Ringing Forums

I am a wholehearted supporter of the practice of recording what has been acheived and rung method wise and of keeping these records for posterity. Will those who follow us and see the records of random changes of order on two bells being named as "methods" feel as I do, that someone out there is taking the p***? "Go Queen Thingamybob; oops, missed a swap; call that "King Thingamyjig" . Really; methods for two bells? No doubt it has alll been said before but this selection reduces things to a riduculous low. Our forebears must be howling in laughter at us. Even with three bells there is the possibility for structure and variety but two simply does not allow it. What next? "Emperor's New Clothes One", Place notation 1. Emperor's Wife's New Hair Style: PN 1.1. A new name for every extra stroke rung; that seems to be the logic of these new methods for two. Why is time and space being wasted on them?

Broadley Little Bob Maximus is not much better. Even I could ring it :lol:

Well, yes, but this has the merit of having a proper method in it. It is PB minor with covering bells. As such, you and I could ring it and it would be a good way of getting us used to 12 bell rhythm. My argument here is that it doesn't justify a separate name; anymore than other methods have different names when rung with and without covering bells. This is not even broadly Little Box max; nor is even Little Bob at any stage; it is Plain Bob minor with covers.

I'm not disagreeing... :grimace:

Some things do seem a bit silly, but different people have different silliness thresholds, so as soon as you build in a fixed threshold either you exclude things which can be seen as OK or you include things that can be seen as not OK. The simplest solution is not to build in thresholds unless you have to and to trust (most) people to be sensible.
If you think something is worthwhile take not. If you think it is silly ignore it. The proportion of such cases is so tiny it has no material effect on the cost of supporting them.

When we were putting together the Framework for Method Ringing, we were tasked with producing a simple and permissive framework with a goal of avoiding arbitrary rules and value judgements. We sought to find the logical boundaries that define the limits of method ringing, and ensure the framework supports everything within these boundaries.

While two-bell ringing may seem pointless to many of us, it did seem like the logical minimum to be able to define a method. There was also another reason for including it. We tried very hard to think about everything that might be possibly rung in the future to explore method ringing further, and one of these was ringing methods side by side, such as Minor on the front six and Minor on the back six of a twelve arranged to avoid any of the twelve-bell rows being false. This has already been done a few times. Extrapolate further and you might splice methods of different stages together to create your rows. If perhaps part of the composition was to ring Cambridge Royal on twelve while two bells dodge behind, then you need a two bell method to describe the dodging. That needs Cross Two. If you look at Cambridge Two, you can see that it has two bells both ringing Cambridge frontwork.

So we decided that including two and three bell methods in the CCCBR Methods Library does no harm, allows us to properly record the methods reported in past performances, and may well prove useful to ringers in the future.

Rule- (or law-) making is hard to get right, and there are few ringers wishing to contribute to the process. There are a few more who wish to explore the boundaries, to test whether the overall effect is consistent / helpful / silly.

The proportion of [silly] cases is so tiny it has no material effect on the cost of supporting them. — John Harrison

. ... but the cost of validating the process (was the naming-Performance true?), adding methods to the database, and (future generations) wondering "why?" - all adds to a non-zero cost in time and effort...

Maybe each new Methods should require ten quid towards Central Council expenses. ??

the cost of validating the process (was the naming-Performance true?), adding methods to the database, and (future generations) wondering "why?" - all adds to a non-zero cost in time and effort — PeterScott

Yes, it adds, but it adds an amount so tiny it is insignificant. Far more effort could be expended arguing about whether or not to allow marginal cases.

And asking for £10 would add a massive admin overheaed, not to mention heat. Just look at the argumanes going on over a suggested extra 20p per year.