[Torg] Possibility Spending

[Benjamin Grant]

>>And you know, I'm quite sure I could phrase my questioning in such a
>>way to
>>get people to agree to whatever I wanted them to say too. Presenting
>>selected phrasing in combination with appropriate leading questions,
>>it'd be
>>easy. So easy, in fact, that avoiding such bias is a significant
>>portion of
>>the study of statistics, because it's hard to avoid when framing
>>questions.
>>It frequently occurs even when questioners are consciously seeking to
>>avoid
>>it.

So what?

>>
>>But if you simply slapped the book in front of someone, asked them to
>>read
>>page 14 for themselves, left them alone to do it and then asked them to
>>describe how Possibilities may be used during play, I believe you will
>>rarely, at best, have anyone tell you that it is as you describe.

I disagree and think you are wrong, but even if your are not, so what?

>>> And I would not only say that your charge applies much more clearly
>>to
>>> *your* interpretation, my quick poll would seem to back that up.
>>
>>There's another set of data available. You put your argument to this
>>list,
>>and a number of people told you they didn't see your interpretation in
>>the
>>written rules. For the most part, readers of this list are people who
>>have
>>bought and read the rules before coming to this list, and thus their
>>initial
>>interpretions have not been gleaned from the teachings of others here.
>>If
>>you ask, I think you will find that your respondants will assure you
>>that,
>>for the most part, they have played the way they do before discussing
>>the
>>matter here.

Again, it doesn't matter because 1) people on this list would tend to cleave
to the interpretations of the most vocal posters when introduced to this
list (that would be you right now) and 2) even if that were true, it doesn't
change the fact of what it actually does say.  I mean, you could have a
million people misread it, and they (and you) would still be wrong.

>>
>>> >>> It does not
>>> >>> appear to me that either of us has offered anything that
>>> >>> seems to be chaning the other person's mind on this.
>>> >>
>>> >>You hold too high an opinion of yourself, that you assume I care
>>> >>whether your mind is changed.
>>>
>>> Where and when did I state that you did?
>>
>>If you don't, you could consider stopping asking about it. Changing
>>your
>>mind is irrelevant.

Quotes please?  A smell a straw man here.

>>
>>> It would also probably be for the best if you didn't take the
>>> discussion so personally.
>>
>>I don't get it. You barely exist to me as a person. It's your arguments
>>I
>>address, and you matter to me no more than as a source of those
>>arguments.
>>My part, likewise, is as a presenter of my own arguments. Where does
>>"personally" enter into it?

Your evident hostility.  Or are you blind to your own state?  That would be
not at all unusual.

>>
>>> I would further wonder what it matters, whether or not the
>>> rules as written say one thing or the other.
>>
>>You tell me.

I am not the one dragging this conversation out, so YOU tell ME.

<<snip more text of Travis saying nothing more than "I am a right" in a
sneering and supercilious way.  Lucky us.>>

I guess there was nothing else to respond to.

Cheers.

I look forward to Travis's next demonstration of being unable to move on.

-Benn Grant
eFix Computer Consulting
benn at 4eFix.com
603.283.6601