How to plow the rich field of Fred's communication? First, by
acknowledging his tracing back some history for us and returning us
closer to some source thinking. I am always deeply grateful for the
opportunity to get original thinking - I find it much more useful to
explore than the more trivial applications of that thinking even if
they are still true to it (which is seldom).
I question the idea that x "first thought of that". Did you know
that Heraclitus had the idea a few thousand years before your source?
It is this attribution of origination that I object to. Because,
wherever it's assigned, it stops any looking deeper. I appreciate
knnowing where original thinking occurred but that's not the same as
the originator of the idea. After all, every idea originated within
a culture. (Einstein and Sauceur came up with similar ideas working
on different areas while both were in Switzerland at the same time -
independently. It was, I suggest, somehow *in the culture* of the
times.)
I take exception to the application of "jargon" to the term
*backcasting*. While anything can be jargon in a context, I consider
this one to be a work of art. It has a poetic and dramatic flavour
that is meant to accomplish something in its different expression.
I, for one, appreciate that it was shared with us.
-- Michael McMaster Michael@kbddean.demon.co.uk