I’m actually moderately alarmed by the level at which their comments are upvoted (with all the bold face and whatnot). This event potentially adds motivation to the “Don’t let users with low Karma upvote things” change.
If a non-negligible number of people upvote comments expressing negative opinions of Eliezer Yudkowsky or the Sequences, what leads you to the conclusion that the best response is to label these comments “slander” and cast for roundabout ways to suppress them? If you want an echo-chamber (a reasonable thing to want), that can be easily and non-disingenuously accomplished, for instance by making it explicit policy that disagreement with local authority figures is not permitted.
I am not calling you a liar, because I accept that you are sincere, but I don’t believe you. The claim that you determine the quality of comments without regard to the positions they express is outlandish, for at least two reasons. One, that you are human, and therefore subject to the same biases as every other human known to have ever existed, meaning that you will inevitably tend to appraise posts that agree with your views more favorably than those that disagree. Two, that if you aren’t judging comments’ quality by the positions they express, there’s little of substance left by which you could judge them. The vast majority of comments and posts are neither formal nor rigorous enough for their reasoning, when considered solely on the comments’ own merits, to hold up to any serious scrutiny. So that leaves presentation, and...?
The claim that you determine the quality of comments without regard to the positions they express
...is not one I’ve made. Caring about quality of comments doesn’t require having perfect perception of this quality that is unaffected by other things. But I’m quite confident in my judgment of the quality of the comments that started this conversation.
The vast majority of comments and posts are neither formal nor rigorous enough for their reasoning, when considered solely on the comments’ own merits, to hold up to any serious scrutiny
They should be amenable to steel-manning, not impossible to criticize (though this is not what I was talking about).
I’m actually moderately alarmed by the level at which their comments are upvoted (with all the bold face and whatnot). This event potentially adds motivation to the “Don’t let users with low Karma upvote things” change.
If a non-negligible number of people upvote comments expressing negative opinions of Eliezer Yudkowsky or the Sequences, what leads you to the conclusion that the best response is to label these comments “slander” and cast for roundabout ways to suppress them? If you want an echo-chamber (a reasonable thing to want), that can be easily and non-disingenuously accomplished, for instance by making it explicit policy that disagreement with local authority figures is not permitted.
I’m afraid of the acceptance and approval of low quality comments, irrespective of the positions they express.
I am not calling you a liar, because I accept that you are sincere, but I don’t believe you. The claim that you determine the quality of comments without regard to the positions they express is outlandish, for at least two reasons. One, that you are human, and therefore subject to the same biases as every other human known to have ever existed, meaning that you will inevitably tend to appraise posts that agree with your views more favorably than those that disagree. Two, that if you aren’t judging comments’ quality by the positions they express, there’s little of substance left by which you could judge them. The vast majority of comments and posts are neither formal nor rigorous enough for their reasoning, when considered solely on the comments’ own merits, to hold up to any serious scrutiny. So that leaves presentation, and...?
...is not one I’ve made. Caring about quality of comments doesn’t require having perfect perception of this quality that is unaffected by other things. But I’m quite confident in my judgment of the quality of the comments that started this conversation.
They should be amenable to steel-manning, not impossible to criticize (though this is not what I was talking about).