Patrick's dual logic: are we being fooled then?

This morning I received a most interesting email - actually a few. Unfortunately, I'm not at liberty to publish these on this blog. However, nothing stops us from thinking aloud - of course thinking aloud is a contrary concept, as thinking is necessarily a non-noisy activity, and we are usually only aware of the results that thinking preceded. That is the reason why we have exclamations such as "What were you thinking!", "what do you think you are doing?", or why we often wonder if others are in the habit of thinking at all.

One of the by-products of human activity is that we often confuse things that are different as being one and the same. Today's example are the concepts of thought versus logic. Most people, and it is only human, are of the opinion (in itself a thought) that if they are thinking a thought they are necessarily thinking logically. They are of course quite correct, because taken from one's immediate reality all thoughts are logical even if they do not follow outside that immediate reality. So, for instance we have the Newtownian logic of perspective, physical limits, and other natural laws. This seemed to have culminated in Einstein's law of relativity - the ultimate Newtownian law. A law simply becomes a premise of logic. For example, going faster than the speed of light is illogical, because Einstein's relativity theory does not allow for it.

Have I said it before? Scientists are sneaks who apply Newtownian law and logic when it comes easy. When the universe presents them with events which contradict their logic, they first begin to splutter and stutter, and then blithly ignore what was before and state a new anti-logical law. Examples are the fact that two subatomic particles will react simultaneously to certain events, even if they were billions of miles apart - contradicts the speed of light; according to calculations there is not enough visible matter in the universe and there should be some kind of material, called dark matter, which fills the empty - huh?

We have our own contradictator (joining contradiction with dictator) in our own reality. You guessed it: Patrick Stapleton, master of deceipts, contradictions and dual stream logic. What is dual stream logic. I have described it partially above. In a universe, such as ours, there is not just a single logic which says if a => b, b=>c then a => c. No, there are also other logics, and every social human construct has its own set of logic rules. We have debated this already in the past when we spoke about the logic of what is legal and what is socially correct.

Unfortunately, we have the sluggers who sneakingly connect elements of one logic system with that of another logic system: dual stream logic.

Let's take our current situation as an example. Hands up those of you who were told when signing the debenture contracts, that such debentures entitled you to a vote in proportion to your investment. There was, of course, none of that. You paid over your money, and understood that the management of Edwafin was going to use more money and pay you some of that (of course that did not happen but that is not under discussion here). Unlike when you buy shares, and you are given a shareholders vote in the running of the company, the sole responsibility for running a company with debentures, is with the directors. So let us get this clear, if you invested R200,000.00 nowhere on the contract did it stipulate that it was in any way understood that your investment was pro rata to anybody else's investment.

Then two investors went to court; brave people, who preempted my own intentions. This is where the Patricksonian dual logic comes into play. The contractual obligation applicable to Edwafin is completely ignored when Patrick crosses over to public company logic. Suddenly his argument is not that the investors have rights, but that they only represent a small part of the total investment. Whereas the individual originally invested and signed the papers, they are totally ignored in favour of another surreptitiously substituted logic, in which you as human beings are displaced for the sake of argumentative expedience. How many bets that Patrick will follow this technique when confronted by the liquidators?

Here is another one. First a quote from the dictionary:

Ponzi scheme
PRONUNCIATION: 'pän-zē-
FUNCTION: noun
ETYMOLOGY: Charles Ponzi †1949 American (Ital.-born) swindler
DATE: 1973

: an investment swindle in which some early investors are paid off with money put up by later ones in order to encourage more and bigger risks

Yeees, you guessed it, and of course in hind sight oh so familiar to us. Remember, after the computers started working at Edwafin in October 2008, there was suddenly no more money to pay us. "A cash flow problem" Patrick called it, which, in short, basically meant, we are out of money because we aren't getting any anymore. Of course, that money was needed to pay you, the investor. The more outrageous the promises became (trips to Mauritius and interest payments as high as 25%), the worst was the public's gullibility to invest more money. Whoops! Bang! down came the Patrickownian empire. That was one logic: no money in, no money out, but Patrick applied dual logic by using the "cash flow" card. Let's be clear about it, a company has a cash flow problem when it has enough assets to cover its debt, but not enough of the assets are in cash to allow the creditors to be paid. In a combination of obfuscation of logic and half-truths, Patrick made us believe that this was because of the general economic climate. We know now, that the company was essentially, and for all practical purposes bankrupt by then already, and probably had been for some time already (of course changing the date for final financial statements to a later date, prevented a proper insight into the status quo at the time). The only reason why we, the investors were not paid, was because nobody felt like giving the company any more money. Naughty, naughty Patrick and utterly despicable. I have all the confidence that liquidators will see through this ruse as well.

A little bit more about the economic climate. If our investments had been invested properly and judiciously in proper business ventures that continued to show profits, I am convinced that the current situation would not have been so dire. Yes, possibly the company might have seen some difficult times - which investors might have understood - but it would not have meant that every last cent that the investors contributed would have been down the drain. Again, the liquidators are intelligent people, that is logical I suspect.

Then we also have the promise of major investors interested in investing in the company. That, as recently as the recent court case. I am sure that the liquidators would appreciate the fact that this is merely a further acknowledgement that a Ponzi scheme was in operation because the money was to be used to pay investor's debts.

Logically I have questions, as I cannot make up my mind if Patrick and comrades, are merely deplorably stupid, naive, and incompetent beings, or if they are simply crooked. According to the archetypal logic, the one leads to the other and are not mutually exclusive. Thus a <==>b.

For those who would like to know, according to a copy of a letter written by them, the directors at Edwafin on 12 March 2009 were:

• Patrick Stapleton
• Don Hutchinson
• Bob Klynsmith
• Brian Poliah
• Garth Stapleton
• Sandy Hutchinson
• Carole Gardner

Hi, Carole, we meet again.

Proofread by wifey