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Some (Bored) Saturday Night Analytic PhilosophyLet us test the blackguards' reasoning skills with a dilemma. Last May I received two subpoenas: between the two I was in contact with the SEC, and between the two I put out a press release where I said, "I may be the first CEO in history to celebrate receiving an SEC subpoena." When I wrote that, was my imbedded claim ("that I had been subpoenaed") true or false? _____You would say that it was true, if you believe (as I do) that the distinction between "being subpoenaed" and "being CEO of a company that is subpoenaed in part about things you have said and done" is a distinction without a difference: however, if you choose this horn of the dilemma, then it means that you acknowledge that I was subpoenaed and then disclosed it. _____On the other hand, if you want to insist that I was subpoenaed but did not disclose it, you have to claim, then, that when I wrote, "I may be the first CEO in history to celebrate receiving an SEC subpoena" I was not telling the truth because I had NOT been subpoenaed: to maintain this, however, you have to insist that the distinction between "being subpoenaed" and "being CEO of a company that is subpoenaed in part about things you have said and done" is really a solid, well-founded distinction. Are the miscreants, in their eagerness to prosecute their J'accuse du jour, in fact willing to choose this second horn? If so, then I have two replies. The first is that this is a patently silly distinction. The second is, it leaves them defending a belief system that says that when I am subpoenaed I hide it from the world, but when I am not subpoenaed I like to pretend to the world that I am being subpoenaed, and that I happened to be engaging in just such a pretense precisely when I actually WAS subpoenaed. If this is, in fact, the belief system they choose to defend, then... well, I wish them all the best, and beg them to elaborate. Bored in Utah, Patrick PS By the way, as I recall (it has been a year), that second subpoena was quite short, had two questions that related to areas covered by the first (I do not remember what, precisely), a third that asked if I had a 10b5 plan ("No"), and then asked for everything I had written, gathered, learned and said about the miscreants: naked shorting, collusive and manipulative practices among hedge funds, analysts, bent journalists, etc. So, given that I had just issued a press release saying, "I may be the first CEO in history to celebrate receiving an SEC subpoena," I can honestly say that I do not think it even occured to me that another press release was due: if it had, I probably would have put out one that said, "Overstock Celebrates Subpoena Indicating The SEC May Finally Be Looking Into Claims About Corruption in Our Capital Markets." PPS If one of the guys whom we mostly ignore manages to make interesting reply, someone please repost it so I will see. |
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Msg # | Subject | Author | Recs | Date Posted |
7314 | Re: Some (Bored) Saturday Night Analytic Philosophy | tamoshanter | 0 | 5/13/2007 8:56:52 AM |