Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:51): Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:51):From: mailing-list anonymous <mailing.list.anonymous@gmail.com>
Dear All,
I would like to start a slightly unusual meta-thread. A person named Markus
(Makarius) Wenzel (makarius@sketis.net) has developed a habit of repeatedly
following-up my posts on this mailing list with unpleasant comments with
regard to my character. In particular, he is continuously referring to me
as a 'dummy'. Please find examples in the list below:
https://mailman46.in.tum.de/pipermail/isabelle-dev/2019-May/016924.html
https://lists.cam.ac.uk/pipermail/cl-isabelle-users/2019-June/msg00093.html
https://lists.cam.ac.uk/pipermail/cl-isabelle-users/2019-November/msg00099.html
According to the Oxford dictionary online, the word dummy has several
meanings. I have extracted the meanings that I consider to be more relevant:
Most certainly, I am a living organism: not a doll or a plastic teat. Also,
I believe that referring to someone as 'stupid' in public for no apparent
reason is both insulting and degrading.
Several months ago, I asked him not to refer to me as a 'dummy' in private
communication. I tried to do so in the most polite manner and, with his
permission, I can display the body of all messages (with the exception of
my signature) that were sent to him. However, my plea was ignored and I was
referred to as a 'dummy' in public almost immediately after sending the
aforementioned email in private (the timing could not have been better).
I believe that he is exhibiting a very inappropriate behavior, especially
given the nature of this mailing list. I would be less concerned about such
comments and behavior on a forum for sports fans or on a forum for a
discussion of alcoholic beverages, for example. However, I believe that
academic forums should demand a certain standard of politeness, tact and
manner of all users. Furthermore, I believe that his comments might be in
violation of the laws of the German Republic, where, to the best of my
knowledge, he resides. In particular, Paragraph 185, Section 14 of the
criminal code of the German Republic (
http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_stgb/englisch_stgb.pdf) states:
"An insult shall be punished with imprisonment not exceeding one year or a
fine and, if the insult is committed by means of an assault, with
imprisonment not exceeding two years or a fine." While I have no intention
to pursue a case against him, I believe that it is only in the best
interest of the forum administrators that all users of the forum do not
violate the laws of the country where they reside. Therefore, I would
kindly ask the community and/or the administrators of the mailing list to
take appropriate measures against the unlawful behavior that he continues
to exhibit. Furthermore, ideally, I would like all posts where I am
referred to as a 'dummy' to be removed from the archives of this mailing
list. I believe that the removal of these threads would also be beneficial
for Markus Wenzel, as it would reduce the odds of someone else making a
decision to pursue a criminal case against him.
Overall, Markus Wenzel gives this forum a feeling of a high school
backyard, where he is the toughest bully. I would like to think that I have
had to endure enough bullying in my youth, not to have to do deal with it
ever again (of course, it is very naive of me to think this way...). The
reasons, of course, were different: it was my frail body, my inability to
communicate information verbally as well as most other persons of the
equivalent age and, of course, my interest in sciences. However, a person
in power (whatever is the meaning of the word in a given context) can
always find reasons to bully someone of 'lesser standing'. It could be
one's race, it could be one's religion, it could be one's nationality, it
could be one's disability, it could be the lack of wealth of one's family,
it could be one's profession or social status, or it could simply be a
personal dislike (I have seen and endured more of this than I could wish
upon anyone). Nevertheless, quite frankly, I hold no personal grudge or
resentment towards Markus Wenzel and most other characters who acted
inappropriately towards me in the past. If I was religious, I would have
said "May God have mercy upon their souls", but I am not religious and,
therefore, I will not do it :). Perhaps, given his status in the community,
I would have even acted in a similar manner towards the 'lesser humans
beings'. Nevertheless, I do not like it and the human laws are on my side.
Therefore, I will use all legal means at my disposal to ensure that I am
not harassed ever again.
While the primary reason why I decided to start this thread is, indeed, the
'dummy' references, I believe that Markus Wenzel has repeatedly acted
inappropriately on this mailing list in many other ways. For example, he
has made a number of remarks that were blatantly off-topic in some of the
threads that I started (both for the thread in the narrow sense and for the
Isabelle mailing list in the most general sense). These remarks were
related to Wikipedia articles, anonymity online and general public
policies, but not related to Isabelle or formal methods in any way:
personally, I would consider such posts to be off-topic even if they were
started as an explicit meta-thread on this list. Most professional public
forums (e.g. Stack Overflow) tightly regulate and moderate lengthy
off-topic discussions (including the associated meta forums). I am rather
confident that any user of Stack Overflow/Meta Stack Overflow would be
banned if (s)he repeatedly made posts about (general) Wikipedia articles,
anonymity online or public policies, even though the scope of the website
Stack Overflow is much wider than the scope of this mailing list. Most
certainly, I am not asking for Markus Wenzel to be denied the privilege of
posting on this forum. However, I would like to see the content of the
forum to be regulated more tightly for the benefit of the users.
Thank you
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:51):From: Lawrence Paulson <lp15@cam.ac.uk>
Sadly it’s not practical to read and moderate all the submissions.
However, I’d like to ask EVERYBODY to behave respectfully on this list.
Larry Paulson
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:51):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
Yes, I agree.
(I will not read anonymous material.)
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:52):From: Peter Zeller <p_zeller@cs.uni-kl.de>
I guess this is a typical misunderstanding of non-native speakers. In
Germany the word "dummy" is almost exclusively used for crash test
dummies, which are faceless mannequins. As such the term fits the
appearance of an anonymous person quite well.
In the first linked thread, Makarius also mentioned that he will filter
anonymous addresses from his inbox, so he probably did not get your
request to stop using that term.
Peter
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:52):From: Peter Lammich <lammich@in.tum.de>
On Fri, 2019-11-29 at 19:57 +0100, Peter Zeller wrote:
I guess this is a typical misunderstanding of non-native speakers.
In
Germany the word "dummy" is almost exclusively used for crash test
dummies, which are faceless mannequins. As such the term fits the
appearance of an anonymous person quite well.
This is exactly how I understood Makarius mentioning of "dummy", too.
So I did not even think of that this could be annoying.
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:52):From: Lawrence Paulson <lp15@cam.ac.uk>
Surely we can manage without calling people names of any sort.
Larry Paulson
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:52):From: Joshua Chen <josh@joshchen.io>
[Peter Zeller wrote:]
As a native English speaker (who additionally doesn't look like the
stereotypical conception of one), I certainly understand the frustration
of having German speakers unwittingly use rude English slang in a very
oblivious manner...
How about we all stop using this particular word, given its connotations
in the wider English-speaking world.
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:52):From: mailing-list anonymous <mailing.list.anonymous@gmail.com>
Dear All,
In the first linked thread, Makarius also mentioned that he will filter
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:52):From: Peter Lammich <lammich@in.tum.de>
I understood it as referring to the anonymous address, not even the
person behind the address ... I definitely have to be careful with this
word in the future.
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:52):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
I was more thinking in terms of "dummy mail address", as in "dummy variable".
These are plain and basic expressions of the international scientific pidgin
-- I am not going to censor that.
Hopefully we can return to a mode on this mailing list where actual problems
can discussed properly and carefully.
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:53):From: mailing-list anonymous <mailing.list.anonymous@gmail.com>
Dear All,
Surely we can manage without calling people names of any sort.
Larry Paulson
In essence, this is exactly what I am asking. If a given word can be used
as an insult, then it should never be used with a reference to a person
without a good reason, even more so, if the person has gone out of his way
to ask for it explicitly. If someone ignores all pleas to stop this
behaviour, some kind of measures need to be taken to prevent this from
happening in the future.
I was more thinking in terms of "dummy mail address", as in "dummy
variable".
These are plain and basic expressions of the international scientific
pidgin
-- I am not going to censor that.
Hopefully we can return to a mode on this mailing list where actual
problems
can discussed properly and carefully.
Makarius
I am not asking to censor the word "dummy". I am asking not to refer to
other human beings as dummies, that is, I am asking to censor a certain
pattern of behavior. I believe that almost every person would agree that it
is, at least, rude to call another person a dummy, whatever is the intended
meaning of the word. Once again, I would like to repeat that I asked Markus
Wenzel not to use the word "dummy" when referring to me personally and I am
very confident that my message was received by him. As a side remark, this
is the first (non-technical) meta-post that I made on this forum, having
used it for over a year (in fact, it may be the first non-technical
meta-thread that I started on any forum of any kind in my entire life).
However, the number of non-technical and off-topic posts that I received
from Markus Wenzel as replies to the technical threads that I started is
far greater than one. Furthermore, I believe that name-calling without a
cause is "an actual problem that needs to be discussed properly and
carefully", if only as a meta-thread.
Thank you
On Fri, Nov 29, 2019 at 7:53 PM mailing-list anonymous <
mailing.list.anonymous@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear All,
I would like to start a slightly unusual meta-thread. A person named
Markus (Makarius) Wenzel (makarius@sketis.net) has developed a habit of
repeatedly following-up my posts on this mailing list with unpleasant
comments with regard to my character. In particular, he is continuously
referring to me as a 'dummy'. Please find examples in the list below:
https://mailman46.in.tum.de/pipermail/isabelle-dev/2019-May/016924.html
https://lists.cam.ac.uk/pipermail/cl-isabelle-users/2019-June/msg00093.htmlhttps://lists.cam.ac.uk/pipermail/cl-isabelle-users/2019-November/msg00099.html
According to the Oxford dictionary online, the word dummy has several
meanings. I have extracted the meanings that I consider to be more relevant:
1. a model or replica of a human being/doll
2. a stupid person
3. a rubber or plastic teat for a baby to suck onMost certainly, I am a living organism: not a doll or a plastic teat.
Also, I believe that referring to someone as 'stupid' in public for no
apparent reason is both insulting and degrading.Several months ago, I asked him not to refer to me as a 'dummy' in private
communication. I tried to do so in the most polite manner and, with his
permission, I can display the body of all messages (with the exception of
my signature) that were sent to him. However, my plea was ignored and I was
referred to as a 'dummy' in public almost immediately after sending the
aforementioned email in private (the timing could not have been better).I believe that he is exhibiting a very inappropriate behavior, especially
given the nature of this mailing list. I would be less concerned about such
comments and behavior on a forum for sports fans or on a forum for a
discussion of alcoholic beverages, for example. However, I believe that
academic forums should demand a certain standard of politeness, tact and
manner of all users. Furthermore, I believe that his comments might be in
violation of the laws of the German Republic, where, to the best of my
knowledge, he resides. In particular, Paragraph 185, Section 14 of the
criminal code of the German Republic (
http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_stgb/englisch_stgb.pdf)
states: "An insult shall be punished with imprisonment not exceeding one
year or a fine and, if the insult is committed by means of an assault, with
imprisonment not exceeding two years or a fine." While I have no intention
to pursue a case against him, I believe that it is only in the best
interest of the forum administrators that all users of the forum do not
violate the laws of the country where they reside. Therefore, I would
kindly ask the community and/or the administrators of the mailing list to
take appropriate measures against the unlawful behavior that he continues
to exhibit. Furthermore, ideally, I would like all posts where I am
referred to as a 'dummy' to be removed from the archives of this mailing
list. I believe that the removal of these threads would also be beneficial
for Markus Wenzel, as it would reduce the odds of someone else making a
decision to pursue a criminal case against him.Overall, Markus Wenzel gives this forum a feeling of a high school
backyard, where he is the toughest bully. I would like to think that I have
had to endure enough bullying in my youth, not to have to do deal with it
ever again (of course, it is very naive of me to think this way...). The
reasons, of course, were different: it was my frail body, my inability to
communicate information verbally as well as most other persons of the
equivalent age and, of course, my interest in sciences. However, a person
in power (whatever is the meaning of the word in a given context) can
always find reasons to bully someone of 'lesser standing'. It could be
one's race, it could be one's religion, it could be one's nationality, it
could be one's disability, it could be the lack of wealth of one's family,
it could be one's profession or social status, or it could simply be a
personal dislike (I have seen and endured more of this than I could wish
upon anyone). Nevertheless, quite frankly, I hold no personal grudge or
resentment towards Markus Wenzel and most other characters who acted
inappropriately towards me in the past. If I was religious, I would have
said "May God have mercy upon their souls", but I am not religious and,
therefore, I will not do it :). Perhaps, given his status in the community,
I would have even acted in a similar manner towards the 'lesser humans
beings'. Nevertheless, I do not like it and the human laws are on my side.
Therefore, I will use all legal means at my disposal to ensure that I am
not harassed ever again.While the primary reason why I decided to start this thread is, indeed,
the 'dummy' references, I believe that Markus Wenzel has repeatedly acted
inappropriately on this mailing list in many other ways. For example, he
has made a number of remarks that were blatantly off-topic in some of the
threads that I started (both for the thread in the narrow sense and for the
Isabelle mailing list in the most general sense). These remarks were
related to Wikipedia articles, anonymity online and general public
policies, but not related to Isabelle or formal methods in any way:
personally, I would consider such posts to be off-topic even if they were
started as an explicit meta-thread on this list. Most professional public
forums (e.g. Stack Overflow) tightly regulate and moderate lengthy
off-topic discussions (including the associated meta forums). I am rather
confident that any user of Stack Overflow/Meta Stack Overflow would be
banned if (s)he repeatedly made posts about (general) Wikipedia articles,
anonymity online or public policies, even though the scope of the website
Stack Overflow is much wider than the scope of this mailing list. Most
certainly, I am not asking for Markus Wenzel to be denied the privilege of
posting on this forum. However, I would like to see the content of the
forum to be regulated more tightly for the benefit of the users.Thank you
--
Please accept my apologies for posting anonymously. This is done to
protect my privacy. I can make my identity and my real contact details
available upon request in private communication under the condition that
they are not to be mentioned on the mailing list.
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:53):From: José Manuel Rodriguez Caballero <josephcmac@gmail.com>
Hi,
If someone feel harassed in the mailing list, that person should solve the problem in private.
I know that to work a lot of time in front of a computer makes people hyper-sensible, but there is a solution: be off-line for a while and enjoy nature.
By the way, to use world like “dummy“ is normal in an academic circle where people have high IQ. For example, both Feynman and Gell-Mann were rude with the speakers, e.g., after a lecture of a guess, Feynman asked to Gell-Mann, who was reading a newspaper, if the speaker was an intelligent person, in such a way that the speaker was able to hear it.
Heisenberg said that Schrödinger was a dummy and conversely. Finally Dirac proved that both, Heisenberg and Schrödinger, get equivalent formulations of quantum mechanics.
Kind Regards,
José M.
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:53):From: Joshua Chen <josh@joshchen.io>
By the way, to use world like “dummy“ is normal in an academic circle where people have high IQ. For example, both Feynman and Gell-Mann were rude with the speakers, e.g., after a lecture of a guess, Feynman asked to Gell-Mann, who was reading a newspaper, if the speaker was an intelligent person, in such a way that the speaker was able to hear it.
This is a terrible anecdote that should be taken as a an example of how
not to behave, instead of being used to excuse such behaviour.
Please do not normalize rudeness and bad behaviour by "high IQ"
people—being smart does not give one free rein to trample over the
feelings of others, and in any case there are certainly very many
brilliant people who are as modest and kind as they are smart, as
evidenced by this list.
Josh
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:53):From: José Manuel Rodriguez Caballero <josephcmac@gmail.com>
You are right Josh, both Feynman and Gell-Mann belong to a time where men didn’t care about the feelings of dummy people. But now, 2019, we are living in a world of political correctness. My advice to high IQ people: please, be tolerant with the so-called “dummies” (use another word, e.g. “special people”).
They can be extremely useful when they are on your side.
best,
José M.
Sent from my iPhone
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 20:54):From: mailing-list anonymous <mailing.list.anonymous@gmail.com>
Dear José Manuel Rodriguez Caballero/All,
For example, both Feynman and Gell-Mann were rude with the speakers...
Personally, I can hardly see how a precedent of rude behavior can justify
further rude behavior. Taking this line of reasoning one step further could
lead one to believe that if successful politicians of the past massacred
entire populations for no apparent reason (Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin
are prototypical examples), then every politician should be allowed to do
so.
I have participated in a number of academic and industrial conferences and
I supported a number of technical presentations to senior management of
global corporations. However, I have never witnessed anyone being rude to a
person speaking at a conference or delivering a presentation, even though
the presentations varied drastically in their content and quality. I would
guess that any member of the audience who allowed himself/herself to speak
out of turn during any of the aforementioned events would be asked to leave
by the organizers of the event.
Just write about the subject and do not contribute in an excessive way
I would like to think that my contributions to this date were not
excessive: please remember that this list is my only portal for the
exchange of information about Isabelle. Furthermore, it is difficult to
write only about the subject when, for example, I submit a valid correction
to the Isabelle code base, and in return, instead of "Thank you", I receive
a reply "You are a dummy". I have never witnessed a precedent of a personal
insult thrown at a person who had just made a positive contribution to
Isabelle.
My advice to high IQ people: please, be tolerant with the so-called
“dummies” (use another word, e.g. “special people”).
best,
José M.
I do not believe that superior intelligence (let alone a high IQ test
score) gives anyone the right to be arrogant towards all people of lower
standing based on this narrow criterion. There could be very talented
musicians, painters, sculptors and fiction writers with reasonably low IQ
test scores. Moreover, most likely, there are many people from whose
perspective, you would fall into the category of "special people" according
to your own criterion. For example, please compare yourself and your
achievements with the achievements of Grigori Perelman, Vladimir Voevodsky,
Ruth Lawrence or Akshay Venkatesh (I can ascertain you, it would be
possible to extend this list almost indefinitely if you include all truly
gifted chemists, computer scientists, engineers, mathematicians and
physicists).
I know that to work a lot of time in front of a computer makes people
hyper-sensible, but there is a solution: be off-line for a while and enjoy
nature.I am not the one calling other people names and trying to, somehow, justify
this. I rarely act on impulse and the idea of this thread was conceived
soon after the initial private communication with Markus Wenzel. I was
simply waiting for him to refer to me as a "dummy" once again. Perhaps, you
should take your own advice under consideration: be off-line for a while,
enjoy nature and, most importantly, try to learn to respect people around
you despite your magnificent talents, superior intelligence and other
traits of inborn superiority which were bestowed upon you.
Thank you
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:04):From: "Klein, Gerwin (Data61, Kensington NSW)" <Gerwin.Klein@data61.csiro.au>
Not really wanting to fan the flames of a dying fire, we all prefer the technical discussion, but as it stands, the majority view of the community on this is under represented (or what I consider the majority view, at least it is confirmed by several off-list conversations on this that I am aware of).
So I’d just like to point out that:
There seems to have been at least a degree of language barrier involved, and we should be conscious of the fact that people here come from many different language and cultural backgrounds. If something has been pointed out as insulting, I don’t think it is too much of an ask to refrain from using it.
As Larry said, there is surely no need to call anyone names.
Cheers,
Gerwin
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:04):From: Tobias Nipkow <nipkow@in.tum.de>
Gerwin, thank you for speaking up and I couldn't agree more. Let us be civil and
polite on this list.
Tobias
smime.p7s
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:04):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
On 03/12/2019 08:40, Klein, Gerwin (Data61, Kensington NSW) wrote:
So I’d just like to point out that:
- it’s of course not Ok to insult people on this list
I agree, and I disagree that it was such as case in the first place.
- it is perfectly fine to raise such an issue publicly if it has happened
on this list
I am unsure. Here no insult happened from my side, but I am the one who
remains publicly blamed.
If something has been pointed out as insulting, I don’t think it is too much of an ask to refrain from using it.
I did not see any of the anonymous material, so I can't say anything about its
content apart from the subject line.
I do not accept unnamed subscribers on this list -- I have used soft and
friendly words to make this clear several times, but it did not help.
By interfering repeatedly with my ongoing discussions, the unnamed subscriber
has provoked a situation where I had to refer to him directly, inventing a
name for the nameless. This can be easily avoided in the future by stopping
such behaviour.
The reason why I don't want to see nameless posts here is the bad culture
coming from it, e.g. on Wikipedia. Over there anonymous subscribers routinely
attack people who are publicly visible, using very strange techniques of
communication (the keyword "harrasment" on the subject smells like that).
This misbehaviour has no direct impact for the anonymous attackers, even if
they are blocked eventually -- they can just return as a different "puppet" later.
I don't want to see anything like that again on our fine mailing list.
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:04):From: Simon Bliudze <simon.bliudze@inria.fr>
Dear all,
I am not an active user of Isabelle and only follow this list to have an
idea of how things work in (and around) Isabelle.
Wanted to send respect to the anonymous user in this thread.
Cheers,
Simon
signature.asc
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:06):From: mailing-list anonymous <mailing.list.anonymous@gmail.com>
Dear Markus Wenzel/All,
This misbehaviour has no direct impact for the anonymous attackers, even if
I partially agree with you. This is why my signature clearly indicates that
I can provide my identity upon request to any user of the mailing list. If
this is not sufficient, I would be happy to pass further ID checks (e.g.
provide a copy of my passport to the administrators of the list).
I would also like to mention that some of the formal proof communities are
less open to the outsiders. For example, there exists "Association of Mizar
Users". To the best of my knowledge, to become a member one needs to submit
an application form and to remain a member one needs to pay a monthly
membership fee (http://www.mizar.org/sum/). Many other websites (e.g.
gambling websites) require one to pass an ID check before the registration
is possible: this did not stop millions of people to register on such
websites.
If the lack of knowledge of the identity of the posters is such grave
concern, then I would kindly suggest implementing an ID check for all
people who wish to post on the list. However, without a requisite ID check
for every member of the mailing list, your policy seems to give more
credibility and respect to liars than to honest people who state clearly
that they do not wish to reveal their identity in public.
At the time when I decided to register this email address, I considered
adopting a human pseudonym. However, I decided against it because I thought
that lying about my identity is not appropriate. Instead, I chose to state
clearly that I simply do not wish to reveal it to the general public. At
the moment, I have a feeling that I am being denied the services that are
provided to anyone who would be shameless enough to lie about his/her
identity.
As a side note, there exist professional researchers who strongly support
the idea of anonymous academic publications (
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1512.05382.pdf), not merely anonymous forum posts.
Thank you
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:06):From: José Manuel Rodríguez Caballero <josephcmac@gmail.com>
Dear Anonymous,
I did not justify that some people call "dummies" to others on 2019, on
the contrary, I called for tolerance. Concerning your mention of "Hitler",
this person was not rude, he killed himself, he was a coward (for example,
Che Guevara fought until the last moment). Concerning your comparison
between myself and other mathematicians, if you want to do it, ok, just
read my papers before in order to make a fair comparison (Voevosky worked
on Topology and I worked on Elementary Number Theory). Please, stop making
spam in the mailing list. If you want to debate, do it in private: you are
not the center here, Isabelle is the center.
Best,
José M.
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:06):From: "Klein, Gerwin (Data61, Kensington NSW)" <Gerwin.Klein@data61.csiro.au>
On 3 Dec 2019, at 21:17, Makarius <makarius@sketis.net> wrote:
On 03/12/2019 08:40, Klein, Gerwin (Data61, Kensington NSW) wrote:
So I’d just like to point out that:
- it’s of course not Ok to insult people on this listI agree, and I disagree that it was such as case in the first place.
Glad we agree, I think almost all here do. I didn’t actually want to imply that you intended insult as such. I was more reacting to the follow-on meta discussion that made it sound like that kind of thing would be Ok to do.
There is of course always the problem that one can easily insult people without intending to, and, given your (not unreasonable) aversion to anonymous communication in general for this list, there was a clear theme of displeasure in your messages, which if I was the anonymous poster and didn’t know you in person, would indeed have led me to feel the same way esp combined with the specific phrasing. This can happen, we can deal with it, and move on.
- it is perfectly fine to raise such an issue publicly if it has happened
on this listI am unsure. Here no insult happened from my side, but I am the one who
remains publicly blamed.
As a general principle, it has to hold that a defence to a public action must be able to be public. (Doesn’t have to be public, but must be able to)
That does induce the risk of being wrongfully accused, but that is what the following discussion is for, and I think people on this list are able to form an independent impression. The evidence (previous messages) is available to everyone.
If something has been pointed out as insulting, I don’t think it is too much of an ask to refrain from using it.
I did not see any of the anonymous material, so I can't say anything about its
content apart from the subject line.
My take is, if you use unnamed subscriber or anonymous subscriber as below everyone should be fine.
I do not accept unnamed subscribers on this list -- I have used soft and
friendly words to make this clear several times, but it did not help.By interfering repeatedly with my ongoing discussions, the unnamed subscriber
has provoked a situation where I had to refer to him directly, inventing a
name for the nameless. This can be easily avoided in the future by stopping
such behaviour.
I do agree with you on the principle and academic tradition of this list that we use our real names, and I wouldn’t want us to move away from that in general.
Larry is the moderator of the list and has explicitly approved this exception, based on the reasons the person gave. He also knows the identity of the person, so the main concerns of the flame wars of the 90s do not apply for this case. The person can be held accountable if need be.
The list itself had a public discussion on the topic, and I think it is clear to people that this is an exception.
Given all this, there has to be a point where we follow Larry’s decision, we have after all given him the trust of doing these for us.
It doesn’t mean everyone has to engage with everyone.
The reason why I don't want to see nameless posts here is the bad culture
coming from it, e.g. on Wikipedia. Over there anonymous subscribers routinely
attack people who are publicly visible, using very strange techniques of
communication (the keyword "harrasment" on the subject smells like that).This misbehaviour has no direct impact for the anonymous attackers, even if
they are blocked eventually -- they can just return as a different "puppet" later.I don't want to see anything like that again on our fine mailing list.
Rest assured that neither I nor anyone I know on this list wants to see such behaviour here, and I’m very confident that Larry will take steps against it if it happens.
There is a subtlety on anonymity: the key about anonymity that leads people to misbehave is the belief that there will be no personal consequences to their actions. I have been the victim of fairly extreme (actually criminal) online harassment myself, to the degree that law enforcement was involved directly, and my experience is that the the problem is not explicit anonymity, but the offender impersonating others/using puppet accounts etc, (in this case wrongfully) believing their identity is unknown.
Here, given that the identity is officially known, just not to everyone on the list, saying explicitly “I am posting anonymously” actually draws attention and scrutiny to the behaviour of this person. So far, the anonymous poster has engaged in technical discussion and been a good citizen of this list. They have reacted to what they perceived a consistent attack against them, a reaction which was fair enough given the input they received, even if it was maybe not intended that way.
Cheers,
Gerwin
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:06):From: Jeremy Dawson <Jeremy.Dawson@anu.edu.au>
No, but if you criticise someone's actions or views on the list, then it
is obvious that you should read their explanations/responses etc. If
not prepared to do so then you should keep your opinions to yourself
Jeremy (my name and affiliation is indicated in my email address)
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:06):From: "Klein, Gerwin (Data61, Kensington NSW)" <Gerwin.Klein@data61.csiro.au>
That would certainly be constructive, yes.
Cheers,
Gerwin
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:06):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
On 04/12/2019 00:17, Klein, Gerwin (Data61, Kensington NSW) wrote:
On 3 Dec 2019, at 21:17, Makarius <makarius@sketis.net> wrote:
On 03/12/2019 08:40, Klein, Gerwin (Data61, Kensington NSW) wrote:
So I’d just like to point out that:
- it’s of course not Ok to insult people on this listI agree, and I disagree that it was such as case in the first place.
Glad we agree, I think almost all here do. I didn’t actually want to imply that you intended insult as such. I was more reacting to the follow-on meta discussion that made it sound like that kind of thing would be Ok to do.
I only saw the parts by the colleagues who where interpreting my language with
more depth than US English standards -- thank you for that.
In fact, my main conclusion is that I need to be more explicit that the
language I use is definitely not US English. Instead it is a jargon in the
context of Isabelle, lambda calculus, formal logic, science, technology.
There is of course always the problem that one can easily insult people without intending to, and, given your (not unreasonable) aversion to anonymous communication in general for this list
All these problems can be easily avoided by some creativity in choosing a
decent nick name for this list, instead of a de-Bruijn index. (After index 0
there was briefly an attempt to allocate index 1, which I found all rather silly.)
- it is perfectly fine to raise such an issue publicly if it has happened
on this listI am unsure. Here no insult happened from my side, but I am the one who
remains publicly blamed.As a general principle, it has to hold that a defence to a public action must be able to be public. (Doesn’t have to be public, but must be able to)
That does induce the risk of being wrongfully accused, but that is what the following discussion is for, and I think people on this list are able to form an independent impression. The evidence (previous messages) is available to everyone.
I am even more unsure about it now, but will not follow on this further -- we
have gone far off the track of isabelle-users already.
If something has been pointed out as insulting, I don’t think it is too much of an ask to refrain from using it.
I did not see any of the anonymous material, so I can't say anything about its
content apart from the subject line.My take is, if you use unnamed subscriber or anonymous subscriber as below everyone should be fine.
No, I will just blot out any nameless posts altogether, and not react in any way.
I do agree with you on the principle and academic tradition of this list that we use our real names, and I wouldn’t want us to move away from that in general.
Larry is the moderator of the list and has explicitly approved this exception, based on the reasons the person gave. He also knows the identity of the person, so the main concerns of the flame wars of the 90s do not apply for this case. The person can be held accountable if need be.
The list itself had a public discussion on the topic, and I think it is clear to people that this is an exception.
The exception was not clear to me. BTW, there might be legal implications for
the one running a public forum on admitting anonymous posts. I leave it to
Larry to do further research on it, and draw the conclusions.
Rest assured that neither I nor anyone I know on this list wants to see such behaviour here, and I’m very confident that Larry will take steps against it if it happens.
Well it did happen. A subject line like "repeated harrasment" is already such
an incident -- but I don't know anything about the actual content, so I can't
say for sure.
This is again a bit too much text. Dispute settlement does not really work in
this format, where many observers are just looking superfically while playing
with their smart phones, catching a few keywords here and there.
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:06):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
Well, I've made clear rather early that I am going to ignore the nameless
posts. No amount of noise will change this.
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:07):From: Andrei Popescu <A.Popescu@mdx.ac.uk>
Dear all,
Here are my three cents on this, as a list of opinions and Christmas wishes:
1) Of course, I agree with Gerwin and others that mailing list harassment or bullying is a serious issue, which should be promptly raised and fought against.
2) However, the discussed case involves no harassment and no bullying whatsoever. Realizing this is hardly a matter of cultural background, native language, etc. -- rather, pure logic shows that Makarius did not use the term "dummy" in reference to Anonymous's intellectual abilities. That would have made absolutely no sense in the context. I wish Anonymous acknowledged this (after re-thinking it over).
3) There is no doubt to me that this Anonymous is a serious contributor, and he gave valid reasons for not revealing his name on the mailing list (though he is happy to reveal it in private, to Makarius or anyone else). Would it be better if he registered as John Doe? So I wish Makarius considered ending his "embargo". However, I am not suggesting that this embargo is in any way related to harassment or bullying.
Andrei
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:07):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
To end the "embargo" one could use a name that looks like a regular one (not
"John Doe"). Thus we avoid the appearance that anonymous posting with its bad
implications is actually happening here. (There is a difference in violating
rules and circumventing them creatively.)
We did have this in the glorious history of the mailing list already, even to
the point where some colleagues wrote a very witty paper about the social
interactions here:
https://sketis.net/2017/social-networks-in-the-isabelle-and-coq-community
That paper is really fun to read, especially for people who have been there
themselves. It also documents the cultural peak of the mailing list so far:
both isabelle-users and coq-club have somewhat declined in recent years.
Maybe this old-school discussion format is no longer understood by a younger
generation that was socialized in a much more aggressive Internet -- with its
strange ways to communicate and implicit power structures enforced by forms of
"higher-order political correctness".
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:07):From: Lawrence Paulson <lp15@cam.ac.uk>
This is certainly what I recommend. The mailing list doesn’t operate a “real names” policy, nor does it have any means of doing so. Nor is there any real need to do so.
I am happy for people to hide their identities, but it’s clear that overt anonymity annoys some people despite the near impossibility of knowing that the sender of any message is the person they claim to be.
Apropos of which, see this story: https://nationalpost.com/news/world/historys-oldest-woman-a-fraud-theory-says-122-year-old-jeanne-calment-was-actually-a-99-year-old-imposter
Larry
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:07):From: Dominique Unruh <unruh@ut.ee>
Hi,
(There is a difference in violating rules and circumventing them
creatively.)
I would like to argue strongly against this sentiment:
First, to my knowledge, no rule has been violated. The anonymous poster
has properly been registered with the mailinglist. They have not lied
about anything. Which rule would have been violated? The fact that
Makarius (and only Makarius so far, as far as I can tell) has exhibited
displeasure at anonymous participation does not, in my opinion, make it
a rule.
Second, the suggestion to circumvent rules creatively surprises me. Do I
understand right that being openly and honestly anonymous is a problem,
while using a fake name and pretending that that is one's real identity
would be OK?
Third, I do not see how participating under a fake name would resolve
any of the problems that Makarius mentioned such as being able to wreak
havoc and then reregister with a new identity. (For the record, I myself
do not think this is a problem here.)
(That being said, for practical purposes, it might be useful if the
anonymous poster would adopt a pseudonym (while still clearly stating in
the email that this is a pseudonym). The advantage is simply that it
will be easier to refer to their contributions. E.g., "Fritz the Cat's
set-to-types implementation" instead of "the anonymous person's
set-to-types implementation".)
Best wishes,
Dominique.
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:07):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
The rule is my own rule to ignore subscribers without a proper name. The bad
experience culminating in this thread emphasizes that.
This is a proposal to transcend classic western thinking and resolve an
impossible situation.
(Note that I privately do look up people on the net to get an impression about
their research interests, previous work, ongoing projects etc. This belongs to
the normal professional routine of science and technology -- and my social
model of known individuals acting responsible on the planet. Blank results
will merely degrade the quality of discussion slightly.)
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:07):From: Lawrence Paulson <lp15@cam.ac.uk>
Just to be clear, we have no “real names” policy, nor a mechanism to enforce it.
I’m often surprised at attitudes to identity. When my university decided to issue photo ID cards many years ago, we all had to make appointments to be photographed, but we did not have to present any ID, and therefore could claim to be anybody. More recently, somebody who I knew only by email informed me that our project was security-critical and therefore we need to set up PGP keys; when I asked him how we would authenticate these keys to each other, he didn’t even understand the question. But anybody can get a public-private key pair in the name of Albert Einstein or Isaac Newton.
Larry
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:07):From: Makarius <makarius@sketis.net>
That is indeed a counter model to what I called "common sense" much earlier.
That common sense must be applied, though, by everybody individually and
responsibly.
I keep repeating this, because I see more and more people acting like true
puppets.
(For my part we can close this thread at any time.)
Makarius
Email Gateway (Aug 22 2022 at 21:11):From: mailing-list anonymous <mailing.list.anonymous@gmail.com>
Dear José Manuel Rodríguez Caballero,
Thank you for your reply and for clarifying "I did not justify that some
people call "dummies" to others" because I was under the impression that
you were trying to suggest that it is only appropriate to be impolite to
people whom one considers to be less intelligent or, rather, that you miss
the times when it was appropriate to be impolite to others.
With regard to the rest of your message, I would like to mention that I was
aware of the primary topic of your research and your current applied
formalization efforts, as well as the primary topics of the research of all
of the people on the list that I provided, at the time of writing the
message. I was merely trying to point out that there is always someone
whose intellectual abilities and the sheer volume of knowledge far exceed
one's own (these qualities are not directly related to the topic of one's
research): nearly every human being could be considered to be a "dummy"
relative to someone else.
Last updated: Apr 19 2024 at 04:17 UTC