The meat of the letter is the 2d and 3d grafs on the first page. Here we see an individual, an unwitting pioneer, beginning to think through what would be involved in building an ontology. He came to it bottom-up: he had a local problem to solve. He knows that it is (at least potentially) an instance of a universal problem of supreme importance. There may have been others pursuing the ontology concept from the top down, but he has no way of contacting them or even of becoming aware of their work. Now for the punchline (and a gut punch it is): 68 years on, a human lilfetime, we are still *beginning* to think through what would be involved in defining an ontology. It is still a universal problem, it is still of supreme importance, and it is still intractable. I assert that its intractability is not intrinsic but extrinsic, and I cite this letter in support. Dispute me who will.

Everything that you say about PM is true, but you fail to mention that it, and its perspective, and its manifesto (which you quote), were the single-handed brainchildren of its founding editor, Ralph Ingersoll, previously of the New Yorker and the Lucempire.

" Oh, me father was the keeper of the eddystone light And he slept with a mermaid one fine night From this union there came three A porpoise and a porgy and the other was me Yo ho ho The wind blows free Oh for the life on the rolling sea One day as I was a-trimmin' the glim Humming a tune from the evening hymn A voice from the starboard shouted, "Ahoy" And there was me mother a-sittin' on the buoy Yo ho ho The wind blows free Oh for the life on the rolling sea Oh what has become of me children three? Me mother then she asked of me One was exhibited as a talking fish The other was served in a chafing dish Yo ho ho The wind blows free Oh for the life on the rolling sea Then the phosphorus flashed in her seaweed hair I looked again, but me mother wasn't there But I heard her voice echoing back through the night The devil take the keeper of the eddystone light Yo ho ho The wind blows free Oh for the life on the rolling sea Oh, the moral of the story you'll learn when you find To leave God's creatures for what nature had in mind For fishes are for cookin', mermaids are for tales Seaweed is for sushi and protecting is for whales Yo ho ho The wind blows free Oh for the life on the rolling sea Yo ho ho The wind blows free Oh for the life on the rolling sea"

"büro" = "office" (from Fr. bureau) Any resemblance to any trademarks, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

So: the tail should cut off the dog?

Half the time, I can't quite tell what you are getting at, but I'll stipulate that that must be my fault. But I am quite sure that devils don't play chess, or do anything else that is connected in any way with the cultivation of the mind. I am equally sure that those old men playing chess, whose appearance so disquieted you (for reasons that do not seem to be clear to either one of us), were less of a threat to you than any other living thing that was then within a radius of four miles.