Dear mhaze,

So you are telling us that you do not have degrees in history.

Dear Paul 1405,

Your Grumpy Old Men are Grumpy Old Men on The Forum simply because the internet came along and took them out of the pub. Otherwise they would still be Grumpy Old Men sitting on bar stools arguing with other Grumpy Old Men all of whom think they know everything and keep making things up as they go along. And they all hate people who are not Grumpy Old Men and don't sit on bar stools in a pub making out that they know everything.

"So you are telling us that you do not have degrees in history."

Where did I say that? What a dill.

Look Mr O, you made a claim about the Athenian constitution which was utterly wrong. Who knows where you got it - Mad Magazine, Readers Digest? But utterly wrong.

Anyone with passing knowledge of Plato or Plutarch or Thucydides or Aristophanes or Sophocles or even Herodotus would know it was wrong. A ten minute check on Wikipedia or myriad other sites would have shown it to be wrong.

No need for a degree in this or that.Just basic general knowledge or a desire to check it out before blurting it out.

But you still felt A-OK with making the moronic claim. And then, when called out, simply move on to other moronic claims. Just once, just once, own up and offer to do better next time.

Oh, any thoughts on Psychological projection? You should check it out. It would help with your self-reflection.

Paul,

During my convalescence I read a marvellous book that I'd recommend- but only if you've got your heart pills nearby.

"War before Civilisation" by Lawrence H. Keeley. Subtitled "the Myth of the Peaceful Savage".

Any book which has more than half its space devoted to footnotes and links to evidence and citations gets my vote

Dear mhaze,

It doesn't bother me if you don't have a degree in history. I've got an MA specialising in Graeco-Roman history and that's what matters most. Like I said earlier, we have absolutely nothing in common.

So I'll stick to my comment on Athenian democracy, which is grounded in my formal postgraduate training in Ancient History at Sydney University. Which of course you don't recognise because it's not the way you do things or some other such thing like that.

mhaze, we should not stir Mr O as he is sensitive and has poor self image, and needs to prove his credentials are the knowledge of his Marxist socialist lecturers. He is the typical new University graduate that is not familiar with Greek logical deduction and believes the old guard got it wrong. I wonder if he will tell us when he graduated with the latest knowledge?

The fact is I read books of my interests all the time. I have in fact a library of over 3,000 books and have over the years disposed of over 6,000 books. I have mastered many fields, and have received accolades for those achievements.