I endorse interpreting net downvotes as information: specifically, the information that more people want less contributions like whatever’s being downvoted than want more contributions like it.
I can then either ignore that stated preference and keep contributing what I want to contribute (and accept any resulting downvotes as ongoing confirmation that of the above), or I can conform to that stated preference. I typically do the latter but I endorse the former in some cases.
The notion of a “truce” whereby I get to contribute whatever I choose and other people don’t use the voting mechanism to express their judgments of it doesn’t quite make sense to me.
All of that said, I agree with you that there exist various social patterns to which labels have been attached in popular culture, where those labels are shibboleths in certain subcultures and anti-shibboleths (“fighting words,” as you put it) in others. I find that if I want to have a useful discussion about those patterns within those subcultures, I often do best to not use those labels.
I endorse interpreting net downvotes as information: specifically, the information that more people want less
contributions like whatever’s being downvoted than want more contributions like it.
Except your interpretation is at least partially wrong—people mass downvote comments based on author, so there is no information about the quality of a particular post (it’s more like (S)HE IS A WITCH!). A better theory is that karma is some sort of noisy average between what you said, and ‘internet microaggression,’ and probably some other things—there is no globally enforced usage guidelines for karma.
I personally ignore karma. I generally write two types of posts: technical posts, and posts on which there should be no consensus. For the former, almost no one here is qualified to downvote me. For the latter, if people downvote me, it’s about the social group not correctness.
There are plenty of things to learn on lesswrong, but almost nothing from the karma system.
Oh, I completely agree that the reality is a noisy average as you describe. That said, for someone with the goals ialdabaoth describes themselves as having, I continue to endorse the interpretation strategy I describe. (By contrast, for someone with the goal-structure you describe, ignoring karma is a fine strategy.)
Do you think it likely that “social activism” and “liberalism” are fighting words in this board’s culture?
Huh. Are “Do you think it likely that ‘social activism’ and ‘liberalism’ are fighting words in this board’s culture?” fighting words in this board’s culture?
Depends on how they’re used, but yes, there are many contexts where I would probably avoid using those words here and instead state what I mean by them. Why do you ask?
Edit: the question got edited after I answered it into something not-quite-grammatical, so I should perhaps clarify that the words I’m referring to here are ‘social activism’ and ‘liberalism’ .
One approach is to identify high-status contributors and look for systematic differences between your way of expressing yourself and theirs, then experiment with adopting theirs.
Be that as it may (or mayn’t), that’s a clever way of making the intended message more palatable, including yourself in the deprecation. But you’re right. Aren’t we all pathetic, eh?
Look at your most upvoted contributions (ETA: or better, look at contributions with a positive score in general—see replies to this comment). Look at your most downvoted contributions. Compare and contrast.
Most downvoted, yes, but on the positive side I’d instead suggest looking at your comments one or two sigma east of average and no higher: they’re likely to be more reproducible. If they’re anything like mine, your most highly upvoted posts are probably high risk/high reward type comments—jokes, cultural criticism, pithy Deep Wisdom—and it’ll probably be a lot harder to identify and cultivate what made them successful.
A refinement of this is to look at the pattern of votes around the contributions as well, if they are comments. Comparing the absolute ranking of different contributions is tricky, because they frequently reflect the visibility of the thread as much as they do the popularity of the comment. (At one time, my most-upvoted contributions were random observations on the Harry Potter discussion threads, for example.)
Rationality quotes might be a helpful way of figuring out how to get upvoted, but it is not particularly helpful in figuring out how to be more competent.
(nods) Then yeah, I’d encourage you to avoid using those words and instead state what you mean by them. Which may also result in downvotes, depending on how people judge your meaning.
No I didn’t, I argued that in a different context, it’s dangerous to discuss your beliefs openly with outsiders. And I wasn’t even trying to defend that behavior, I was offering an explanation for it.
...and you’re using rhetorical tactics. Why do you consider this a fight? Why is it so important that I lose?
I’ll agree to have lost if that will help. Will it help?
Interesting, so do you disprove of the behavior in question. If so why do you still identify it’s practitioners as “your side”?
Issues can be complex, you know. They can be simpler than ‘green’ vs. ‘blue’.
I wasn’t trying to. I was pointing out the problems with basing a movement on ‘pious lies’.
Which is still a gross mischaracterization of what was being discussed, but that mischaracterizing process is itself part of the rhetorical tactic being employed. I’m afraid I can no longer trust this communication channel.
I wasn’t trying to. I was pointing out the problems with basing a movement on ‘pious lies’.
Which is still a gross mischaracterization of what was being discussed,
How so? Near as I can tell from an outside view my description is a decent summary of your and/or Julian’s position. I realize that from the inside it feels different because the lies feel justified, well ‘pious lies’ always feel justified to those who tell them.
I’m afraid I can no longer trust this communication channel.
You’re the one who just argued (and/or presented Julian’s case) that I was not to be trusted with the truth. If anything, I’m the one who has a right to complain that this communication channel is untrustworthy.
If anything, I’m the one who has a right to complain that this communication channel is untrustworthy.
And yet you’re still using it. What are you attempting to accomplish? What do you think I was attempting to accomplish? (I no longer need to know the answers to these questions, because I’ve already downgraded this channel to barely above the noise threshold; I’m expending the energy in the hopes that you ask yourself these questions in a way that doesn’t involve assuming that all our posts are soldiers fighting a battle.)
And yet you’re still using it. What are you attempting to accomplish?
(..)
I’m expending the energy in the hopes that you ask yourself these questions in a way that doesn’t involve assuming that all our posts are soldiers fighting a battle.
Same here with respect to the questions I asked here, here, and here. The fact that you were willing to admit to the lies gave me hope that we might have something resembling a reasonable discussion. Unfortunately it seems you’d rather dismiss my questions as ‘rhetoric’ than question the foundations of your beliefs. I realize the former choice is easier but if you’re serious about wanting to anilyze your beliefs you need to do the latter.
For the sake of others watching, the fact that you continue to use phrases like “willing to admit to the lies” should be a telling signal that something other than truth-seeking is happening here.
For the sake of others watching, the fact that you continue to use phrases like “willing to admit to the lies” should be a telling signal that something other than truth-seeking is happening here.
Something other than truth-seeking is happening here. But the use of that phrase does not demonstrate that—your argument is highly dubious. Since the subject at the core seems to be about prioritizing between epistemic accuracy and political advocacy it can be an on topic observation of fact.
If a phrase such as “pursuing goals other than pure truth-seeking” were used rather than “noble lies”, I would agree with you. But he appears to deliberately attempt to re-frame any argument that he doesn’t like in the most reprehensible way possible, rather than attempting to give it any credit whatsoever. He’s performing all sorts of emotional “booing” and straw-manning, rather than presenting the strongest possible interpretation of his opponent’s view and then attacking that. And when someone attempts to point that out to him, he immediately turns around and attempts to accuse them of doing it, rather than him.
It’s possible to have discussions about this without either side resorting to “this is how evil you’re being” tactics, or without resorting to “you’re resorting to ‘this is how evil you’re being’ tactics” tactics, or without resorting to “you’re resorting to ‘you’re resorting to {this is how evil you’re being} tactics’ tactics” tactics. Unfortunately, it’s a classic Prisoner’s Dilemma—whoever defects first tends to win, because humans are wired such that rhetoric beats honest debate.
But he appears to deliberately attempt to re-frame any argument that he doesn’t like in the most reprehensible way possible, rather than attempting to give it any credit whatsoever. He’s performing all sorts of emotional “booing” and straw-manning, rather than presenting the strongest possible interpretation of his opponent’s view and then attacking that. And when someone attempts to point that out to him, he immediately turns around and attempts to accuse them of doing it, rather than him.
That is approximately how I would summarize the entire conversation.
It’s possible to have discussions about this without either side resorting to “this is how evil you’re being” tactics, or without resorting to “you’re resorting to ‘this is how evil you’re being’ tactics” tactics, or without resorting to “you’re resorting to ‘you’re resorting to {this is how evil you’re being} tactics’ tactics” tactics.
Theoretically, although those most capable of being sane when it comes to this kind of topic are also less likely to bother.
Unfortunately, it’s a classic Prisoner’s Dilemma—whoever defects first tends to win, because humans are wired such that rhetoric beats honest debate.
Often, yes. It would be a gross understatement to observe that I share your lament.
If a phrase such as “pursuing goals other than pure truth-seeking” were used rather than “noble lies”, I would agree with you.
Specifically, the method of pursuing said goals in question is by making and promoting false statements. This is precisely what the phrase ‘noble lie’ means. This is the kind of thing that would be bad enough even if the authority of “Science” weren’t being invoked by the people making said false statements. Yes, the phrase “noble lie” has negative connotations, there are very good reasons for that.
I endorse interpreting net downvotes as information: specifically, the information that more people want less contributions like whatever’s being downvoted than want more contributions like it.
I can then either ignore that stated preference and keep contributing what I want to contribute (and accept any resulting downvotes as ongoing confirmation that of the above), or I can conform to that stated preference. I typically do the latter but I endorse the former in some cases.
The notion of a “truce” whereby I get to contribute whatever I choose and other people don’t use the voting mechanism to express their judgments of it doesn’t quite make sense to me.
All of that said, I agree with you that there exist various social patterns to which labels have been attached in popular culture, where those labels are shibboleths in certain subcultures and anti-shibboleths (“fighting words,” as you put it) in others. I find that if I want to have a useful discussion about those patterns within those subcultures, I often do best to not use those labels.
Except your interpretation is at least partially wrong—people mass downvote comments based on author, so there is no information about the quality of a particular post (it’s more like (S)HE IS A WITCH!). A better theory is that karma is some sort of noisy average between what you said, and ‘internet microaggression,’ and probably some other things—there is no globally enforced usage guidelines for karma.
I personally ignore karma. I generally write two types of posts: technical posts, and posts on which there should be no consensus. For the former, almost no one here is qualified to downvote me. For the latter, if people downvote me, it’s about the social group not correctness.
There are plenty of things to learn on lesswrong, but almost nothing from the karma system.
Oh, I completely agree that the reality is a noisy average as you describe. That said, for someone with the goals ialdabaoth describes themselves as having, I continue to endorse the interpretation strategy I describe. (By contrast, for someone with the goal-structure you describe, ignoring karma is a fine strategy.)
Huh. Are “Do you think it likely that ‘social activism’ and ‘liberalism’ are fighting words in this board’s culture?” fighting words in this board’s culture?
Depends on how they’re used, but yes, there are many contexts where I would probably avoid using those words here and instead state what I mean by them. Why do you ask?
Edit: the question got edited after I answered it into something not-quite-grammatical, so I should perhaps clarify that the words I’m referring to here are ‘social activism’ and ‘liberalism’ .
Because I want to discuss and analyze my beliefs openly, but I don’t want to lose social status on this site if I don’t have to.
A deeper observation and question: I appear to be stupid at the moment. Where can I go to learn to be less socially stupid on this site?
One approach is to identify high-status contributors and look for systematic differences between your way of expressing yourself and theirs, then experiment with adopting theirs.
Ya lol works awsome, look at my awsome bla-bla (lol!) ye mighty, and despair.
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Alas, you and I are not in the same league as Yvain, TheOtherDave, fubarobfusco, or Jack.
Be that as it may (or mayn’t), that’s a clever way of making the intended message more palatable, including yourself in the deprecation. But you’re right. Aren’t we all pathetic, eh?
Look at your most upvoted contributions (ETA: or better, look at contributions with a positive score in general—see replies to this comment). Look at your most downvoted contributions. Compare and contrast.
Most downvoted, yes, but on the positive side I’d instead suggest looking at your comments one or two sigma east of average and no higher: they’re likely to be more reproducible. If they’re anything like mine, your most highly upvoted posts are probably high risk/high reward type comments—jokes, cultural criticism, pithy Deep Wisdom—and it’ll probably be a lot harder to identify and cultivate what made them successful.
A refinement of this is to look at the pattern of votes around the contributions as well, if they are comments. Comparing the absolute ranking of different contributions is tricky, because they frequently reflect the visibility of the thread as much as they do the popularity of the comment. (At one time, my most-upvoted contributions were random observations on the Harry Potter discussion threads, for example.)
Not to mention Rationality Quotes threads...
Rationality quotes might be a helpful way of figuring out how to get upvoted, but it is not particularly helpful in figuring out how to be more competent.
Edit: Oops. Misunderstood the comment.
Actually, I was agreeing with TheOtherDave. (I’ve edited my comment to quote the part of its parent I was elaborating upon; is that clearer now?)
(nods) Then yeah, I’d encourage you to avoid using those words and instead state what you mean by them. Which may also result in downvotes, depending on how people judge your meaning.
And yet you’ve just argued that your beliefs should not be discussed openly with outsiders.
No I didn’t, I argued that in a different context, it’s dangerous to discuss your beliefs openly with outsiders. And I wasn’t even trying to defend that behavior, I was offering an explanation for it.
...and you’re using rhetorical tactics. Why do you consider this a fight? Why is it so important that I lose?
I’ll agree to have lost if that will help. Will it help?
I don’t see the difference in context. (This isn’t rhetoric, I honestly don’t see the difference in context.)
Interesting, so do you disapprove of the behavior in question. If so why do you still identify it’s practitioners as “your side”?
I wasn’t trying to. I was pointing out the problems with basing a movement on ‘pious lies’.
Issues can be complex, you know. They can be simpler than ‘green’ vs. ‘blue’.
Which is still a gross mischaracterization of what was being discussed, but that mischaracterizing process is itself part of the rhetorical tactic being employed. I’m afraid I can no longer trust this communication channel.
How so? Near as I can tell from an outside view my description is a decent summary of your and/or Julian’s position. I realize that from the inside it feels different because the lies feel justified, well ‘pious lies’ always feel justified to those who tell them.
You’re the one who just argued (and/or presented Julian’s case) that I was not to be trusted with the truth. If anything, I’m the one who has a right to complain that this communication channel is untrustworthy.
And yet you’re still using it. What are you attempting to accomplish? What do you think I was attempting to accomplish? (I no longer need to know the answers to these questions, because I’ve already downgraded this channel to barely above the noise threshold; I’m expending the energy in the hopes that you ask yourself these questions in a way that doesn’t involve assuming that all our posts are soldiers fighting a battle.)
Same here with respect to the questions I asked here, here, and here. The fact that you were willing to admit to the lies gave me hope that we might have something resembling a reasonable discussion. Unfortunately it seems you’d rather dismiss my questions as ‘rhetoric’ than question the foundations of your beliefs. I realize the former choice is easier but if you’re serious about wanting to anilyze your beliefs you need to do the latter.
For the sake of others watching, the fact that you continue to use phrases like “willing to admit to the lies” should be a telling signal that something other than truth-seeking is happening here.
Something other than truth-seeking is happening here. But the use of that phrase does not demonstrate that—your argument is highly dubious. Since the subject at the core seems to be about prioritizing between epistemic accuracy and political advocacy it can be an on topic observation of fact.
If a phrase such as “pursuing goals other than pure truth-seeking” were used rather than “noble lies”, I would agree with you. But he appears to deliberately attempt to re-frame any argument that he doesn’t like in the most reprehensible way possible, rather than attempting to give it any credit whatsoever. He’s performing all sorts of emotional “booing” and straw-manning, rather than presenting the strongest possible interpretation of his opponent’s view and then attacking that. And when someone attempts to point that out to him, he immediately turns around and attempts to accuse them of doing it, rather than him.
It’s possible to have discussions about this without either side resorting to “this is how evil you’re being” tactics, or without resorting to “you’re resorting to ‘this is how evil you’re being’ tactics” tactics, or without resorting to “you’re resorting to ‘you’re resorting to {this is how evil you’re being} tactics’ tactics” tactics. Unfortunately, it’s a classic Prisoner’s Dilemma—whoever defects first tends to win, because humans are wired such that rhetoric beats honest debate.
That is approximately how I would summarize the entire conversation.
Theoretically, although those most capable of being sane when it comes to this kind of topic are also less likely to bother.
Often, yes. It would be a gross understatement to observe that I share your lament.
Specifically, the method of pursuing said goals in question is by making and promoting false statements. This is precisely what the phrase ‘noble lie’ means. This is the kind of thing that would be bad enough even if the authority of “Science” weren’t being invoked by the people making said false statements. Yes, the phrase “noble lie” has negative connotations, there are very good reasons for that.