b322da wrote:I think that all this maligning, insulting and outright libel of Professor Krause is beginning to show widespread immaturity. He is a brilliant professor, who had his latest book, just released, reviewed by the Times just yesterday. There are not many who can write a biography of Richard Feynman, much less understand Feynman's genius, or his field, quantum electrodynamics theory, even a little bit.
This thread reminded me of the review I read yesterday, I ordered the book from Amazon a few minutes ago, and I received it less than a minute later. I am sure that most of you, being Texans, remember Feynman, the guy who rescued the space shuttle program by just sitting down and thinking.
Elmo
(Edited to spell Richard Feynman's name correctly, thanks to a perceptive reader).
Off topic, but I actually
knew Feynman. He ate dinner in our home on more than one occasion. He was a really funny guy.
Now, let me tell you a little bit about the 'geniuses' of academia... My parents were on the faculty at Caltech, in the humanities division. My father was a published author considered to be one of the world's foremost authorities on the works of Joseph Conrad. He had
two PhDs. My mother graduated
summa cum laude from the Sorbonne, and her doctoral thesis was published as a book. She has authored, or co-authored 13 books since then, and at age 86 is currently working on number 15. we counted among our family friends no less than
THREE Nobel laureates, including Max Delbrück—who, to this day, is the only person I ever met who really did know almost everything there was to know about anything, and who truly was a superlative human being who was part of our closest inner circle. Even Feynman couldn't match that. Believe me, I KNOW.
This guy Krause is small cheese. He is a minor professor in a second tier university—no offense meant to anyone who went to school there... but it ain't Harvard Law. Academics, by nature of the same sheltered environment that is supposed to support and nurture their work by insulating them from the realities of the economy and job marketplace, know little or nothing about how the real world works—my parents included. I reserve an exception for engineers, who often seem to do creative and
useful things in real life.
Elmo, you're an attorney, and meaning no disrespect, but if you're honest with me you'll acknowledge the old joke in the legal industry that all attorneys think they have a good book somewhere inside of them. Some actually do, but most don't....just like the rest of us don't. Many attorneys (and professors) suffer from the vanity that, because they know a lot about one thing, they then necessarily know a lot about most things. Again, meaning no disrespect to you personally, but this is no more true of attorneys who teach the law than it is true of doctors who teach gynecology, or literary professors who teach courses about Joseph Conrad. When I worked for Daily Journal Corporation, a large west coast legal publisher, I had plenty of opportunity to see books written by attorneys that were submitted for review. A few were good. Most were not.
Just because Krause wrote a book about Feynman doesn't mean that he did anything either original or great, just because he is a law professor. I'll reserve judgement until I've had a chance to read the book myself. Even so, even IF he wrote a good book about Feynman, that does not mean that his approach to CHL in the classroom is either correct, well thought out, or even that intelligent. My previously mentioned and very capable mother survived the Axis occupation of North Africa. My dad (barely) survived Iwo Jima. Both came to the conclusion that violence is NEVER the proper response. They were both demonstrably wrong as hades about that, their exalted positions in academia notwithstanding.
Krause's public statements are patently ridiculous. He made them very publicly. They are therefore fair game for public ridicule.
“Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And, weak men create hard times.”
― G. Michael Hopf, "Those Who Remain"
#TINVOWOOT
