Who's On First?

File under "There ain't nothin' new under the sun". While looking up sources for the term "tabling" (yes, I am still harping on that Table Saw), I came upon an instance of the sort that gives bookworms and librarians headaches. A simple quote:

"But many seem to aim at making the beam stronger that if it were one piece: and this inconsiderate practice has given rise to many whimsical modes of tabling and scarfing, which we need not regard."

You'ld think that a statement as peculiar as this one would appear once and then fade away. Whimsical is not your everyday woodworking term, unless your specialty are toys or weathervanes. So let's take a look at this one simple phrase...

1822 - A System of Mechanical Philosophy. Robison, John; Watt, James. Page 531
1824 - Encyclopedia Britannica. Page 638
1827 - Introduction to the Mechanical Principles of Carpentry. Hale, Benjamin. Page 165
1853 - Elementary Principles of Carpentry. Tredgold, Thomas. Page 176
1867 - Treatise on Architecture... Hosking, Ashipitel and Tredgold. Page 224
1888 - Encyclopedia Britannica. Page 478
1907 - Encyclopedia Britannica. Page 427

What is most annoying about this viral plagiarism is that no one, and I mean No One, explains how to do it! Why? Because everyone was too busy lifting the quote from someone else to actually put the effort into spelling it out. Msrs. Robinson  & Watt must surely have known of whence they spoke. All the rest thought this was a nifty quote and so included in their treatises.

Which brings me to my complaint. You can't trust what you read any more. I wonder just how much of the 'experts' such as Tredgold lifted from earlier works without verifying the content? Makes you stop and think for a moment. We base so much of our current "knowledge" on the so-called classic books of carpentry and joinery yet we don't know how much the authors actually wrote and how much they borrowed. Holtzappfel is responsible for so many engravings of tools and processes that it's impossible to track the authors who borrowed his work. Or to fully track from whom Holtzappfel borrowed his stuff.

Here and there we find a quote or an image that clearly was created by an earlier author. The unsettling part is knowing what is bona fide good practice and what is simply filler to make the book more impressive. Let's not blame the authors of the classics. This kind of plagiarism is rampant today in research. I can't count how often I come across some thesis or scholarly article that has a stack of referenced quotes of which some are bogus. Upon tracking those quotes back to the original author, it sometimes happens that many of the latter authors have simply lifted the quote.. and the referenced article... from someone who made a mistake in the attribution. The mistake proliferates. So what's the big deal? It means that the latter authors may never have read the original work, instead relying on another author for some level of veracity. Oops, one of those experts didn't read the original work. My bad.

Upon graduation from the Simmons College of Library and Information Sciences, we were all given diplomas and a coupon for a lifetimes supply of tylenol.

So know I can safely say that Tabling is a verified term for joining two pieces of wood, particularly used in ship-building (mast making used this technique) and in timber framing. But I still haven't found a reference that explains why there is a Table Saw and even if this saw has a clear relationship with Tabling. And it's all their fault.

Till next,
Gary