Wow! Those comments (as of now 98 comments) say a lot about who the man was.

There were allegations and the investigation exonerated him. Was there truth to it? A human being is a fairly complex entity and the smarter they come, the more complex they are. But even then, the humanity of a human being can be estimated by looking at the total person, what he did, how he behaves, and so on.

Here’s a bit from Harlan Ellison writing about ACC (quoted in Wired.)

Sci-fi is a moron’s neologism and Arthur hated it. He was a serious writer and a serious man, and when he wrote about the future, he took it seriously. He had very little patience for those who call it sci-fi. I suppose what passes for attention in the glare of his brilliance and erudition is the singular ability to extrapolate what our lives would be like down the line. He was not just a gentleman: He was an elegant and steadfast friend, a supporter of the arts and a gracious man, a quality that was in the bone and marrow of his demeanor. The passing of that graciousness from our common everyday life troubled him.

And he was steadfast. I met him when I was 18, your basic pencil-neck geek. In those days, he was still a youngish man and everyone referred to him as The Great Ego; he had to suffer that for decades. Arthur really did not like stupid people, but he would always talk to them as if they were Nobel laureates. I asked him where he got the patience, and he would answer that it’s not nice to kick cripples.

Arthur and I were once talking about the responsibility of being an icon, how it’s easy for people to take umbrage if you don’t live up to their preformed concepts. It’s hard to codify, without meaning to be self-serving, but we were discussing the burden of public identity. And he said that we are like two survivors of an oceanic flight who end up on a lost island, watching the tides go in and out. And we don’t realize that time is passing and behind us there is a continent being built. Arthur became that continent, and he wore it with grace, aplomb and wisdom. He was a smart cookie.

I think that the man was too good a person to abuse children, sexually or otherwise.

If true, I must say, for all his ideas and talent, he doesn’t deserve any praise.