Hal,


Every once in a while, I see subtle hints that some think only scholars,
with degrees absolute, should count as authority. When I was a very young
grad student, I went to the first Mark Twain Circle meeting in New Orleans
and gushed over Justin Kaplan's book.  One of the august, who shall remain
nameless, responded, "Oh he's just a biographer.  He's not a scholar."  I
have a Harlen Ellison record on which he excoriates a MIT audience who booed
the name of Carl Sagan.  For them Sagan was just a popularizer of science,
and Ellison thought this was great.  "He's a nifty guy," Ellison said,
"providing a real service for folks who aren't coming to MIT."

We scholars are an interesting breed.  I remember a newspaper account on a
humor conference in which the reporter was startled that, during the run of
the conference, no one laughed.  The seminars were detailed, foot-noted, and
eminently publishable.  But no one laughed. So why call it humor?

I wonder if God created scholars because he was disappointed in
administrators.