>In a way, you illustrate the point that "merit" is only one of the
>considerations publishers bring. They look at "what will sell" and
>"readership market", etc. Your difficulties were partly because you
>were challenging all the paradigms held by the various publishers you
>approached.
When it comes to books, it is very important for the publisher to look
at what will sell. Their job is to make money. For the journals, which
also rejected my attempt to outline my views, the problem was, as you
note, my challenging of every paradigm out there. But on the other
hand, the journals function should be to bring forth new ideas
occasionally. I am very thankful to the ASA for finally agreeing to
publish my stuff after first rejecting it.
As to the usefulness of challenging, I still challenge the validity of
all other apologetical paradigms(they all are falsified by observational
data), and if I can think of a better paradigm than the one I now
advocate, I will challenge mine also. Christians have got to realize
that challenges to a paradigm are good. Unfortunately, we all act as if
a rejection of the paradigm each of us personally holds means a
rejection of the Bible itself. It is this attititude, (that ones own
interpretation is the only divinely inspired interpretation ) that
causes so many problems among Christians. And it is for this reason that
I believe that the title of this thread should be changed to the one
above.