Sat Feb 8 16:47:38 1997

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Date: Sat, 8 Feb 1997 15:50:08 -0700
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From: "Robert B. Waltz" 
Subject: Re: Equidistant letters
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On Sat, 8 Feb 1997, DrJDPrice@AOL.COM wrote:

> Nichael wrote:
>
><< Whatever the validity of the original claims, the BR article presented
>only
> the must cursory and "hand-waving" description of what the original authors
> claimed and virtually no discussion whatsoever of the statistical issues
> involved.  It was very hard to come away from the article with any real
> understanding of what was going on.
> 
> Rather the author, Jeffrey R. Satinover (a family therapist and mystery
> novelist) did not even even attempt to appear to present a critical
> examination --or indeed even a serious discussion-- of the authors' claims.
> Rather he accepted the claims at full face value and presented them as
> simple, given fact. >>
>
>I have read and studied the original article in the journal STATISTICAL
>SCIENCE, the most prestigious journal serving the top academic statisticians.
>The article underwent the most strenuous peer review before publication, and
>no one found any flaws in it. Since its publication some critiques have been
>circulated, but no refutation of the article has appeared in a professional
>journal. The conclusion of the authors was "We conclude that the proximity of
>ELS's with related meanings in the Book of Genesis in not due to chance."
>This is supported by impressive data that rank the phenomenon in Genesis 5th
>among 1,000,000 samples in the control group.

Before incivility breaks out, we should perhaps note that two different
journals are being referred to here.

But this still doesn't address the point that some of us are still wondering
about. That point being, "What did the articles claim?"

If it is claimed that the MT is very uniform, and seems to have been copied
with extreme fidelity from generation to generation -- well, that is no
surprise. I haven't heard anyone deny it. The effort made by the scribes
was immense.

But so what?

I hope someone can offer some elucidation.

Bob Waltz
waltzmn@skypoint.com

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