MR's Corrections - Wherein We Clarify A Few Things about UCI and Apologize to Some of Our Academic Betters
(1) The link-based nature of the blogosphere is at the heart of its fact-checking, self-correcting structure. This is almost always a very good thing. Unless you post hunches and guesswork on your blog. Then this happens. Regarding the UCI event, we wrote:
At one point, a heckler who slipped into the auditorium had to be led outside - but not before he was systematically dismantled by Ted Hayes. From what we understand, the heckler (who we're pretty sure is the same one who screamed at Lee Kaplan for being an "Israeli agent"... because you know all Jews work for Israel) - from what we understand, the heckler made some comment about how slavery was a conspiracy by non-Muslims against Muslims. Hayes responded by severely educating the young man as to the extensive Islamic and Arab role in the African slave trade.
That parenthetical, it turns out, was wrong (not so much the "all Jews work for Israel" part - the other part). Courtesy of an email from The Disgruntled Chemist:
To clarify, the guy who got thrown out for saying that Lee Kaplan was an "Israeli agent" was not the same guy who Ted Hayes lectured about the slave trade (and who was also thrown out). The young man who Ted lectured was thrown out after he shouted down Lee Kaplan, who then called him a fascist, which caused a man from the audience to charge at the young man in the audience. Those two were thrown out together, and the "Israeli agent" guy shortly thereafter.
(2) Sometimes we like to insert airy humor (read: facile snark) into our posts. Sometimes it turns out that our attempts to be funny trade on statements that aren't technically "true" (as such). This is one of those times. In a post about the Bush Administration's willingness to acquiesce to the UAE's shameful boycott of Israel, we wrote
The academic blog Language Log (where they don't like Strunk and White, Dan Brown, or George Bush), recently passed on this passage from a preface to the translated works of Roman aristocrat Sidonius.
That parenthetical, it turns out, was wrong (not the "Strunk and White, Dan Brown" part so much as the "George Bush" part). While many of Language Log's contributors are indeed liberal academics who are predictably not fans of the Commander in Chief of the most powerful military in human history, UPenn linguistics and cog sci uberprofessor Mark Liberman has defended the President on numerous occasions. See: here and here and here and here. The final link is actually to a post warning against political stereotyping. As Glenn Reynolds is wont to say, ouch.
At one point, a heckler who slipped into the auditorium had to be led outside - but not before he was systematically dismantled by Ted Hayes. From what we understand, the heckler (who we're pretty sure is the same one who screamed at Lee Kaplan for being an "Israeli agent"... because you know all Jews work for Israel) - from what we understand, the heckler made some comment about how slavery was a conspiracy by non-Muslims against Muslims. Hayes responded by severely educating the young man as to the extensive Islamic and Arab role in the African slave trade.
That parenthetical, it turns out, was wrong (not so much the "all Jews work for Israel" part - the other part). Courtesy of an email from The Disgruntled Chemist:
To clarify, the guy who got thrown out for saying that Lee Kaplan was an "Israeli agent" was not the same guy who Ted Hayes lectured about the slave trade (and who was also thrown out). The young man who Ted lectured was thrown out after he shouted down Lee Kaplan, who then called him a fascist, which caused a man from the audience to charge at the young man in the audience. Those two were thrown out together, and the "Israeli agent" guy shortly thereafter.
(2) Sometimes we like to insert airy humor (read: facile snark) into our posts. Sometimes it turns out that our attempts to be funny trade on statements that aren't technically "true" (as such). This is one of those times. In a post about the Bush Administration's willingness to acquiesce to the UAE's shameful boycott of Israel, we wrote
The academic blog Language Log (where they don't like Strunk and White, Dan Brown, or George Bush), recently passed on this passage from a preface to the translated works of Roman aristocrat Sidonius.
That parenthetical, it turns out, was wrong (not the "Strunk and White, Dan Brown" part so much as the "George Bush" part). While many of Language Log's contributors are indeed liberal academics who are predictably not fans of the Commander in Chief of the most powerful military in human history, UPenn linguistics and cog sci uberprofessor Mark Liberman has defended the President on numerous occasions. See: here and here and here and here. The final link is actually to a post warning against political stereotyping. As Glenn Reynolds is wont to say, ouch.
