Dear friends,

I take the points that have been made here.  Here's a word about how the thing was planned.  I started out with a very limited budget in 2019 and planned the conference to take place in April last year, as a necessarily small meeting held physically here in Edmonton, where I work.  Financially, I could only invite a very few international people, or even travellers from other parts of Canada (which is huge).  As a matter of priority, I reached out to several historians in India, including two lady professors, but to my regret they all said no.  Then I had to cancel everything because of the pandemic.  Now, doing it online, I'm basically working with the people who kindly agreed back at the beginning.  But now, precisely because it has become non-local, it doesn't look like a small, local meeting any more.  But against that, the time-zone problem means that we can only meet for a few hours each day, so it is not feasible to enlarge the symposium.  Interesting lessons.

There are lots of people who have thought about the GM theory.  A real factor is that I am simply not very well informed about everyone who has thought a lot about GM.  I was initially guided by people who had published prominent book reviews of the GM book and who responded positively to my enquiries in 2019 and who were able to travel to Edmonton.

This symposium is just one meeting.  GM is a major theory and deserves more discussion than just this symposium.  I hope other colleagues can organize something more comprehensive and inclusive, in the future.

Best,

Dominik