
NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Cross-culture contact. was: LUNAR SCOPES
From: George Huxtable
Date: 2005 Feb 15, 15:29 +0000
From: George Huxtable
Date: 2005 Feb 15, 15:29 +0000
Alex Eremenko has made a dignified response to all this silliness about "nationalism". I agree with Craig Scott that Alex, with his feet in two different cultures, has opened our eyes to aspects of another world, from which the language barrier tends to exclude us. Long may he continue to do so. Each side has plenty to learn, and to understand, from the other. I can add that he has he has been equally helpful backstage, in correspondence off the list about some navigational fine-detail. And I hope that Alex won't mind me making this comment- It's been most interesting to watch his learning-process. Here's an intelligent man, who came in as rather a newcomer to celestial navigation, and was determined to master it. So he has asked sensible questions, made mistakes and hasn't minded admitting them, and where he didn't understand, has been prepared to keep saying so until he did. It's been fun to observe. And now, in a few months, he has got himself thoroughly into the practical skills of observing (from land), and the theoretical understanding of what's going on, so that now he explains matters to us, not vice versa. Of course, his mathematical background has helped. I hope other listmembers who are finding their way into astro-nav have taken note, and taken heart. Now I look forward to his reports when he gets to take his sextant to sea, a long way from Purdue. That's another world to learn, and the navigation (from a wobbly platform) is only one aspect of the seamanship that's required. He has my best wishes. George. ================================================================ contact George Huxtable by email at george@huxtable.u-net.com, by phone at 01865 820222 (from outside UK, +44 1865 820222), or by mail at 1 Sandy Lane, Southmoor, Abingdon, Oxon OX13 5HX, UK. ================================================================