Flint Senior Member

Registered: May 2001 Location: Posts: 454 As Diane used to say, *big sigh*. OK, I'll do my best here.

First, mea culpa to all for saying there were no y2k problems. There were indeed problems. There are *always* problems. There were indeed date bugs, some of which got found and fixed (or worked around) AFTER they bit, rather than before. All was not milk and honey everywhere, and never is.

So I was pointing to calm seas and saying "Hey, no storm after all", and people here were looking at ripples and saying "Look! Real problems". Perspective is important. Maybe it's just me, but I admit I prefer to suit my responses to the nature and scope of the stimulus. You know, "be realistic" and such like. And I can't avoid the impression that on this forum, the conviction that things are terrible is a priori, an article of faith. *Documenting* how terrible things are becomes a matter of careful selection and interpretation, divorced from basic good sense...

So, to Michiana:

You are correct that I like to debate. You are incorrect that I'll pick a position at random just for the fun of arguing. My position about y2k did change over time as the evidence came in, but I've always done my best to assess the evidence to the best of my ability, and change my mind to fit the evidence rather than vice versa.

When I see you falling all over yourself in gratitude to Ed and Gary for scaring you into unnecessary behaviors, I can only wonder. You even admit you didn't use your preps, and you are STILL GRATEFUL for being tricked into stockpiling them. This puzzles me, I admit.

I never argue what I think is wrong. What I DO do is change my mind in the face of overwhelming evidence contrary to my expectations -- a trait I find rare as hens' teeth around here. Hey, I started out really worried and tried to get everyone around me to PAY ATTENTION. It was frustrating. But the more I learned, especially as remediation continued, the less cause I could find for concern.

I can understand Ed's position pretty well. He had a product to sell, which became increasingly important to him as he realized that the Great Fizzle damaged his reputation. He was, like it or not, wedded indelibly to that position. But us rubberneckers, why should we cling so fiercely to a fiction that reality discredited as resoundingly as reality (notorious for ambiguity) has ever discredited anything? Why?

dkulha:

The problem with your mode of analysis is, it is too universal. There has never been any place, any time, where nobody has problems. If you choose, therefore, you could make the claim that (...to be filled in later...) is suffering just terribly. Then you could blindfold yourself, spin around three times, throw darts, and THEN return in fill in the blank. And you'd be absolutely correct! You couldn't miss, if you get to define what "terribly" means to fit your preconceptions!

The juxtoposition between the "solution" (Michiana stockpiling "food, heat and water, as well as a few other essentials, that could last us for however long") and your statement of the "problem" ("an insurance bill I got dated 1907 for some reason. A neighbor also showed me a statement from a finance company dated 1903. All the 7-11 stores around here couldn't take credit or debit cards for several days") is precious. Can you say *inappropriate*, boys and girls? But thanks for putting the *real* y2k impact into perspective -- with few and mostly minor exceptions, these were problems so tiny you'd miss them if you weren't hyperalert for them.

But I must extend my sincere thanks for putting the Great Y2K Disaster into perspective. An insurance bill dated 1908, forsooth! Stock up the food and water, maw!

Brooks:

So you are saying that the paucity of (visible) y2k problems is simply the difficulty of bringing suit? I gotta admit, this is creative. Gee, we need to comb near and far through fine teeth indeed to find anything at all above the noise level, and you're trying to say that there *really were* Big Problems, but nobody noticed because of faulty liability statutes?

Well, I'm open to new information. Can you direct me to one or two of these "carefully crafted statutes"?

Still, your argument works counter to your forum mates. After all, if TPTB made it so difficult to recover from real problems, this ought to make it *easier* for your mates to *document* real problems. They always have real *worries*, that's what this forum is all about. Let me refer you to Michiana above, who gushes with gratitude for those who tricked her into buying what she didn't need. Gratitude indeed!

Wasn't it supposed to be Abe Lincoln who asked how many legs a dog would have if you called its tail a leg, and then answered that the dog would STILL have four legs, because a tail is not a leg no matter what you call it. And what I find here is the Weird Order Of The Fifth Leg. Hey, I started out being wrong, misunderstanding the problem badly. But I have no reputation to defend or book to sell. This lets me correct myself. Try it sometime.

What I try to do, in general, is adjust my conclusions to fit the reality around me, rather than vice versa. There seems to be a LOT of vice versa here.

-- (Keeping@Track.Here), November 30, 2001