FOM: surgery; Pais/Gonshor confusion

[Stephen G Simpson]

John Pais 08 Jun 1999 12:28:33 complains about my alleged ``posting
surgery''.

 > The surgery on and Frankensteinian reassembly of my original
 > posting ... quotes me as quoting Harry Gonshor as claiming to
 > introduce the surreal numbers as a new structure.

But you *did* quote Gonshor as claiming that.  In your posting of 24
May 1999 18:50:34, you quoted Gonshor's book at length, including

  ``... more important than obtaining a new way of building up a
  familiar set such as the real numbers, is the enrichment of
  mathematics by the inclusion of a new structure with interesting
  properties.''

Didn't you?  Please acknowledge that these words came from Gonshor.
You need to acknowledge this, otherwise people may believe you when
you say I manufactured these words and attributed them to Gonshor.

 > Steve contracts my original posting in such a way as to destroy the
 > context and main import of my original question, and to apparently
 > answer one he liked better.

It's true that I didn't like your original question and therefore
didn't answer it directly.  Instead, I answered your original question
indirectly, by directly answering another question that I liked
better.  (See my posting of 7 Jun 1999 14:45:01.)  However, that
doesn't mean that I destroyed the context or import of your original
question.  The full context is still available in the FOM archives.

I think you are attributing too much importance to your own question,
and to your criticism of my posting style.  I am still waiting for you
to contribute something of value regarding some serious f.o.m. issue.

-- Steve