[throwaway0071]

It's the first time I read this blog post (thanks for sharing) but it's not surprising to me.

I always cringe when I see people quoting Bryan because that's exactly my experience interacting with him on mailing lists or watching him give talks.

At this point I don't have the energy to deal with people like him. I just accept him as a natural occurrence in our field. I certainly praise does who do have the energy for fighting that.

[oblio]

I'm also quite combative in discussions. And then someone told me: be careful not to win the battle (current conversation) and lose the war (attention and possibly the respect or friendship of the person you're talking to).