Kat and Emerson were well-known in the community and they were accused of something that would cause future harm to EA community members as well. By contrast, Chloe isn’t particularly likely to make future false allegations even based on Nonlinear’s portrayal (I would say). It’s different for Alice, since Nonlinear claim she has a pattern. (But with Alice, we’d at least want someone to talk to Nonlinear in private and verify how reliable they seem about negative info they have about Alice, before simply taking their word for it based on an ominous list of redacted names and redacted specifics of accusations.)
Theoretically Ben could have titled his post, “Sharing Information About [Pseudonymous EA Organization]”, and requested the mods enforce anonymity of both parties, right?
That would miss the point, rendering the post almost useless. The whole point is to prevent future harm.
but not for Roko to unilaterally reveal the names of Alice and Chloe?
Alice and Chloe had Ben, who is a trusted community member, look into their claims. I’d say Ben is at least somewhat “on the hook” for the reliability of the anonymous claims.
By contrast, Roko posted a 100 word summary of the Nonlinear incident that got some large number of net downvotes, so he seems to be particularly poorly informed about what even happened.
By contrast, Roko posted a 100 word summary of the Nonlinear incident that got some large number of net downvotes, so he seems to be particularly poorly informed about what even happened.
Roko posted a request for a summary—he offered his own current and admittedly poorly-informed understanding of the situation, by way of asking for a better version of same. (And he was right about the post he was commenting on being very long.) This is virtuous behavior, and the downvotes were entirely unwarranted.
My point is that I have no evidence that he ended up reading most of the relevant posts in their entirety. I don’t think people who read all the posts in their entirety should just go ahead and unilaterally dox discussion participants, but I feel like people who have only read parts of it (or only secondhand sources) should do it even less.
Also, at the time, I interpreted Roko’s “request for a summary” more as a way for him to sneer at people. His “summary” had a lot of loaded terms and subjective judgments in it. Maybe this is a style thing, but I find that people should only (at most) write summaries like that if they’re already well-informed. (E.g., Zvi’s writing style can be like that, and I find it fine because he’s usually really well-informed. But if I see him make a half-assed take on something he doesn’t seem to be well-informed on, I’d downvote.)
My point is that I have no evidence that he ended up reading most of the relevant posts in their entirety.
Indeed, because they were very long. That was Roko’s complaint!
I don’t think people who read all the posts in their entirety should just go ahead and unilaterally dox discussion participants, but I feel like people who have only read parts of it (or only secondhand sources) should do it even less.
I don’t think “how much of a post has someone read” has any bearing whatever on whether it’s proper to dox anyone.
Also, at the time, I interpreted Roko’s “request for a summary” more as a way for him to sneer at people. His “summary” had a lot of loaded terms and subjective judgments in it.
Neither sneers nor loaded terms (a) make the summary untrue, or (b) bear on whether it’s fine to dox someone.
Now, if the summary was untrue, that’s another matter. But the proper response to that is to reply with a correction—which is exactly what Roko asked for! It would have been easy for someone (including the mods, if they wished) to post a reply saying “nah actually that’s wrong, the situation in fact is [some comparably short but more accurate description]”.
Sneers and loaded terms are, IMO, evidence that the summary is unlikely to be true. It’s not impossible to sneer while having an accurate understanding of the situation, but typically sneering goes along with a lack of interest in the details of whatever one sneers at and a lack of concern for the accuracy of one’s characterization; mechanically, a sneer is a status attack on something the sneerer feels contempt for. It can also be a sign of dishonesty: sneering feels good, so people are generally inclined to lower their epistemic standards when presented with a description of something that makes it sound sneerworthy, and this is a convenient impulse for bad actors to exploit.
Due to these same features, I think they are also evidence that the speaker is, if they dox the target of the sneering, likely to be doing so out of a desire to hurt the target and without careful consideration for whether the ostensible justification for the doxxing is true.
Posting a request would have been fine, and nothing about that request requires or really benefits from including a summary. I don’t see how it’s virtuous to include one, especially one so inaccurate that it adds a lot of heat and noise to the discussion?
Elsewhere in discussions on LW, I have been told, repeatedly, that it’s proper to say what you think your interlocutor meant, if you have any kind of idea or guess, but are not sure or are confused. I don’t see why that principle should suddenly go out the window now, when it’s inconvenient.
I’m not sure if I agree with that principle in general, especially if you have as little context as Roko seemed to, but it also seems pretty different if you’re going back and forth with someone as opposed to making a request for someone to summarize the discourse so far? Like, who is the “interlocutor” you’re referring to in this case?
And then another reason I’m negative on the comment is that I don’t actually think Roko was trying to summarize the discussion as best as he understood it, but was in part trying to mock some of the participants.
Though also note that it’s mostly just heavily disagree voted and not downvoted.
Like, who is the “interlocutor” you’re referring to in this case?
In the phrase “what you think your interlocutor meant”, the interlocutor is the OP, naturally.
The request was directed to the commentariat generally.
And then another reason I’m negative on the comment is that I don’t actually think Roko was trying to summarize the discussion as best as he understood it, but was in part trying to mock some of the participants.
See my comment here.
Kat and Emerson were well-known in the community and they were accused of something that would cause future harm to EA community members as well. By contrast, Chloe isn’t particularly likely to make future false allegations even based on Nonlinear’s portrayal (I would say). It’s different for Alice, since Nonlinear claim she has a pattern. (But with Alice, we’d at least want someone to talk to Nonlinear in private and verify how reliable they seem about negative info they have about Alice, before simply taking their word for it based on an ominous list of redacted names and redacted specifics of accusations.)
That would miss the point, rendering the post almost useless. The whole point is to prevent future harm.
Alice and Chloe had Ben, who is a trusted community member, look into their claims. I’d say Ben is at least somewhat “on the hook” for the reliability of the anonymous claims.
By contrast, Roko posted a 100 word summary of the Nonlinear incident that got some large number of net downvotes, so he seems to be particularly poorly informed about what even happened.
Roko posted a request for a summary—he offered his own current and admittedly poorly-informed understanding of the situation, by way of asking for a better version of same. (And he was right about the post he was commenting on being very long.) This is virtuous behavior, and the downvotes were entirely unwarranted.
My point is that I have no evidence that he ended up reading most of the relevant posts in their entirety. I don’t think people who read all the posts in their entirety should just go ahead and unilaterally dox discussion participants, but I feel like people who have only read parts of it (or only secondhand sources) should do it even less.
Also, at the time, I interpreted Roko’s “request for a summary” more as a way for him to sneer at people. His “summary” had a lot of loaded terms and subjective judgments in it. Maybe this is a style thing, but I find that people should only (at most) write summaries like that if they’re already well-informed. (E.g., Zvi’s writing style can be like that, and I find it fine because he’s usually really well-informed. But if I see him make a half-assed take on something he doesn’t seem to be well-informed on, I’d downvote.)
Indeed, because they were very long. That was Roko’s complaint!
I don’t think “how much of a post has someone read” has any bearing whatever on whether it’s proper to dox anyone.
Neither sneers nor loaded terms (a) make the summary untrue, or (b) bear on whether it’s fine to dox someone.
Now, if the summary was untrue, that’s another matter. But the proper response to that is to reply with a correction—which is exactly what Roko asked for! It would have been easy for someone (including the mods, if they wished) to post a reply saying “nah actually that’s wrong, the situation in fact is [some comparably short but more accurate description]”.
Sneers and loaded terms are, IMO, evidence that the summary is unlikely to be true. It’s not impossible to sneer while having an accurate understanding of the situation, but typically sneering goes along with a lack of interest in the details of whatever one sneers at and a lack of concern for the accuracy of one’s characterization; mechanically, a sneer is a status attack on something the sneerer feels contempt for. It can also be a sign of dishonesty: sneering feels good, so people are generally inclined to lower their epistemic standards when presented with a description of something that makes it sound sneerworthy, and this is a convenient impulse for bad actors to exploit.
Due to these same features, I think they are also evidence that the speaker is, if they dox the target of the sneering, likely to be doing so out of a desire to hurt the target and without careful consideration for whether the ostensible justification for the doxxing is true.
Posting a request would have been fine, and nothing about that request requires or really benefits from including a summary. I don’t see how it’s virtuous to include one, especially one so inaccurate that it adds a lot of heat and noise to the discussion?
Elsewhere in discussions on LW, I have been told, repeatedly, that it’s proper to say what you think your interlocutor meant, if you have any kind of idea or guess, but are not sure or are confused. I don’t see why that principle should suddenly go out the window now, when it’s inconvenient.
I’m not sure if I agree with that principle in general, especially if you have as little context as Roko seemed to, but it also seems pretty different if you’re going back and forth with someone as opposed to making a request for someone to summarize the discourse so far? Like, who is the “interlocutor” you’re referring to in this case?
And then another reason I’m negative on the comment is that I don’t actually think Roko was trying to summarize the discussion as best as he understood it, but was in part trying to mock some of the participants.
Though also note that it’s mostly just heavily disagree voted and not downvoted.
In the phrase “what you think your interlocutor meant”, the interlocutor is the OP, naturally.
The request was directed to the commentariat generally.
The two are not incompatible!