will regard them
as tokens unless they indoctrinate.
3. If opinion polls taken after the courses, show that students don't
have the correct views, there will be demand to indoctrinate even more.
4. The people who will want jobs teaching these courses have shown
little respect for freedom of opinion. Many of them regard all education
as indoctrination and only want it to be their kind of indoctrination.
∂01-Nov-88 1629 JMC re: Final Touches
To: BLUMENTHAL@a.ISI.EDU, duane.adams@CS.CMU.EDU, dongarra@MCS.ANL.GOV,
gannon%rdvax.dec@decwrl.dec.com, gossard@CADLAB2.MIT.EDU,
hearn@RAND-UNIX.ARPA, jlh@VSOP.STANFORD.EDU,
mchenry%guvax.bitnet@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU, ouster@GINGER.BERKELEY.EDU,
ralston@MCC.COM, thornj@max.acs.washington.edu, CWeissman@DOCKMASTER.ARPA,
troywil@IBM.COM
[In reply to message from BLUMENTHAL@A.ISI.EDU sent Tue 1 Nov 88 17:20:47-EST.]
I have been thinking about Soviet access to Western computer
technology on lines somewhat orthogonal to the committee's deliberations.
I'm sorry I didn't write it up sooner, because I think it's too late
to incorporate its ideas in the report even if the committee considered
it appropriate. I would like to refer to the committee report when it
is released. Here are my ideas, and I would welcome comments including
comments about where it might be appropriate to direct the essay.
%soviet[f88,jmc] Terms for Soviet access to Western computer technology
\input memo.tex[let,jmc]
\title{TERMS FOR SOVIET ACCESS TO WESTERN COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY}
The object of this essay is to suggest that the United
States and its allies undertake to set terms for greatly
increased Soviet access to Western computer and other electronic
technology. We will also have to sell the Soviets on changing
their ways of importing technology and on the advantages of paying
the price we ask.
Here are some considerations.
1. The Soviets are far behind in these areas. They have been
behind ever since the computer industry started and are not catching up.
2. The Western countries through the COCOM consortium restrict
technology exports to the Soviet Union for defense reasons. In the
computer area the newest technologies are restricted, but the restrictions
on any particular technology are removed after some years, averaging
five years.
3. The Soviets import some Western computer technology in
compliance with the restrictions.
4. The Soviets steal other technology, chiefly through getting
unscrupulous Western businessmen to set up dummy companies, purchase
the computers and smuggle them. Every so often Western countries catch
someone at it and arrest them. Only small numbers of computers are
illegally imported. Probably they are mainly imported to be copied
rather than just for use. The Soviets copied the IBM 360/370 line starting
in the middle 1960s with only moderate success. In the middle 1970s
they started making computers compatible with the D.E.C PDP-11 and
more recently the VAX. This hasn't been very successful either.
5. Theft as a means of getting technology has serious disadvantages
for the Soviets. Here are some.
a. The documentation obtained often doesn't agree with the
hardware.
b. The normal use of computer technology involves continued
communication between the users of the hardware or software and the
suppliers. This communication involves correcting users' mistakes, resolving
ambiguities and incompleteness in the documentation, getting bugs that
have arisen in the users' work corrected, and getting information about
projected improvements in the software and hardware. The Soviets and
their allies have no reliable way of communicating with the suppliers
of the technology they steal. As a result initial compatibility with foreign
technology often lost when the Soviets have to improvise a solution to
a problem that arises. Their solution is likely to be incompatibile with
changes made by the supplier.
c. The KGB or whoever steals the technology insists that
the technology be kept under wraps, and this interferes with communication
within the Soviet Union.
d. Institutions with stolen technology are restricted
in their communication with foreigners.
6. Very likely the KGB doesn't understand the difficulties
their methods make for their Soviet customers. Most likely they are
proud of their intelligence coups. Our intelligence people are chagrined
at the KGB's successes but may not be in a position to analyze how much
use Soviet industry gets from it.
7. The COCOM restrictions have important effects in
limiting Soviet computer technology. However, they are
probably less than the effects of the Soviets' own restrictions on
their ability to absorb foreign technology. Here are some details.
a. They restrict foreign travel by their own scientists
and engineers far beyond the restrictions imposed by their lack
of foreign currency. While they get all the important foreign
scientific journals in their central libraries,
distribution throughout the country is weak, and there are very
few individual subscriptions. This makes use of foreign ideas
difficult, and encourages complacency about how well they are
doing.
b. When they do buy foreign computers legally, they usually
restrict their contacts with the service organizations of the
companies from which they purchase. For example, they don't
let them set up service organizations within the Soviet Union.
This makes service calls very difficult.
8. The Gorbachev reforms are making the Soviet Union
more congenial to many people all over the world. Lots of
people didn't see the defense importance of observing COCOM
restrictions in the past, and this number will increase. The
number of suppliers has increased. The COCOM system may weaken
considerably.
9. It would increase the Soviet standard of living
considerably over the long term to induce the West to
relax or abandon restrictions on technology transfer. It
would be to their advantage to pay a considerable price
for this relaxation. Running a technology race with the
rest of the world is something they can't win.
10. The Soviet standard of living hasn't been the
dominant consideration with the Politburo in the past, and it
isn't obvious today what its priority is relative to military
advantage.
11. Some Western people favor relaxing the restrictions
unilaterally to encourage Gorbachev, to promote peace, because
they consider them wasted effort or for other reasons. They have
had some success from time to time, but there is no reason to
suppose they will get the West to abandon the restrictions to an
extent that would remove them as a hindrance to Soviet
technology. Therefore, the West has bargaining power.
12. To the extent that the West is agreeable, the best Soviet
strategy is to rejoin the world technologically. This means
buying Western products and technology from a variety of countries
using the same commercial practices as are used among Western
countries. It means letting Western companies set up sales and
service organizations within the Soviet Union. It means letting
Soviet organizations deal directly with foreign companies, rather
than only through the Ministry of Foreign Trade. It means letting
Soviet engineers and scientists subscribe freely to foreign
publications and travel abroad freely when it advances their work.
13. The advantages of rejoining the world technologically
will not be obvious to organizations like the KGB, proud of their
success in stealing technology. It also goes against the
tendency of the Party to control everything. However, the
Gorbachev Administration has been taking some steps in this
direction.
14. The West needs to figure out how to sell the Soviets
on the advantages of rejoining the world. Otherwise, the negotiations
will fail, because the Soviet diplomats won't find the price
worth paying.
15. It is beyond the scope of this paper to treat comprehensively
the price we should ask. Here are a few considerations.
a. The Soviets might like agreements purely in the
technological area - we exchange our technology for theirs. However,
we have so much more that they need than vice-versa that purely
technological exchanges won't go very far.
b. We should imagine a sequence of successively more
comprehensive agreements.
c. Reduction of Soviet territorial and industrial
secrecy should be part of the price. Giving up some of the military
advantage this secrecy gives them will make disarmament agreements
more verifiable. Some of this secrecy was pointless anyway, and
we are getting some concessions for nothing. For example, they now
have promised the Soviet public to publish correct maps, including
a road atlas of the Soviet Union.
d. Probably the main concessions have to be in
the military area. They need to give up some of their conventional
armaments advantage in Europe, maybe even their draft.
16. Experts frequently have said, ``The Soviets will never
give up X'', only to be confounded by events. We should enter
negotiations without preconceptions about what they might agree to.
17. According to Arkady Shevchenko, the Soviets have never
feared an unprovoked Western attack. This suggests that we make
no presumptions about their state of mind based on ideas of symmetry
between their situation and ours.
18. The single most effective way for them to improve their
standard of living is to reduce military and police expenditures.
Howver, this offers institutional difficulties, the extent of which
we cannot predict.
\noindent Summary.
1. The West should decide on terms for reducing technological
restrictions. Otherwise, they may just evaporate with no corresponding
gain in Western security and with reinforcement of the KGB doctrine
that the West consists of villains and suckers.
2. We need to sell the Soviets on the advantages to their
standard of living of rejoining the world technologically.
∂01-Nov-88 2104 JMC re: russians
To: SHOHAM@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 1 Nov 88 19:47:47-PST.]
I suggest you ask Vladimir these questions. Let him become an expert
on Soviet AI.
∂01-Nov-88 2104 JMC
To: CLT
Miyako Hotel, Kyoto
771-7111
∂01-Nov-88 2107 JMC Miyako Hotel
To: CLT
The number for Hazel to dial is 011 81 75 771-7111#.
The # is not strictly necessary. It tells the system
that the number has been finished. Otherwise, it
waits a while before it concludes that there aren't
any more digits.
∂01-Nov-88 2157 JMC re: russians
To: SHOHAM@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
CC: VAL@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Tue 1 Nov 88 21:42:38-PST.]
Oh dear. To tell the truth I haven't been paying much attention
lately. Donald Michie at the Turing Institute in Strathclyde
might know more, but even his attention may have lapsed. Try
to get Vladimir to ask questions when he goes to Tallinn in
December. One person in Moscow to ask is Victor Briabrin
at the USSR Academy of Sciences Computation Center and
Andrei Ershov in Novosibirsk. Enn Tyugu at the Institute
of Cybernetics in Tallinn might also know who's who.
∂02-Nov-88 1659 Mailer re: anti-racism
To: RTC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from RTC rcvd 02-Nov-88 16:11-PT.]
Mencken could well have coined it before the 1920s. However, Webster's
Collegiate refers to the word as chiefly Australian but of unknown origin.
∂02-Nov-88 1749 Mailer re: anti-racism
To: tucker@POLYA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from tucker@polya.stanford.edu sent 3 Nov 88 01:39:52 GMT.]
The 7th edition of Webster's Collegiate doesn't give a date.
Does a later edition, or do you mean a different dictionary? Of
course, if any dictionary gives an 1890 date, Mencken becomes
just a popularizer of the word in the U.S.
∂03-Nov-88 1023 JMC reprint file
To: MPS
I've just taken the last copy of Ascribing Mental Qualities to Machines
and we need more right away. Please check the reprint drawers for others
that need replenishment.
∂03-Nov-88 1026 JMC re: CSLI evening seminars
To: SHOHAM@SCORE.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu 3 Nov 88 09:52:15-PST.]
Sounds good to me, although I'll be in Dallas November 16.
∂03-Nov-88 1034 Mailer re: Article on meat eating
To: singh@GLACIER.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from singh@glacier.stanford.edu sent 3 Nov 1988 0953-PST.]
I notice what seems to be misinformation in the article, and I suspect there's
lots more.
The scratches on the teeth show that Ramapithecus ate lots of vegetables.
They don't show that they didn't eat meat when they could get it. For a
long time people thought chimpanzees were strictly vegetarian, and this
turned out not to be true. To jump to conclusions about an animal represented
by a few fossils is very brave. However, this is characteristic of
"science" in support of ideology.
∂03-Nov-88 1615 JMC re: research mentor
To: scales@POLYA.Stanford.EDU
[In reply to message sent Thu, 3 Nov 88 10:56:32 PDT.]
I will be away for two weeks, so I suggest you talk to Joe Weening,
and he can tell you about the project.
∂03-Nov-88 1616 JMC re: Proposal review
To: mzemanko@NOTE.NSF.GOV
[In reply to message sent Thu, 03 Nov 88 14:33:34 -0500.]
Send it on. I'll be back from Japan in two weeks.
∂03-Nov-88 1756 Mailer re: Article on meat eating
To: singh@SIERRA.Stanford.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from singh@sierra.stanford.edu sent Thu, 3 Nov 1988 13:43:19 PST.]
My remarks on chimpanzees eating meat were based on Jane Goodall's
noticing, some years after she began observing chimpanzees, that they
occasionally caught and ate small monkeys. I don't believe she claimed
that eating meat was important for their health. My guess is that
animals sometimes subject to shortage of food or shortage of certain
components of food will survive better the wider their choice of diet.
The conclusion that Ramapithecus didn't eat meat when it could
get it still seems unsupported. The idea that humans began eating
meat only when they moved into cold climates is what biologists
call "a Just So Story". The trouble with Just So Stories is that
one can make up lots of them, and few are as entertaining as
Kipling's. Just So Stories are as source of conjectures, but theories
based only on them are not well regarded. Others believe, perhaps on
somewhat better evidence, that substantial human meat use depended on
fire and on tools for butchering carcasses.
I eat meat, because I like it and am not impressed by the alleged moral
arguments against it. By the way, I was taken to a vegetarian
restaurant in Peking. The imitations of meat were realistic in
appearance, but didn't taste very good to me.
Finally, I don't see that facts about Ramapithecus are relevant about
whether a person should become a vegetarian. If primitive humans
lived entirely on meat, you could still decide that humanity has
advanced morally to the point where eating meat should be stopped.
If they never ate meat, you could still regard eating meat as an
advance that should not be given up.
I decline a formal confrontation on the subject. I only debate about
AI and rarely SDI or nuclear power. These suffice to satisfy my
combative instincts and my desire to do good by influencing people's
opinions.
∂03-Nov-88 2347 JMC letters
To: MPS
You still aren't entering letter file names in letter[let,jmc].
If you alias to let,jmc and execute the command drd, you will
be in the program dired. You can then compare the files in
let with those you have entered in letter and then enter
the others.
Also please decorate shanka.re1,smolen.re1 and davis.re3.
∂04-Nov-88 1128 Mailer re: more Coverup
To: C.COSGROVE@LEAR.STANFORD.EDU, su-etc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
From: John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
[In reply to message from C.COSGROVE@lear.stanford.edu sent Thu 3 Nov 88 19:11:03-PST.]
"Media figures such as Bob Woodward have apparently
concluded that the "October surprise" theory doesn't merit
further investigation. Nevertheless, there are some unanswered
questions. In March 1981 ..."
Mr. Scott evidently accedes to the doctrine of throwing as much mud
as possible in the hopes that some will stick. The collapse of one
major part of a package of accusations should cause poeple to discount
the package as a whole. Perhaps this is what Woodward, et. al. did.
The Christic Institute was listed as one of the groups praising "Coverup".
In fact several of items in the charges formed the basis of the Christic
Institute racketeering suit against North, etc. which was thrown out
of court as having no basis in evidence.
∂04-Nov-88 1832 JMC re: CSLI Stanford Faculty Meeting
To: BETSY@CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent Fri 4 Nov 88 16:58:06-PST.]
Unfortunately, I will still be in Dallas at the DARPA Principal
Investigator's meeting looking after the bird in the hand rather
than contemplating various birds in the bush.
∂04-Nov-88 1835 JMC re: Mud-slinging and JMC's heroes [was Re: more Coverup]
To: singh@GLACIER.STANFORD.EDU
[In reply to message sent 4 Nov 1988 1316-PST.]
What hero of mine do you have in mind?
∂05-Nov-88 0958 JMC re: You haven't sent me the number of the
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Nov-88 09:10-PT.]
>Inamori Foundation
tel: 011 81 75 255-2688,
∂05-Nov-88 0958 JMC re: You haven't sent me the number of the
To: CLT
[In reply to message rcvd 05-Nov-88 09:10-PT.]
I assume you got the hotel name and phone.
∂05-Nov-88 2114 JMC
To: CLT
Throwing things when annoyed is likely to be imitated by Timothy.
∂06-Nov-88 0131 JMC Meyer letter
To: MPS
Please put in expenses as I gave them to you, remembering to
get Boston round trip fare from Franklin. Send off the letter.
It is meyer.1[let,jmc].
∂06-Nov-88 0911 JMC
To: MPS
I will be in Japan till Nov 15 and Dallas until Nov. 17.
I will mostly be at the Miyako Hotel in Kyoto.
011 81 75 771-7111
∂06-Nov-88 0911 JMC (→21577 17-Nov-88)
To: "#___JMC.PLN[2,2]"
I will be in Japan till Nov 15 and Dallas until Nov. 17.
I will mostly be at the Miyako Hotel in Kyoto.
011 81 75 771-7111
∂06-Nov-88 0921 JMC
To: MPS
I've put the address on smolen.re1.
∂06-Nov-88 1007 JMC
To: MPS
davis.re3 now has its address. Please send it.
∂06-Nov-88 1033 JMC pens and meeting
To: CLT
My present train reservation would get me to the Miyako Hotel
about the same time as you. However, the visit to IBM Tokyo
may cause some delay. It turns out that Timothy hasn't swiped
the transparency pens from my office here, so I didn't swipe
yours.