Intellectual Honesty

Folks, without intellectual honesty we cannot have meaningful discussions. Without meaningful discussions, we cannot explore important areas of our art that are unclear. As one example, admit when you are wrong! Everyone makes mistakes, everyone spouts off comments “from the cuff” in informal discussions, and everyone of us is misinformed about certain areas of our art. None of these things marks you as an idiot or a failure, so admit to them when they are pointed out. Case in point, here is a conversation I just had on a discussion list:

He: “Unlike Fiore, [the Germans] NEVER [emphasis his—HTK] wait to counterstrike/exchange thrusts.”

Me: Yes, sometimes they do. I provided specific examples of the Sprechfenster, plays of the 3rd guard of the halfsword and others, along with a link to my blog entry giving a detailed analysis of this issue.

He: Your analysis is flawed. You do not know what you are talking about (no evidence, no citations, just the blanket statements).

Me: Direct quote from von Danzig telling us to assume Long Point *before* the combat starts and wait to see what the enemy will do. I cited the exact page where the quote could be checked for accuracy.

He: Claimed that was a threatening guard so it did not apply. What he *really* meant was that the Germans never do it the way *Fiore* does it, but he did not specify how that was different. (To make it worse, he confused Döbringer with Liechtenauer, thus demonstrating his lack of familiarity with the material, but I let that pass with only a polite correction after he had made the same mistake several times.)

Me: Deep sigh—here we go. First, showed him Fiore’s Long Guard which is exactly analogous to our Long Point, so it was clear Fiore *did* do it that way. Second, gave him a link to a video clip of a technique from the 3rd guard of the halfsword in which you do not threaten, you merely wait, and documented this with a clear citation for the technique. Next, showed a very similar technique in Fiore, thus clearly proving that, while I do not believe the German and Italian systems to be at all similar, the Germans *do* do some things that the Italians do, too.

He: Well, I am not going to take your undocumented video of a technique as evidence. Besides, I do not agree with your Sprechfenster argument. Besides, your video was poorly done (but no statement as to why).

Me: Well, I *did* provide a citation for the technique, but here is the text for you to examine so you do not have to look it up. And the Sprechfenster *does*deny your original argument, but I gave you a different example so as to deny your ability to twist the argument around. And the video is well done, but even if it were not well done it still proves the point because it matches the text exactly. None of this is open to interpretation: I have shown you an almost exact match of ideas proving that, at least in a limited number of cases, the Germans use the same approach of waiting that Fiore does.

He: Well, you are just an egotistical jerk.

Me: Let us leave personality out of this and avoid ad-hominem attacks. What is your response to the example from the 3rd guard I provided?

He: I will retreat into lofty silence to prove you are a jerk for being so insistent because I am a *real* scholar while you are not. What you should have done was to simply agree to disagree. That you did not proves you to be a jerk.

Me: When an issue is debatable or open to question then we can agree to disagree. When someone is patently wrong he should admit it; you have not supplied any evidence or documentation to contradict what I have written, nor even addressed most of it.

The funny thing is his signature line on his e-mails is from Mark Twain: “Far better to remain silent, and let others wonder at the extent of one's ignorance, than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt.” If only he had thought about that!

So folks, when you are wrong, admit it. Do not try to turn things into an ad-hominem slugfest; all that does is to prove that you have no more arguments to make and cannot respond to the ones on the table. And if you do, and your opponent responds in kind, that does not prove him to be a bigger jerk than you—he probably sees no reason to keep providing you with evidence when, clearly, you have no interest in it nor in reasoned debate. I have to admit that when I am attacked personally I often respond in kind merely because it is so much fun, but I acknowledge that it is unprofessional. Fortunately, in this case, I avoided the temptation.

This was a clear case of a guy who spouted off about a subject about which he was un- or misinformed. No harm, no foul—that applies to all of us in at least some areas, including me, and besides, this issue (Germans waiting to be attacked) is one about which very few people know the facts. In fact, as regular readers of this blog know, I actually *post* my mistakes here for all to see because I would rather admit to an error than to continue to be wrong because while ignorance is both inevitable and forgivable, blind obstinacy is not.