It's not really an opposing thesis. The moral of the story is that his opponent became married to the use of the abacus and convinced of its superiority and th

It's not really an opposing thesis. The moral of the story is that his opponent became married to the use of the abacus and convinced of its superiority and that led to an overreliance on it and inflexible thinking. The thesis of the TFA is that the abacus can be a great tool for teaching arithmetic and number sense. It doesn't argue that it's the only thing you'll ever need and you should use other tools.