Louis Blair wrote in message usenet.com...
I wrote:
If Jeremy Spinrad wants to hypothesize that a sufficiently poorly
informed individual might have "rationally" jumped to such a
conclusion, I suppose that we could allow that, but it strikes me as
a bit of a stretch on the meaning of "rational".

Nick wrote:
*Perhaps* (this is only my hypothesis) Jeremy Spinrad was only
contending that it would have been a 'quite rational belief' for
people then to accept the authority of some (though not all) medical
'experts' who may have come to that conclusion about Paul Morphy.

So far I have seen no reference to medical experts believing
that Morphy's mental problems were caused by blindfold playing.

Mr Blair, with your characteristic attention to detail, you are correct,
as far as I know, that Jeremy Spinrad has not made any specific "reference
to medical experts believing that Morphy's mental problems were caused by
blindfold playing".

I did have a reason (which I could explain in private to the extent that it
should become necessary) to suppose that Jeremy Spinrad might have been
thinking of the authority of 19th century 'medical experts'. Given that
Mr Spinrad has declared that he does "not plan to respond to (your) comments
on (his) post", I believe that it should be inappropriate now for me to
discuss this subject any further in public. (Please read my E-mail.)
I regret it if my hypothesis has led to anything negative for Jeremy Spinrad.

I wrote:
Surely part of "rational" includes making some sort of proper effort
to obtain relevant information.

Nick wrote:
By that evidently rather high standard, however, many voters in modern
democracies may not be regarded as necessarily making 'rational' decisions.

In the interest of clarity, my statement (above) was a comment on only the
immediately preceding statement by Louis Blair, *not* on any other statements
by him or Jeremy Spinrad in this thread.

The phrase used by Jeremy Spinrad was "very rational".
It seems to me that if one wants to be very rational about the idea that
blindfold play caused Morphy's mental troubles, the very first thing one
should consider is whether or not mental trouble was apparent at any time
even remotely close to the time of the blindfold encounters.

Mr Blair, I regret that there has been any misunderstanding between us here.
Actually, I already agreed with what you have expressed again in your statement
(above). My statement about 'many voters in modern democracies' was intended
only to remark (in passing) on the popular non-rationality of human decisions.

Again, people IN MORPHY'S TIME expressed skepticism about the strain theory.

Yes, Mr Blair, in my view, your comments to Jeremy Spinrad have made
several good points.

--Nick