Glenn noted, in a recent post:
" I would point out to the Cranach Institute that Dembski by his own
admission,
engaged in a blatant case of disobeying his boss. When you do that you
should be prepared to pay the consequences without squawking."
That, in a nutshell, is the whole point. Glenn argues, and I agree with
him, that
Dembski committed a very understandable, but altogether human, error in so
doing
and that the consequences which followed are to be expected.
It is OK to disobey the boss if you are prepared to take the consequences.
That's what Luther did.
There were many times when I opposed decisions made by my management at
IBM.
In some cases, they were wrong and I was right. But I did not take my
disagreements to the press, for heaven's sake! I fought them out within the
structure of the business. Yes -- even breaking the chain of command
in a couple of cases, but still keeping it within the business. And when
the decision
did not go my way, in one instance at least I simply requested (and
received) a transfer
out of the situation, one which cost me money, but that was the price I was
prepared to pay to not work on something I saw as a self-defeating project.
It would have been oh-so-easy for me to have called up the editors of
DATAMATION
and told them about the problems. If I would have done so, I would have
expected to
be fired, or at least asked to resign. People should not do that unless
there is a moral or public safety issue involved; even in those cases there
are
necessary consequences and one should be prepared to face them.
As I understand my friend Joe Carson's case, he went to the press, because
there were public safety issues involved. And he paid a great price. And I
think
he'd do it again, even knowng now that the price was a lot higher than he
had
anticipated. I admire him.
I respect Bill Dembski, and his work, a lot. But in this case, what Glenn
writes
above is the simple facts. It is time to move on.
Burgy
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