neither i nor kenneally said _he_ had a bad effect on the field. as i mentioned, Kenneally says that his _reputation_ did. in which case, as CK points out, it wasn't Chompers who caused the problem. It was an excessive fandom that she thinks really didn't have to do with Chompers. Like I said, if he made some off the cuff conjecture in a footnote, people would take it as gospel like a bunch of fanbuoyz.
I personally found this fascinating to learn because I'd thought the fanbuoydom was confined to politicos. apparently not!
in a related discussion, she discusses the famous Chomsky-Hauser-Fitch article that incensed a lot of people. People were getting pissy and an academic fight broke out where people couldn't get words in edgewise. One guy insists that Chomsky says human language is "a miracle". Hauser finally gets a word in and says, the word miracle is nowhere to be found in the paper, WTF? (I'm paraphrase; book's at work)
I mean, the book is a wealth of information on its own merits, but it's highly entertaining to read the soap opera, too.
"let's be civil and nice, but not to the point of obeying the rules of debate as defined by liberal blackmail (in which, discomfort caused by a challenge is seen as some vague form of harassment)."
-- Dwayne Monroe, 11/19/08
-- http://cleandraws.com Wear Clean Draws