I did use the term “reasonably argued” but I didn’t mean clever. Maybe “rationally argued”? By my own algorithm a cleverly argued but clearly wrong argument would not garner an up vote.
I gave you an upvote for explaining your down vote.
I did use the term “reasonably argued” but I didn’t mean clever. Maybe “rationally argued”? By my own algorithm a cleverly argued but clearly wrong argument would not garner an up vote.
You are right, ‘clever’ contains connotations that you wouldn’t intend. I myself have used ‘clever’ as term of disdain and I don’t want to apply that to what you are talking about. Let’s say stick with either of the terms you used and agree that we are talking about arguments that are sound, cogent and reasonable rather than artful rhetoric that exploits known biases in human social behaviour to score persuasion points. I maintain that even then down-votes are sometimes appropriate. Allow me to illustrate.
There are two outwardly indistinguishable boxes with buttons that display heads or tails when pressed. You know that one of the boxes returns true 70% of the time, the other returns heads 40% of the time. A third party, Joe, has experimented with the first box three times and tells you that each time it returned true. This represents an argument that the first box is the “70%” box. Now, assume that I have observed the internals of the boxes and know that the first box is, in fact, the 40% box.
Whether I downvote Joe’s comment depends on many things. Obviously, tone matters a lot, as does my impression of whether Joe’s bias is based on dis-ingenuity or more innocent ignorance. But even in the case when Joe is arguing in good faith there are some cases where a policy attempting to improve the community will advocate downvoting the contribution. For example if there is a significant selection bias in what kind of evidence people like Joe have exposed themselves to then popular perception after such people share their opinions will tend to be even more biased than the individuals alone. In that case downvoting Joe’s comment improves the discussion. The ideal outcome would be for Joe to learn to stfu until he learns more.
More simply I observe that even the most ‘rational’ of arguments can be harmful if the selection process for the creation and repetition of those arguments is at all biased.
I did use the term “reasonably argued” but I didn’t mean clever. Maybe “rationally argued”? By my own algorithm a cleverly argued but clearly wrong argument would not garner an up vote.
I gave you an upvote for explaining your down vote.
You are right, ‘clever’ contains connotations that you wouldn’t intend. I myself have used ‘clever’ as term of disdain and I don’t want to apply that to what you are talking about. Let’s say stick with either of the terms you used and agree that we are talking about arguments that are sound, cogent and reasonable rather than artful rhetoric that exploits known biases in human social behaviour to score persuasion points. I maintain that even then down-votes are sometimes appropriate. Allow me to illustrate.
There are two outwardly indistinguishable boxes with buttons that display heads or tails when pressed. You know that one of the boxes returns true 70% of the time, the other returns heads 40% of the time. A third party, Joe, has experimented with the first box three times and tells you that each time it returned true. This represents an argument that the first box is the “70%” box. Now, assume that I have observed the internals of the boxes and know that the first box is, in fact, the 40% box.
Whether I downvote Joe’s comment depends on many things. Obviously, tone matters a lot, as does my impression of whether Joe’s bias is based on dis-ingenuity or more innocent ignorance. But even in the case when Joe is arguing in good faith there are some cases where a policy attempting to improve the community will advocate downvoting the contribution. For example if there is a significant selection bias in what kind of evidence people like Joe have exposed themselves to then popular perception after such people share their opinions will tend to be even more biased than the individuals alone. In that case downvoting Joe’s comment improves the discussion. The ideal outcome would be for Joe to learn to stfu until he learns more.
More simply I observe that even the most ‘rational’ of arguments can be harmful if the selection process for the creation and repetition of those arguments is at all biased.