Posted by: Merv () on Sat Dec 4 08:11:09 2004

>>> Jack-
> >
> > I would encourage you to participate directly at www.hitting-mechanics.org.
> >
> > The site is owned/maintained/overseen by Paul Nyman,but the attempt is to welcome dissent.
> >
> > I would expect you to be treated with respect,and the site has good indexing and audiovisual capability.
> >
> > Not tt be too much of a pollyanna about this,I suppose there is risk of someone being percieved as right or wrong/winner or loser which could translate into a loss of business or proprietary information,but my guess is that it would really just mean more interest and business for all involved even if more heat than light gets generated.
> >
> > The scientific principles are hard enough to understand with a direct good faith informed dialog.Understanding via intermediaries and proxies is not likely to develop understanding in my opinion.
> >
> > Would you be willing to give it a try ?
> >
> > Specific times for a dialog more or less real time could probably be arranged so you and Paul could interact directly/productively. <<<
> >
> > Hi Tom
> >
> > I thank you for your invitation. Business considerations would play no part in my decision whether or not to accept. I opened this Site to inform the public of my findings from a study of how energy is transferred in the baseball/softball swing. There were no products offered for sale until many readers requested a video explaining the batting principles presented on the Web Site.
> >
> > I have not posted to another site since Batspeed.com came on line. However, my obvious concern with accepting your invitation is that it appears Paul has been successful in convincing his readers that a recognized physics law is “Voodoo Science.” There can be no intelligent discussion until this is resolved.
> >
> > My high school physics book defines torque as, “Forces applied from opposing directions that cause an object to rotate around an axis.” The drawings that accompany and define this can be seen at: http://www.batspeed.com/research10.html
> > Once Paul and his readers accept that this physics law is not “Voodoo Science,” then maybe we can have an informed discussion of how it applies to the baseball swing.
> >
> > Jack Mankin
> >
>
> Jack and Tom and All
>
> Jack your refusal to engage in a real time conversation is intriguing and yet somewhat understandable. There should be a third party mediator that would navigate the conversations and discussion so that they would stay on task. A friendly discussion of opposing views are not always pleasant as each person is exposed to criticism and strongly held ideas are dissected and then can show flaws.
>
> If you believe that one's ideas are flawless then a discussion about those ideas should be very open and irrefutable. To back away from a discussion about those ideas would appear to be a lack of confidence in those ideas or a lack of confidence that the conversation would be enlightening.
>
> I am not saying that either one of you are right or wrong but without a discussion it is impossible to expand the knowledge that we are all looking for in the area of hitting. Posturing is a political way of not exposing your weaknesses or your strengths.
>
> Dave

Dave, about 6 or 8 months ago Paul Nyman himself came on this site and challenged Jack to a discussion. Jack accepted. It only took about 2 posts by Nyman for the discussion to degenerate into exchanges of personal insults. Nyman's approach is that if what you have to say differs from his opinion, then you are dumb, misinformed. That attitude is ok for his site since he owns his site. But when you go to someone else's site you can't take that attitude with you. After Nyman made his personal insults, others responded in kind, Nyman got in one last shot and then never returned.Again, the record shows that Nyman challenged, Jack accepted, Nyman made personal insults, Nyman didn't like the insults being returned and left. So who is the one who was running away from an honest discussion?