Did it ever occur to you that perhaps you can dish it out but you can’t take it? That phrase is often used to refer to insults, but it also applies to “helpfulness”. You need to be willing to be helped by others in the same way that you want to help them. And you don’t seem to be. When someone disagrees with you, take it as a learning opportunity for yourself just like you expect others to take learning opportunities from you.
Oh no, I’m very grateful to people for having helped me. Lumifer’s elaboration and Vaniver’s comments were great. I haven’t found your comments useful yet, but I can easily imagine that I might if you wrote more than a few lines.
In the context of you “teaching” others, it means that others are trying to “teach” you as well.
This is a discussion forum. That means that it has discussions, which are two-way. The people whom you describe as “nitpicking” and “strawmanning” are people on the other end of the discussion. We’re permitted to nitpick here—even to nitpick you—because you’re discussing, you’re not teaching. And while strawmanning is bad everywhere, what may look like strawmanning can actually be a result of you failing to communicate.
I don’t claim that I’ve been communicating well :-). It’s clear that I haven’t been.
I feel as though I’m out of touch with the goals of LW readers.
When I read a post, it’s usually because I’m eager to learn something from the author. I almost never respond to posts that I disagree with: it’s only when I have high regard for the author that I go out of my way to engage. So I’ve been very puzzled as to why when I post to LW, it’s not uncommon for people to respond in confrontational / standoffish ways, implicitly or explicitly expressing skepticism as to the value of what I have to offer. It’s not that I’m never skeptical of the value of an author’s writing: there are just things that I’d rather be doing than talking about it!
So I’ve been very puzzled as to why when I post to LW, it’s not uncommon for people to respond in confrontational / standoffish ways, implicitly or explicitly expressing skepticism as to the value of what I have to offer.
Possibilities that hinge on the way you post are worth extra attention if you notice that people are responding that way to you but not to others. I don’t have a fully formed opinion on that, though, and so will ignore it in favor of generic possibilities. The first three that come to mind:
People are busy, and collaborate to conserve attention. Suppose A posts 5k words; B reads it and responds with “I think this is low quality for reason X,” then C can see the comment first and avoid spending time on the post. B can’t recover their lost time by writing the comment, but they can save C’s time, and by creating a culture of quality / calling out bad quality, they can have their time saved in the future. (This is more typically a role for karma, but comments also have a function here. Comments often remind people to vote, one way or another—one of my early posts was hovering at a very low score until someone commented that they thought the post was surprisingly good for its karma score, at which point it rocketed up about 10 points. It looks like a similar thing happened with this post.)
People are confused, and resolve their confusion by throwing it at other people. “Claim X seems wrong” is an invitation to point out that the claim is not actually X, but Y, that while X seems wrong it is actually right for reason Z, or that yes, X is wrong. Norms for resolving confusion vary widely across communities, and the sort of thing that one is encouraged to say publicly and immediately in one place might be the sort of thing one is encouraged to quietly contemplate, for years if necessary, in another place.
People are attempting to demonstrate their intelligence or compete for karma by identifying problems in posts.
There is a fourth possibility, which has to deal with openness vs. suspension of disbelief. Typically, I associate LWers with being more open than traditional skeptics, because LWers are more willing to run EV and VoI calculations and try things out that might not work or might be silly, where the standard skeptic is more interested in protecting themself from wrong beliefs. Underlying skepticism will naturally generate confrontational / standoffish behavior, because the skeptic is naturally standoffish when it comes to ideas, and their standards require surviving challenges that seem confrontational. It may be that LW has more skeptics than other communities you’re using as reference.
I wasn’t talking about people’s responses to my posts specifically: I’ve had the same reaction to people’s comments on other people’s as well – I don’t see a difference on that front.
My intuitive response has been “these people are just belligerent nitpickers who care more about arguing than about overcoming bias!” and so it’s useful to have more charitable possible explanations in mind.
I liked your post but didn’t really have anything substantive to add to it. In general, it’s harder to think of good constructive ideas than to think of decent flaws in an idea. Combine that with a tendency for status seeking, and you get a big threat to productive group conversations.
So I’ve been very puzzled as to why when I post to LW, it’s not uncommon for people to respond in confrontational / standoffish ways, implicitly or explicitly expressing skepticism as to the value of what I have to offer.
Because that’s what it means for a discussion to be two way. People criticize you. That’s how it works.
It’s not that I’m never skeptical of the value of an author’s writing: there are just things that I’d rather be doing than talking about it!
I doubt it, because that would imply that even if you’re trying to teach someone, you never try to dispel any misconceptions, correct errors, etc. You probably don’t think of those as “being skeptical of the value of an author’s writing”, but in fact, that’s what it is. Well, in a two way discussion, this is going to be happening in both directions, and just like you do it to other people, other people will do it to you.
Because that’s what it means for a discussion to be two way. People criticize you. That’s how it works.
Has this been your experience in real life interactions? LW is virtually the only context in which I’ve seen this dynamic as a community norm. :-)
I doubt it, because that would imply that even if you’re trying to teach someone, you never try to dispel any misconceptions, correct errors, etc. You probably don’t think of those as “being skeptical of the value of an author’s writing”, but in fact, that’s what it is.
Some reasons why I might engage somebody:
I have a lot to learn from the person.
The person is high potential enough so that if I communicate relevant information him or her, that’ll enable him or her to use it to powerful effect.
The person is in a position of influence such that it’s actually really important that misconceptions get corrected, and the person seems open-minded enough so that the chance of influencing the person’s thinking is reasonable.
I find the person pleasant to be around.
All of these things are signals of respect. What I’m puzzled by is the fact that some LWers who engage with me don’t seem to respect me in the way that I respect them (as shown by my taking time to communicate with them when the time could be spent in other ways!). I feel like “If you don’t respect me, why are you talking to me at all? Why don’t you instead spend time talking with people who you do respect?”
What I’m puzzled by is the fact that some LWers who engage with me don’t seem to respect me in the way that I respect them (as shown by my taking time to communicate with them when the time could be spent in other ways!).
The ultimate problem is that you seem to have a double standard, and this is an example of it. If you taking time to communicate with them counts as a sign of you respecting them, then them taking the time to communicate with you should count as a sign of them respecting you. Just like the double standard where someone who criticizes you is “skeptical of the value of an author’s writing” but when you do the same thing to other people, you’re just correcting misconceptions and influencing the person’s thinking. You’re nobody special here, just like everyone else is nobody special. [1]
[1] There are some people, like Eliezer, who sometimes get treated as special. I don’t agree at all with this.
The ultimate problem is that you seem to have a double standard, and this is an example of it. If you taking time to communicate with them counts as a sign of you respecting them, then them taking the time to communicate with you should count as a sign of them respecting you.
Your comments have been giving me the sense that you don’t respect me – have I been misreading you?
The thing is, most people on LW don’t disagree for any specific reason like respect or wanting to correct misconceptions or whatever. Disagreement just happens to be the status quo here. I haven’t worked out why people here like to disagree so much, even when there seems to be no benefit from doing so—but then again, humans aren’t perfectly instrumentally rational, and perhaps LWers are lessinstrumentally rational than most. (We certainly do seem to have more people suffering from akrasia around here than most places, after all.) It’s also possible that Lumifer and Vaniver are right, and that LW users are a conceited, contentious bunch that like to disagree to signal intelligence and/or gain karma. I know I’ve fallen victim to the urge to nitpick before, and so have many others here, including even prominent users like shminux. (Jiro, too, from my previous experience talking with him/her.) It’s just nitpicking. Respect, for better or for worse, doesn’t even really enter the equation.
For the record, however, I do respect your mathematical ability, and while I’m less confident about your metacognitive abilities, I think that if you’ve spent as much time pondering this subject as you claim—certainly a lot more time than most people around here have, probably—you have a reasonably good grasp on what you’re talking about. Just don’t expect most LWers to feel the same way.
I think it’s more issues like tone, personally. (Particularly egregious are examples of “you are” statements, instead of “I feel” statements, which I’ve noticed many LWers seem really prone to making. It’s a lot less pretentious-sounding when you prefix your statements with an “I feel” or “I think” or “in my opnion”.)
You didn’t answer my question: do you respect me? :-) You’re not giving any positive feedback whatsoever. I don’t care what you think of me, but it’s reasonable for me to assume that you don’t have any positive feelings toward me if you’re not saying anything positive.
Based on JonahSinick’s prior comments, his motivation for asking this question is pretty clear. You have already critiqued the thought process that made him think this question is necessary, to attack it again is almost double-counting. I think if you had answered the question directly the discussion would have a better chance of bootstrapping out of mutual unintelligibility. Then again, I mostly lurk and only rarely participate in internet debates so I don’t feel I really understand how any given discussion strategy would actually play out. Also, I cheated, since Jonah already expressed a desire for a direct answer.
Did it ever occur to you that perhaps you can dish it out but you can’t take it? That phrase is often used to refer to insults, but it also applies to “helpfulness”. You need to be willing to be helped by others in the same way that you want to help them. And you don’t seem to be. When someone disagrees with you, take it as a learning opportunity for yourself just like you expect others to take learning opportunities from you.
Oh no, I’m very grateful to people for having helped me. Lumifer’s elaboration and Vaniver’s comments were great. I haven’t found your comments useful yet, but I can easily imagine that I might if you wrote more than a few lines.
In the context of you “teaching” others, it means that others are trying to “teach” you as well.
This is a discussion forum. That means that it has discussions, which are two-way. The people whom you describe as “nitpicking” and “strawmanning” are people on the other end of the discussion. We’re permitted to nitpick here—even to nitpick you—because you’re discussing, you’re not teaching. And while strawmanning is bad everywhere, what may look like strawmanning can actually be a result of you failing to communicate.
I don’t claim that I’ve been communicating well :-). It’s clear that I haven’t been.
I feel as though I’m out of touch with the goals of LW readers.
When I read a post, it’s usually because I’m eager to learn something from the author. I almost never respond to posts that I disagree with: it’s only when I have high regard for the author that I go out of my way to engage. So I’ve been very puzzled as to why when I post to LW, it’s not uncommon for people to respond in confrontational / standoffish ways, implicitly or explicitly expressing skepticism as to the value of what I have to offer. It’s not that I’m never skeptical of the value of an author’s writing: there are just things that I’d rather be doing than talking about it!
Can you help me understand what’s going on here?
Possibilities that hinge on the way you post are worth extra attention if you notice that people are responding that way to you but not to others. I don’t have a fully formed opinion on that, though, and so will ignore it in favor of generic possibilities. The first three that come to mind:
People are busy, and collaborate to conserve attention. Suppose A posts 5k words; B reads it and responds with “I think this is low quality for reason X,” then C can see the comment first and avoid spending time on the post. B can’t recover their lost time by writing the comment, but they can save C’s time, and by creating a culture of quality / calling out bad quality, they can have their time saved in the future. (This is more typically a role for karma, but comments also have a function here. Comments often remind people to vote, one way or another—one of my early posts was hovering at a very low score until someone commented that they thought the post was surprisingly good for its karma score, at which point it rocketed up about 10 points. It looks like a similar thing happened with this post.)
People are confused, and resolve their confusion by throwing it at other people. “Claim X seems wrong” is an invitation to point out that the claim is not actually X, but Y, that while X seems wrong it is actually right for reason Z, or that yes, X is wrong. Norms for resolving confusion vary widely across communities, and the sort of thing that one is encouraged to say publicly and immediately in one place might be the sort of thing one is encouraged to quietly contemplate, for years if necessary, in another place.
People are attempting to demonstrate their intelligence or compete for karma by identifying problems in posts.
There is a fourth possibility, which has to deal with openness vs. suspension of disbelief. Typically, I associate LWers with being more open than traditional skeptics, because LWers are more willing to run EV and VoI calculations and try things out that might not work or might be silly, where the standard skeptic is more interested in protecting themself from wrong beliefs. Underlying skepticism will naturally generate confrontational / standoffish behavior, because the skeptic is naturally standoffish when it comes to ideas, and their standards require surviving challenges that seem confrontational. It may be that LW has more skeptics than other communities you’re using as reference.
Perhaps it’s just the cynic in me talking, but of the reasons you posted, I find 3 the most compelling one by far.
Thanks, this is helpful.
I wasn’t talking about people’s responses to my posts specifically: I’ve had the same reaction to people’s comments on other people’s as well – I don’t see a difference on that front.
My intuitive response has been “these people are just belligerent nitpickers who care more about arguing than about overcoming bias!” and so it’s useful to have more charitable possible explanations in mind.
I liked your post but didn’t really have anything substantive to add to it. In general, it’s harder to think of good constructive ideas than to think of decent flaws in an idea. Combine that with a tendency for status seeking, and you get a big threat to productive group conversations.
Because that’s what it means for a discussion to be two way. People criticize you. That’s how it works.
I doubt it, because that would imply that even if you’re trying to teach someone, you never try to dispel any misconceptions, correct errors, etc. You probably don’t think of those as “being skeptical of the value of an author’s writing”, but in fact, that’s what it is. Well, in a two way discussion, this is going to be happening in both directions, and just like you do it to other people, other people will do it to you.
Has this been your experience in real life interactions? LW is virtually the only context in which I’ve seen this dynamic as a community norm. :-)
Some reasons why I might engage somebody:
I have a lot to learn from the person.
The person is high potential enough so that if I communicate relevant information him or her, that’ll enable him or her to use it to powerful effect.
The person is in a position of influence such that it’s actually really important that misconceptions get corrected, and the person seems open-minded enough so that the chance of influencing the person’s thinking is reasonable.
I find the person pleasant to be around.
All of these things are signals of respect. What I’m puzzled by is the fact that some LWers who engage with me don’t seem to respect me in the way that I respect them (as shown by my taking time to communicate with them when the time could be spent in other ways!). I feel like “If you don’t respect me, why are you talking to me at all? Why don’t you instead spend time talking with people who you do respect?”
Can you help me understand what’s going on here?
The ultimate problem is that you seem to have a double standard, and this is an example of it. If you taking time to communicate with them counts as a sign of you respecting them, then them taking the time to communicate with you should count as a sign of them respecting you. Just like the double standard where someone who criticizes you is “skeptical of the value of an author’s writing” but when you do the same thing to other people, you’re just correcting misconceptions and influencing the person’s thinking. You’re nobody special here, just like everyone else is nobody special. [1]
[1] There are some people, like Eliezer, who sometimes get treated as special. I don’t agree at all with this.
Your comments have been giving me the sense that you don’t respect me – have I been misreading you?
The thing is, most people on LW don’t disagree for any specific reason like respect or wanting to correct misconceptions or whatever. Disagreement just happens to be the status quo here. I haven’t worked out why people here like to disagree so much, even when there seems to be no benefit from doing so—but then again, humans aren’t perfectly instrumentally rational, and perhaps LWers are less instrumentally rational than most. (We certainly do seem to have more people suffering from akrasia around here than most places, after all.) It’s also possible that Lumifer and Vaniver are right, and that LW users are a conceited, contentious bunch that like to disagree to signal intelligence and/or gain karma. I know I’ve fallen victim to the urge to nitpick before, and so have many others here, including even prominent users like shminux. (Jiro, too, from my previous experience talking with him/her.) It’s just nitpicking. Respect, for better or for worse, doesn’t even really enter the equation.
For the record, however, I do respect your mathematical ability, and while I’m less confident about your metacognitive abilities, I think that if you’ve spent as much time pondering this subject as you claim—certainly a lot more time than most people around here have, probably—you have a reasonably good grasp on what you’re talking about. Just don’t expect most LWers to feel the same way.
I think you are too quick to take disagreement personally. Interpreting disagreement as lack of respect is an example of this.
I think it’s more issues like tone, personally. (Particularly egregious are examples of “you are” statements, instead of “I feel” statements, which I’ve noticed many LWers seem really prone to making. It’s a lot less pretentious-sounding when you prefix your statements with an “I feel” or “I think” or “in my opnion”.)
You didn’t answer my question: do you respect me? :-) You’re not giving any positive feedback whatsoever. I don’t care what you think of me, but it’s reasonable for me to assume that you don’t have any positive feelings toward me if you’re not saying anything positive.
I respect you by my standards, but apparently not by your standards.
Based on JonahSinick’s prior comments, his motivation for asking this question is pretty clear. You have already critiqued the thought process that made him think this question is necessary, to attack it again is almost double-counting. I think if you had answered the question directly the discussion would have a better chance of bootstrapping out of mutual unintelligibility. Then again, I mostly lurk and only rarely participate in internet debates so I don’t feel I really understand how any given discussion strategy would actually play out. Also, I cheated, since Jonah already expressed a desire for a direct answer.