They may honestly be trying to inform themselves.
However the other thought I have is that they are simply trying to appear to be open minded. Then they may get too little in the way of response and say "See, I told you so." as if they aren't responsible for informing themselves. On the other hand they may get "too much" response which will just confuse the already confused further.
Even worse there may be some hanky-panky going on where the IDists (or others) will be allowed to answer in full and others may be restricted in some way.
How much time is allowed for preparting the submissions?
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