This is an unhelpful comment and did not contribute to the conversation and I interpret it as an attack. Instead of attack why not engage EY on why he thinks it is so important to link to want he has written rather then what other people have written.
Any time I get the urge to use a “witty” oneliner I instead ask for the persons reasoning, perspective and logic that lead them to their conclusion.
First let me say that I do not think that attacks are by their very nature impermissible, and if you do, how dare you put “witty” in scare quotes? That’s just flat-out unkind.
Anyway, it’s a little hard for me to defend my comments of two years ago against attack, because I no longer remember what prompted me to make them. I will do my best to reconstruct my mental state leading up to the comment I made.
I don’t think I was necessarily on PhilGoetz’s side when I read his comment. I think I agreed, and still agree, with Technologos. But when I read the Wise Master’s response to it, it didn’t sit right with me. It read like an attempt to fight back against attack with anything that came to hand, rather than an attempt to seek truth. Surely, I must have felt, if the Wise Master were thinking clearly, he would see that unfamiliarity with the works of others is not an excuse, but in fact the entire problem. I feel that I wanted to communicate this insight. I chose the form that I did probably because it was the first one that came to mind. I hang out on some pretty rough and tumble internet forums, described by one disgruntled former poster as “geek bevis[sic] and buthead[sic] humour[sic]”. Sharp, witty-without-the-scare-quotes one-liners are built into my muscle memory at this point, and I view a well-executed burn as having aesthetic value in and of itself. I dunno, there is something to be said for short, elegant responses to provoke thought, rather than long plodding walls of text.
Anyway, that’s my reasoning, perspective, and logic. I hope you found this enlightening.
“witty” was describing my remark, as in the remarks I hold back on may not actually be witty, I was not trying to reference your remark though in retrospect it does seem easy to infer that so I apologize for communicating sloppily.
Attacks that do not forward the conversation are not useful. If the attacker does not expose the logic and data behind their attack then the person being attacked has no logic or data to pick a part and respond to and has no reason to believe that the attacker is earnest in seeking the truth.
“witty” was describing my remark, as in the remarks I hold back on may not actually be witty, I was not trying to reference your remark though in retrospect it does seem easy to infer that so I apologize for communicating sloppily.
Your attack against Nominull was, in fact, stronger and less ambiguous than Nominull’s.
Attacks that do not forward the conversation are not useful. If the attacker does not expose the logic and data
The logic behind the point was actually quite obvious, which is not to say I would have presented it in this context. As Perplexed points out, sometimes there are benefits to taking the effort that you do know what other people have written. (Incidentally, I upvoted both Eliezer Phil and left Nominull alone).
Nominull’s comment, discourteous or not, furthered the actual conversation while yours did not (and nor did mine). So that isn’t the deciding factor here of why your kind of attack is different from Nominull’s kind. I think the difference in perception is that you are responding to provocation, which many people perceive as a whole different category—but that can depend which side you empathise with.
Your attack against Nominull was, in fact, stronger and less ambiguous than Nominull’s.
You use the terms “Stronger”, “less ambiguous” when I did not make the claim of weaker or more ambiguous. Are you implying that I am untruthful in your first quote of me, if so it is a misinterpretation on your part.
The logic behind the point was actually quite obvious, which is not to say I would have presented it in this context.
The logic on why Nominull values EY linking and quoting philosophical works is not obvious to me. Nor is it obvious to me what Nominull’s mental model on why EY has not been linking an quoting philosophical works(from 2009 comment). With out making that mental model clear and pointing out supporting evidence I do not see who it is useful.
As Perplexed points out, sometimes there are benefits to taking the effort that you do know what other people have written.
I do not see any one denying that there are benefits to this in this conversation. I can not tell if you have a deeper point.
I think the difference in perception is that you are responding to provocation
That does not fit to how I view my response. It seems to me that the conversation could have taken a much different and more productive route right after EY’s comment and Nominull’s comment discouraged it. I gave the alternative of engaging EY on “why he thinks it is so important to link to want he has written rather then what other people have written” that I thought would lead to a more productive conversation. I want to encrage productive conversation if I am going to be a community member of lesswrong.
This is an unhelpful comment and did not contribute to the conversation.
I disagree. It is a very appropriate response to Eliezer’s flip dismissal of Goetz’s quite sincere (and to my mind, good) suggestions.
Eliezer is, of course, very well-read for a man of his age, but he is actually a bit parochial given the breadth of his ambitions and the authoritative, didactic writing style. His credibility, his communication ability, his fundraising, and even his ideas could probably benefit if he made a conscious effort to make his writing a bit more scholarly.
I understand that Eliezer is both very busy and very prolific, but I thought that his excuse (that he cited himself so much only for reasons of convenience (or laziness)) was much too dismissive of Phil’s arguments—in large part because I think his excuse is quite likely the truth.
With only a sentence and without back and forth conversation do you have the ability to pull out flippant intent from:
I link to myself because I know what I have written.
I do not know EY so I can not assign myself a high probability of doing so. In truth I subconsciously assigned a high probability that Nominull was in the same boat as me, in other words I jumped to conclusions. Do you assign yourself a high probability of determining EY’s intent from the above? If so please share if you can.
I can imagine EY’s statement made with helpful intent(I could have made that statement with helpful intent), responding to it as if it was made with unhelpful intent with out evidence does not seem rational/helpful to me.
I think you are attaching too much importance to inferring the intent (flippant vs helpful) of Eliezer’s one-line response to several dozen lines of discussion, and attaching too little importance to assessing the tone. In any case, the dictionary definition of flippant:
frivolously disrespectful, shallow, or lacking in seriousness; characterized by levity
seems to be about tone, rather than intent. Eliezer’s comment qualifies as flippant. Nominull’s response was also flippant by this definition. This matching tone strikes me as appropriate—which is exactly what I said.
At the point where Eliezer made his comment, he was being mildly criticized. His flippant comment, which I think was exactly truthful, carried the subtext that he was not particularly interested in discussing those criticisms at that time. He is totally within his rights sending that message. The criticism was mild, and formulating a serious and thoughtful response to the criticism is not something he was required to do. He could have just ignored it. He chose not to.
Sometimes clever, conversation-stopping responses don’t stop conversations. Particularly when they are a little bit rude. Eliezer got a clever and rude response back. And for almost two years, everyone was satisfied with that ending.
Eliezer got a clever and rude response back. And for almost two years, everyone was satisfied with that ending.
I think there is a high probability that lack of further comments is just due to the propensity not to post in old conversations.
I figured if the sequences and in post links are to be taken seriously then the comments should be too. Old comments should not be treated as if they were perserved in carbonite but living arguments.
You can replace intent with tone and I would stand by that point. I could make the same remark without disrespectful, shallow, lacking seriousness, and with out levity.
Sometimes clever, conversation-stopping responses don’t stop conversations. Particularly when they are a little bit rude. Eliezer got a clever and rude response back.
By your description Eliezer makes a true but rude remark and receives a rude response back and this is “appropriate.” I do not see how a rude response to what is believed to be a rude comment is productive, it does not bring any logic or new data to the table.
You seem to be remarkably willing to assert how your comments should be interpreted with respect to intent, meaning and social implications. Yet you do not seem to have paid Nominull that same courtesy.
Well I know what my intent is I know what I want my social implications to be. It makes sense that I try and communicate them. I accept that Nominull hangs “out on some pretty rough and tumble internet forums” and did not have unproductive intentions. I have not claimed that Nominull had unproductive intentions.
An example of impoliteness is needed if you want to continue this conversation.
Maybe you should read something written by somebody else sometime.
This is an unhelpful comment and did not contribute to the conversation and I interpret it as an attack. Instead of attack why not engage EY on why he thinks it is so important to link to want he has written rather then what other people have written.
Any time I get the urge to use a “witty” oneliner I instead ask for the persons reasoning, perspective and logic that lead them to their conclusion.
First let me say that I do not think that attacks are by their very nature impermissible, and if you do, how dare you put “witty” in scare quotes? That’s just flat-out unkind.
Anyway, it’s a little hard for me to defend my comments of two years ago against attack, because I no longer remember what prompted me to make them. I will do my best to reconstruct my mental state leading up to the comment I made.
I don’t think I was necessarily on PhilGoetz’s side when I read his comment. I think I agreed, and still agree, with Technologos. But when I read the Wise Master’s response to it, it didn’t sit right with me. It read like an attempt to fight back against attack with anything that came to hand, rather than an attempt to seek truth. Surely, I must have felt, if the Wise Master were thinking clearly, he would see that unfamiliarity with the works of others is not an excuse, but in fact the entire problem. I feel that I wanted to communicate this insight. I chose the form that I did probably because it was the first one that came to mind. I hang out on some pretty rough and tumble internet forums, described by one disgruntled former poster as “geek bevis[sic] and buthead[sic] humour[sic]”. Sharp, witty-without-the-scare-quotes one-liners are built into my muscle memory at this point, and I view a well-executed burn as having aesthetic value in and of itself. I dunno, there is something to be said for short, elegant responses to provoke thought, rather than long plodding walls of text.
Anyway, that’s my reasoning, perspective, and logic. I hope you found this enlightening.
“witty” was describing my remark, as in the remarks I hold back on may not actually be witty, I was not trying to reference your remark though in retrospect it does seem easy to infer that so I apologize for communicating sloppily.
Attacks that do not forward the conversation are not useful. If the attacker does not expose the logic and data behind their attack then the person being attacked has no logic or data to pick a part and respond to and has no reason to believe that the attacker is earnest in seeking the truth.
Your attack against Nominull was, in fact, stronger and less ambiguous than Nominull’s.
The logic behind the point was actually quite obvious, which is not to say I would have presented it in this context. As Perplexed points out, sometimes there are benefits to taking the effort that you do know what other people have written. (Incidentally, I upvoted both Eliezer Phil and left Nominull alone).
Nominull’s comment, discourteous or not, furthered the actual conversation while yours did not (and nor did mine). So that isn’t the deciding factor here of why your kind of attack is different from Nominull’s kind. I think the difference in perception is that you are responding to provocation, which many people perceive as a whole different category—but that can depend which side you empathise with.
You use the terms “Stronger”, “less ambiguous” when I did not make the claim of weaker or more ambiguous. Are you implying that I am untruthful in your first quote of me, if so it is a misinterpretation on your part.
The logic on why Nominull values EY linking and quoting philosophical works is not obvious to me. Nor is it obvious to me what Nominull’s mental model on why EY has not been linking an quoting philosophical works(from 2009 comment). With out making that mental model clear and pointing out supporting evidence I do not see who it is useful.
I do not see any one denying that there are benefits to this in this conversation. I can not tell if you have a deeper point.
That does not fit to how I view my response. It seems to me that the conversation could have taken a much different and more productive route right after EY’s comment and Nominull’s comment discouraged it. I gave the alternative of engaging EY on “why he thinks it is so important to link to want he has written rather then what other people have written” that I thought would lead to a more productive conversation. I want to encrage productive conversation if I am going to be a community member of lesswrong.
I disagree. It is a very appropriate response to Eliezer’s flip dismissal of Goetz’s quite sincere (and to my mind, good) suggestions.
Eliezer is, of course, very well-read for a man of his age, but he is actually a bit parochial given the breadth of his ambitions and the authoritative, didactic writing style. His credibility, his communication ability, his fundraising, and even his ideas could probably benefit if he made a conscious effort to make his writing a bit more scholarly.
I understand that Eliezer is both very busy and very prolific, but I thought that his excuse (that he cited himself so much only for reasons of convenience (or laziness)) was much too dismissive of Phil’s arguments—in large part because I think his excuse is quite likely the truth.
With only a sentence and without back and forth conversation do you have the ability to pull out flippant intent from:
I do not know EY so I can not assign myself a high probability of doing so. In truth I subconsciously assigned a high probability that Nominull was in the same boat as me, in other words I jumped to conclusions. Do you assign yourself a high probability of determining EY’s intent from the above? If so please share if you can.
I can imagine EY’s statement made with helpful intent(I could have made that statement with helpful intent), responding to it as if it was made with unhelpful intent with out evidence does not seem rational/helpful to me.
I think you are attaching too much importance to inferring the intent (flippant vs helpful) of Eliezer’s one-line response to several dozen lines of discussion, and attaching too little importance to assessing the tone. In any case, the dictionary definition of flippant:
seems to be about tone, rather than intent. Eliezer’s comment qualifies as flippant. Nominull’s response was also flippant by this definition. This matching tone strikes me as appropriate—which is exactly what I said.
At the point where Eliezer made his comment, he was being mildly criticized. His flippant comment, which I think was exactly truthful, carried the subtext that he was not particularly interested in discussing those criticisms at that time. He is totally within his rights sending that message. The criticism was mild, and formulating a serious and thoughtful response to the criticism is not something he was required to do. He could have just ignored it. He chose not to.
Sometimes clever, conversation-stopping responses don’t stop conversations. Particularly when they are a little bit rude. Eliezer got a clever and rude response back. And for almost two years, everyone was satisfied with that ending.
I think there is a high probability that lack of further comments is just due to the propensity not to post in old conversations.
I figured if the sequences and in post links are to be taken seriously then the comments should be too. Old comments should not be treated as if they were perserved in carbonite but living arguments.
You can replace intent with tone and I would stand by that point. I could make the same remark without disrespectful, shallow, lacking seriousness, and with out levity.
By your description Eliezer makes a true but rude remark and receives a rude response back and this is “appropriate.” I do not see how a rude response to what is believed to be a rude comment is productive, it does not bring any logic or new data to the table.
This example did.
Are you replying to this?
It is long past time for chastisement, if it was ever required.
I respond to a similar comment here.
It is not about chastisement, it is about the people, like me, who come and read it later.
You seem to be remarkably willing to assert how your comments should be interpreted with respect to intent, meaning and social implications. Yet you do not seem to have paid Nominull that same courtesy.
Well I know what my intent is I know what I want my social implications to be. It makes sense that I try and communicate them. I accept that Nominull hangs “out on some pretty rough and tumble internet forums” and did not have unproductive intentions. I have not claimed that Nominull had unproductive intentions.
An example of impoliteness is needed if you want to continue this conversation.