🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <C0M4w0.6p6@news.cso.uiuc.edu>, pms26964@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Phil Scopes) writes:
|> Robert Skeel is a well-known professor at the University of Illinois at
|> Urbana/Champaign, but he has one major problem--...
(More ad-hominem comments deleted)
 etc. The moral of the story is Never leave yourself
logged in at an open terminal. A nasty-minded prankster might use it
to make embarrassing postings to Usenet, for which you may be held
accountable. Or maybe a disgruntled student is *very* disappointed
with their grade. Who cares?

On with the regularly scheduled sci.math.num-analysis

--------------------------------------------------------
Sean Marrett                     email: sean@pet.mni.mcgill.ca 
wb213, PET Unit, Montreal Neurological Institute.
3801 University St., Montreal, Quebec.	H3A 2B4 
                                 tel:(514)-398-1537,1996 Fax: 8948 

Mr. Marrett may wish to talk to the good folks at sci.logic about the
definition of an ad hominem. The previous poster did not seek to refute some
argument made by Prof. Skeel (who I don't know) by making a personal attack
(indeed, a logical error - though that is a valid approach when questioning the
truthfulness of a speaker). Rather, he offered his opinion as to the teaching
abilities of Prof. Skeel. Incidentally, Mr. Marrett may take note that his
response satisfies his own apparent misdefinition of 'ad hominem' (any critical
comment made about some one else ?).

It is a fact that there are some very good researchers who happen to be truly
awful teachers, and when our undergraduate students point out some candidates,
it is inappropriate for any of us to simply dismiss their criticism so lightly.
True enough, some of the complaints will come from poor students. But some will
be inspired by poor instructors. If the initial poster is honest in his
criticism of his instructor, he should be shown respect for the level of
courage shown here - the amount of damage an irritated faculty member can do to
an academic career is no secret. To seek to warn other students away from a bad
situation is a good thing to do - even if one doesn't sound very sophisticated
as one does so.


                                Joseph B. Dunphy
                                Graduate Student
                                    Mathematics - Indiana (on leave)
                                    Electrical Eng. - U.Illinois - Chicago

In article <93011.170832U53644@uicvm.uic.edu> <U53644@uicvm.uic.edu> writes:
>Mr. Marrett may wish to talk to the good folks at sci.logic about the
>definition of an ad hominem. The previous poster did not seek to refute some
>argument made by Prof. Skeel (who I don't know) by making a personal attack
>(indeed, a logical error - though that is a valid approach when questioning the
>truthfulness of a speaker). Rather, he offered his opinion as to the teaching
>abilities of Prof. Skeel.

... which, as Mr. Marrett suggested, is not of interest here.  Take it to
alt.flame or start a discussion on the related educational topics in an 
appropriate newsgroup.
-- 
Regards,
Mike Hosea (mhosea@seas.smu.edu)