{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3415",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 3415,
    "subject": "Unnecessary and Insufficient Unicorns",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "2002-08-20T21:12:25+00:00",
    "last": "2002-08-20T21:12:25+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0208-1581@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes",
        "address": "ddanehy at siebel.com"
      },
      "date": "2002-08-20T21:12:25+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Unnecessary and Insufficient Unicorns",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "If we are considering Charlie Turner as a \"unicorn\" then we might also\nconsider the ghost of the coldhouse prank as one, too."
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "O, what a can of worms is opened here!\nIf Charlie Turner is a unicorn,\nand if there never was a coldhouse prank,\nthen maybe Sherry Gold's a phantom too,\na middle-aged man's onanistic dream;\nand Louis Gold a harmless cheapener\nof curious and slightly obscene books;\nperhaps Olivia never lived at all,\nwhile Bobby Black did, to a ripe old age.\nIn short, if we but once begin to claim\nthat this or that is \"just a unicorn,\"\nthen what remains? A vapid, empty text,\nwith \"content\" a wild goose to lead us on,\nthe reader free to pick and choose at will\nwhat parts to keep and what to set aside\nas inconvenient to her favorite theory?\nEnough. This will not do. One unicorn,\nperhaps, we might accept, but (as it were)\nat sword's-point only; otherwise we must\nadmit _the text's the text_, and if it's not\nconsistent, self-coherent, then perhaps\nthat's what the writer meant for it to be;\na writer who had just one novel past\nembodied Heisenberg's uncertainty\nmight well decide to dramatize Godel;\nif PEACE is incoherent, incomplete,\nand ultimately undecideable,\nperhaps that's just the point. Then to delete\nan inconvenient detail, character,\nor even an entire anecdote,\nbecause it tidies up chronology\nand makes our theories neat is simply wrong.\nRoy Lackey brought some evidence to bear\nthat makes the Turner-unicorn at least\nsupportable (though I am not convinced\nthis means it's necessary to accept).\nThis isn't true, now, for the cold-house prank;\nyou've shown it simplifies the timeline, true,\nbut \"simple\"'s never been the adjective\nI'd use for Lupine texts. So what's the point?\nThe text's the text, the book's the book, I say,\nand all our theories merely serve to light\nour dusty way to comprehending it.\nExplain the text, but don't explain away\nwhat doesn't seem to fit; don't change the facts,\nas third-year physics majors often do.\nAnd now that I've offended everyone,\nI'll shut my mandibles and go to sleep."
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}