mls@sfsup.att.com (Mike Siemon) (03/25/91)
Palm Sunday, 1991
This is going to be very Germanic (but perhaps the context calls for it :-))
I apologize for the length, and also for some delay in getting this out;
the system on which I saved O'Keefe's samples was down most of last week.
Source A
a. Abe Baker was a clinician who shot from the hip.
10 words; colloquial idiom.
b. During a typical teaching session, one of my fellow first-year residents was presenting a patient who had a confusional psychosis.
21 words.
c. After telling Abe about the entire medical history of this patient and the
results of the physical examination, this poor, unsuspecting resident then
began to recount the patient's psychiatric history.
30 words; very colloquial ("this poor, unsuspecting resident")
d. Abe would have none of it.
6 words; colloquial idiom.
e. He exploded.
2 words; colloquial idiom.
f. A psychiatric history is a waste of time, he said.
10 words; indirect [or at least, unmarked by "] quotation.
g. No neurologist should ever take one.
6 words; indirect quotation continues (to end of sample).
h. Everybody has psychiatric problems.
4 words
i. The whole world is crazy, so are all its inhabitants.
10 words; colloquial idiom.
j. The question is not if a patient has a psychiatric problem.
11 words.
k. The question is whether the pation has a neurological problem that can
account for his or her behaviour.
18 words; note splitting of parallel between two sentences
(similar stylistically to the asyndeton in i.)
l. That is a neurologic question and has to be evaluated on neurologic
grounds, not on psychiatric ones.
17 words.
m. A psychiatric history is irrelevant.
5 words.
13 sentences, median length 10 words. Note that there is a rhythm of
alternation in word length -- the only long sentence (30 words) is followed
by two sentences in 8 words. Word count rises again to 18 & 17 -- then drops
to 5. This large scale characteristic may disppear in a conflated text.
Very colloquial, even specifically American colloquialism though possibly
findable in British sources: "shot from the hip," "crazy," plus more generic
cases like "exploded" or "have none of it."
Notes: a neurologist may be expected to hold negative opinions about most
non-physiological forms of psychiatry, and that is aptly illustrated
in the sample. The only problem is that we don't know the AUTHOR's
opinion, only Abe's. And the short, abrupt sentences may be Abe's;
however, the presentation as indirect at least suggests that brief
sentences may be authorial and not simply reportage. Similarly, the
colloquialisms may be Abe's or maybe not; since this sample is given
as representative, I have no alternative but to consider it as the
stylistic baseline for source A.
Source B
i. The Oedipus complex now became the central point of Freud's theories.
11 words.
ii. The first published mention of Oedipal motivation occurs in "The
Interpretation of Dreams", published three years later.
17 words; quote marks around a book title.
iii. "It is the fate of all of us, perhaps, to direct our first sexual impulse
towards our mother and our first hatred and our first murderous wish against
our Father.
30 words; direct quotation.
iv. Our dreams convince us that this is so."
8 words; direct quotation.
v. The story of Oedipus and his destiny "moves us only because it might have
been ours--because the oracle laid the same curse upon us before our birth as
upon him," he declared.
33 words; direct quotation.
vi. Oedipal conflicts now replaced seduction as the origin of the neuroses.
11 words.
vii. Wittels tells us that when Freud had brought a patient to a successful
conclusion, he used to show the patient an engraving after a painting by
Ingres, "Oedipus and the Sphinx".
31 words; indirect quotation; quote marks on cited painting.
viii. Many years later Freud enlarged on the Oedipus theory with an excursion
into anthropology in "Totem and Taboo" (1912-1913) when he traced the begin-
nings of religion to the "father of the primal horde".
34 words; quote marks around book title and direct quotation.
8 sentences; average length 21.9 words (the median is between 17 and 30). And
note that the only short sentence is in direct quotation; if we omit the out-
liers in both samples, A still has median length 10 while B's median is 30.
Indirect quotation occurs once, but is relatively infrequent -- just enough to
make indirect quotation less than a reliable marker for disintguishing these
styles. There is no evident opinion, pro or con, about psychoanalytic notions
(as may seem to befit a "medical historian") but there *is* concern for dates
and titles of publications.
The test passage:
1. Freud's early experiments with cocaine and his own use of the newly syn-
thesized drug as a medication in the years 1884 to 1887 is known from his
early papers and appears in all his biographies.
35 words. No specific markers, but note that length outside
the range of A suggests B, as does the concern with dates and
"papers." Tentatively assigned to B.
2. Sigmund Freud's original interest in cocaine was the direct result of the
suggestion that cocaine might have a specific therapeutic use in the treatment
of addiction.
27 words. No specific markers, but the interest in drugs for
therapy MAY be a marker of a neurologist's interests. A?
3. By 1883, Freud had become a close friend of another young medical scientist,
Ernst von Fleischl.
16 words; uncharacteristically short for B, but the date is
a marker for B, and "young medical scientist" sounds to me
too stilted for A (who might anyway question the "science.")
4. There is no question that Fleischl was addicted to morphine.
10 words. Short sentence, borderline colloquialism with a
specific echo of "question" in sentences j. and k. Assigned
to A.
5. The cost of the drug was prohibitive, but nevertheless Freud ordered some
from the house of Merck.
17 words. Middling-length sentence, interest in price and
source of drugs might suggest A -- but "House of Merck" is
distinctly non-American idiom. Tentative assignment to B.
Note that this sentence CANNOT have followed 4 immediately in
the same source (assuming competent editing :-)): "the drug"
here is cocaine, not morphine.
6. Freud obtained a shipment of cocaine from Eli Merck in the United States
in the hope that he could use it to cure his friend and colleague.
27 words. Length of sentence is getting a bit long for A,
but note the *different* manner of referring to Merck here --
This is a "doublet" with 5, and I am confident they come from
different sources. Tentatively assigned to A.
7. Clutching at the new drug "like a drowning man," within a few days Fleischl
was taking it regularly.
18 words. Contradictory markers -- quote marks suggest B while
the idiom is more suggestive of A. That it is quoted undercuts
the colloquialism -- A would hardly be so apologetic about it
and so I tentatively assign this to B.
8. After several months of administering cocaine to Fleischl and taking it
himself, Freud wrote the first of his five articles on coca.
22 words. Unassigned on first pass.
9. This article, entitled "Ueber Coca", was a glowing report that suggested
seven successful therapeutic applications for coca.
17 words. Contradictory markers; shortness and drug therapeutic
interests suggest A, while quote marks suggest B. The placing
of the comma and quotation mark suggests British usage rather
than American. Assigned to B.
10. Having been witness to the terrible scenes of von Fleischl's severe cocaine
intoxication, knowing that von Fleischl was still taking morphine as well as
cocaine, and having warned his fiancee of acquiring the habit, Freud allows
his 1885 paper to go forward for publication.
44 words. Length suggests B! Note the consistent use of
"von" in Fleischl's name (note also that this is NOT correct
German practice.) This use of "von" will become a marker on
my second pass.
11. In print, Freud always maintained that cocaine was a wonder drug, and
that, by itself, it was not addicting.
19 words. The shortness of the sentence, the tinge of collo-
quialism in "wonder drug" and the "maintained" leading up to a
summary and no direct quotation assigns this to A.
12. Freud continued to hold that cocaine was not addicting, stating in his
fifth and final paper on cocaine, published in 1887, that "cocaine has claimed
no victim who has not previously been addicted to another drug."
36 words. Length, quotation marks and *less* colloquial
parallel to the statement in 11 strongly urge source B.
This is another "doublet" of the kind critics find in the OT.
This one is also suggestive of *different* opinions -- 11
has an implicit suggestion (possibly because of the earlier
"warned his fiance"?) that Freud's printed opinion was not
the whole story, whereas 12's "continued to hold" makes no
such suggestion. This is a very faint analogy to the blatant
contradictions between e.g. Genesis 7:2 and 7:9.)
13. It always always [sic?] been assumed that Freud ceased taking cocaine in
1887, years before he began his major psychoanalytical work.
20 words; the date may be a marker for B, but note the close
connection syntactially and semantically to sentence 14.
14. But when Freud formulated his psychoanalytic theories, he was under the
influence of a toxic drug with specific effects on the brain.
22 words; a trace of colloquialism ("under the influence") and
an implicit negative judgment on Freud's work while under this
"toxic" influence on his "brain." This is A.
First pass: A <- 2,4,6,11,14 B <- 1,3,5,7,9,12,13?
This turns up two pairs of "doublets" -- sentences 5,6 and 11,12 -- which I
am confident appear in the distinct sources, so that *independently* of my
assignment of the individual sentences, I *also* claim that 5 and 6 do NOT
come from the same source, as 11 and 12 also do not. Sentences 1 and 2 also
may be a doublet -- "Freud's early experiments with cocaine" and "Sigmund
Freud's original interest in cocaine" are rather redundant; and if they are
from the same source, then the sequence "Freud's X"/"Sigmund Freud's X||" is
extremently poor (English) rhetoric.
It is difficult for me to believe that the same author would -- in a short
passage from a single work -- use both the correct "Fleischl" and the hyper-
correct "von Fleischl" to refer by surname to Freud's friend (consider, if
you like, how touchy O'Keefe and I both were about our respective different
preferences for others speaking about us.) But we have the unprepositioned
Fleischl in 4 and in 7; on balance (and with the awkward sequence form 4 to 5
noted above), I might reassign 7 to A and get:
(*) A <- 2,4,6,7,8,11,14 B <- 1,3,5,9,10,12,13?
I am not happy about this, as 8 would seem to have a fairly tight semantic
connection with 9, "This article" refering back to "the first of five" in 8,
as well as the connection that seems to bind 13 and 14. In fact the markers
I have been using (idiom, quotes, dates) are so meagre and superficial as to
be nothing I place much confidence in. I have also looked at taking the "von"
of sentence 10 and making that A, moving 7 and 8 back to B; trouble is, this
leaves 4 exposed with its bare "Fleischl." This line of exploration yields:
(**) A <- 2,4,6,10,11,13,14 B <- 1,3,5,7,8,9,12
Note that there is no mention in the first 12 sentences of Freud using
cocaine after 1887, nor any mention here of the "formulation" of his theories
during the 1884-1887 period. Sentences 13 and 14 are either from a different
context, or the redactor has omitted something of significance in his sources.
Indeed there are OTHER indications of O'Keefe's editorial omissions. We have
two sources mentioning Fleischl by name, but only ONE introduction of the man.
Sentence 3 *could* derive from either source; I suspect that a parallel was
dropped because it was TOO obviously redundant.
My final guess is (**), simply because that "factors" better into readable
accounts -- though with some obvious gaps like a parallel to 3 from A, and
a context for 13-14. But the assignments here are the least important thing;
what counts is the doublets and the stylistic problems THAT RESULT FROM this
putting together of sources. These things exist IN THE TEXT and can be seen
and argued about. I am more confident of the *intersection* of my two lines
of thinking (*) and (**) based on the "von" marker than I am in either one
by itself. This makes 2,4,6,11,14 A sentences, and 1,3,5,9,12 B sentences;
Of these ten, I expect to have 7 +/- 1 correct.
Despite uncertainties, I will stand for now with these assignments. I'm least
confident of the assignments to A, as for the most part they only HINT at the
stylistic characteristics that are very evident in the sample passage A. That
and the shortness of the test passage, and the tight binding of BOTH sources
to recent, well-documented events (thus reducing the scope of traditional
variation in telling the tale) are my main direct complaints about O'Keefe's
test sample. Plus the omissions from his sources that I think I have detected
suggest to me a *different* redactorial procedure than is posited for the DH
redactor.
Nichael Cramer commented that style is NOT the only (or even necessarily the
most important) criterion in the J/E/P/D hypothesis -- theological viewpoint
is often a major determinant, as in the sacrifice of clean beasts by Noah
in Genesis 8:20, where the "Aaronic" perspective of 6:19-20 and 7:9 only has
him take a breeding pair with him.) I think O'Keefe has in fact honestly
represented [but underplayed, as with the style differences] this aspect,
since I think I CAN find some sort of distinction between neurologist and
historian in a few places in the test sample. But as in my "generic" protest
before I looked at this data, I find it hard to believe that O'Keefe has not
biased the question, consciously or unconsciously, by taking selections which,
though they differ in style and content, do so to a FAR lesser degree than is
claimed for the sources of the Torah.
--
Michael L. Siemon "O stand, stand at the window,
m.siemon@ATT.COM As the tears scald and start;
...!att!attunix!mls You shall love your crooked neighbor
standard disclaimer With your crooked heart."ok@goanna.cs.rmit.oz.au (Richard A. O'Keefe) (03/27/91)
I have quite a number of comments to make on the earlier postings on this topic, which will have to wait until after Easter. I have had one paper posting from New Zealand which will earn its author US$10 (he got 7 right out of the 14). The biggest comment is to say THANK YOU VERY MUCH. My posting was to some extent a "put your money where your mouth is" exercise, and Mike Siemon, by taking the risk of exposing how he thinks the method would work, has demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt the sincerity of his belief in the DH, and by the clarity and detail of his analysis, he may well have convinced a great many readers that it is reasonable. I must admit that I was biting my fingernails as I read through his presentation, because although I had reduced the required number of right answers from 14 to 10 in order to roughly double my expected loss, I really didn't want to part with $100, and his presentation was so convincing. I turned to my original copy (with the sources labelled) in genuine apprehension; but oh what a relief. Amongst the things Mike Siemon did that I liked: he showed a clear appreciation of uncertainty, limiting his estimates to 10 sentences, and he gave an estimate of how reliable he thought _those_ were. Splendid! > This makes 2,4,6,11,14 A sentences, and 1,3,5,9,12 B sentences; > Of these ten, I expect to have 7 +/- 1 correct. In fact 6 are correct, which is well within chance, but it is also within Mike Siemon's estimate of how well he has done. Excellent! The study doesn't _prove_ anything (it was only a pilot study after all), but Mike Siemon's posting has convinced me that I ought to look into DH methods rather more. (I did start to read Gerhard von Rad, but when I found him talking about "saga" in the Torah I decided not to bother any more.) If I add in Mike Siemon's last estimate for the remaining sentences, his score rises to 7 out of 14. > It is difficult for me to believe that the same author would -- in a short > passage from a single work -- use both the correct "Fleischl" and the hyper- > correct "von Fleischl" to refer by surname to Freud's friend ... Believe it. > That > and the shortness of the test passage, and the tight binding of BOTH sources > to recent, well-documented events (thus reducing the scope of traditional > variation in telling the tale) are my main direct complaints about O'Keefe's > test sample. Plus the omissions from his sources that I think I have detected > suggest to me a *different* redactorial procedure than is posited for the DH > redactor. The shortness of the sample is regrettable. I could very easily have made it twice as long. I had to make it short enough so that there'd be some chance of people being willing to try. Precisely two people did, and then only after a somewhat heavy-handed "dare" following up the original posting. (No, the second posting was *NOT* prompted by any recent postings in soc.religion.christian.) However, the "Freud story" is one which has been subjected to a great deal of retelling. The distance between the events and the texts in question is rather greater than the distance between the Gospels and their events. Freud himself began the mythologising (see Eysenck's "The Decline and Fall of the Freudian Empire" for details), and Jones continued it. In fact, one of the texts is out to challenge the "traditional" story. > But as in my "generic" protest > before I looked at this data, I find it hard to believe that O'Keefe has not > biased the question, consciously or unconsciously, by taking selections which, > though they differ in style and content, do so to a FAR lesser degree than is > claimed for the sources of the Torah. This is fair comment. For a pilot study, it's not such a problem; I've learned a lot about what a realistic test should be like. -- Seen from an MVS perspective, UNIX and MS-DOS are hard to tell apart.