This particular post of yours was, last night, at 4 upvotes. Do you have any hypothesis as to why that was the case? I am rather curious as to how that happened.
This particular post of yours was, last night, at 4 upvotes.
An instance of the more general phenomenon. If I recall the grandparent in particular was at about −3 then overnight (wedrifid time) went up to +5 and now seems to be back at −4. Will’s other comments from the time period all experienced a fluctuation of about the same degree. I infer that the fickle bulk upvotes and downvotes are from the same accounts and with somewhat less confidence that they are from the same user.
Do you have any hypothesis as to why that was the case?
It’s possible that the aesthetic only appeals to voters in certain parts of the globe.
Are you saying there is a whole country which supports internet trolls? Forget WMDs, the next war needs to be on the real threat to (the convenience of) civilization!
If I told you that God likes to troll people would that raise your opinion of trolls or lower your opinion of GOD DAMMIT I can’t take it anymore, why does English treat “or” as “xor”? We have “either x or y” for that. Now I have to say “and/or” which looks and is stupid. I refuse.
If I told you that God likes to troll people would that raise your opinion of trolls or lower your opinion of GOD
Which God? If it is Yahweh then that guy’s kind of a dick and I don’t value his opinion much at all. But he isn’t enough of a dick that I can reverse stupidity to arrive at anything useful either.
If I told you that God likes to troll people would that raise your opinion of trolls or lower your opinion of GOD
Neither, really. There are trickster figures all over the place in mythology; it’d take a fairly impressive argument to get me to believe that YHWH is one of them, but assuming such an argument I don’t think it’d imply many updates that “Coyote likes trolling people” (a nearly tautological statement) wouldn’t.
Hm? Even if YHWH existed and was really powerful, you still wouldn’t update much if you found out He likes to troll people? Or does your comment only apply if YHWH is a fiction?
What’s the hypothesis, that the Bible was subtly optimized to bring about Rick Astley and Rickrolling 1,500 or so years later? That… that does seem like His style… I mean obviously the Bible would be optimized to do all kinds of things, but that might be one of the subgoals, you never know.
Aw, wedrifid, that’s mean. :( I was asleep during that time. There’s probably some evidence of that on my Facebook page, i.e. no activity until about like 5 hours ago when I woke up. Also you should know that I’m not so incredibly lame/retarded as to artificially inflate a bunch of comments’ votes for basically no reason other than to provoke accusations that I had done so.
Is it? I didn’t think it was something that you would be offended by. Since the mass voting was up but then back down to where it started it isn’t a misdemeanor so much as it is peculiar and confusing. The only possibility that sprung to mind was that it could be an extension of of your empirical experimentation. You (said that you) actually made a bunch of the comments specifically so that they would get downvotes so that you could see how that influenced the voting behavior of others. Tinkering with said votes to satisfy a further indecipherable curiosity doesn’t seem like all that much of a stretch.
No, not really at all, I was just playing around. I don’t really get offended; I get the impression that you don’t either. And yeah upon reflection your hypothesis was reasonable, I probably only thought it was absurd ‘cuz I have insider knowledge. (ETA: Reasoning about counterfactual states of knowledge is really hard; not only practically speaking ’cuz brains aren’t meant to do that, but theoretically too, which is why people get really confused about anthropics. The latter point deserves a post I mean Facebook status update at some point.)
ETA: Reasoning about counterfactual states of knowledge is really hard; not only practically speaking ’cuz brains aren’t meant to do that, but theoretically too, which is why people get really confused about anthropics. The later point deserves a post I mean Facebook status update at some point.
That’s true. It’s tricky enough that Eliezer seems to get confused about it (or at least I thought he was confusing himself back when he wrote a post or two on the subject.)
I guess that sounds fun? Or why do you think it sounds fun? I think it’d only be worth if if the thread was really public, like when that Givewell dude made that one post about naive EU maximization and charity.
Why does that sound fun? I don’t know. I do know that when I am less-than-lucid, I am liable to lead individuals on conversational wild-goose chases. Within these conversations, I will use a variety of tactics to draw the other partner deeper into the conversation. No tactic in particular is fun, except in-so-far as it confuses the other person. Of course, when I am of sound mind, I do not find this game to be terribly fun.
I assume that you play similar games on Lesswrong. Purposely upvoting one’s own comments in an obvious way, followed by then denying that one did it, seems like a good way to confuse and frustrate other people. I know that if the thought occurred to me when I was less-than-lucid, and if I were the sort of person to play such games on Lesswrong, I probably would try the tactic out.
This seems more likely than you having a cadre of silent, but upvoting, admirers.
Both seem unlikely. I’m still confused. I think God likes trolling, maybe He did it? Not sure what mechanism He’d use though so it’s not a particularly good explanation.
Wedrifid said that too. I don’t have a model that predicts that. I think that most of the time my comments get upvoted to somewhere between 1 and 5 and then drop off as people who aren’t Less Wrong regulars read through; that the reverse would happen for a few hours at least is odd. It’s possible that the not-particularly-intelligent people who normally downvote my posts when they’re insightful also tend to upvote my posts when they’re “worthless”. ETA: thomblake’s hypothesis about regional differences in aesthetics seems more plausible than mine.
Greetings, Will_Newsome.
This particular post of yours was, last night, at 4 upvotes. Do you have any hypothesis as to why that was the case? I am rather curious as to how that happened.
An instance of the more general phenomenon. If I recall the grandparent in particular was at about −3 then overnight (wedrifid time) went up to +5 and now seems to be back at −4. Will’s other comments from the time period all experienced a fluctuation of about the same degree. I infer that the fickle bulk upvotes and downvotes are from the same accounts and with somewhat less confidence that they are from the same user.
Or, you know, memories.
It’s possible that the aesthetic only appeals to voters in certain parts of the globe.
Are you saying there is a whole country which supports internet trolls? Forget WMDs, the next war needs to be on the real threat to (the convenience of) civilization!
If I told you that God likes to troll people would that raise your opinion of trolls or lower your opinion of GOD DAMMIT I can’t take it anymore, why does English treat “or” as “xor”? We have “either x or y” for that. Now I have to say “and/or” which looks and is stupid. I refuse.
The general impression of the Book of Job seems to be to lower people’s opinion of God rather than raise their opinion of trolling.
And it was an atheist philosopher who first called trolling a art.
I DID NOT KNOW THAT THANK YOU. Not only is Schopenhauer responsible for Borges, he is a promoter of trolling… this is amazing.
I hear that Zen people have been doing it for like 1,000 years, but maybe they didn’t think of it as an art as such.
If you like it than you should have put an upvote on it.
Now I have. And on that comment too. All the single comments.
Which God? If it is Yahweh then that guy’s kind of a dick and I don’t value his opinion much at all. But he isn’t enough of a dick that I can reverse stupidity to arrive at anything useful either.
/nods, makes sense.
Neither, really. There are trickster figures all over the place in mythology; it’d take a fairly impressive argument to get me to believe that YHWH is one of them, but assuming such an argument I don’t think it’d imply many updates that “Coyote likes trolling people” (a nearly tautological statement) wouldn’t.
Hm? Even if YHWH existed and was really powerful, you still wouldn’t update much if you found out He likes to troll people? Or does your comment only apply if YHWH is a fiction?
You could say, “x or y or both” in place of “x and/or y”. I’m not sure if that looks more or less stupid.
I’ll try it out at some point at least, thanks for the suggestion.
If the Bible is the world’s longest-running Rickroll, does that count?
What’s the hypothesis, that the Bible was subtly optimized to bring about Rick Astley and Rickrolling 1,500 or so years later? That… that does seem like His style… I mean obviously the Bible would be optimized to do all kinds of things, but that might be one of the subgoals, you never know.
Aw, wedrifid, that’s mean. :( I was asleep during that time. There’s probably some evidence of that on my Facebook page, i.e. no activity until about like 5 hours ago when I woke up. Also you should know that I’m not so incredibly lame/retarded as to artificially inflate a bunch of comments’ votes for basically no reason other than to provoke accusations that I had done so.
Is it? I didn’t think it was something that you would be offended by. Since the mass voting was up but then back down to where it started it isn’t a misdemeanor so much as it is peculiar and confusing. The only possibility that sprung to mind was that it could be an extension of of your empirical experimentation. You (said that you) actually made a bunch of the comments specifically so that they would get downvotes so that you could see how that influenced the voting behavior of others. Tinkering with said votes to satisfy a further indecipherable curiosity doesn’t seem like all that much of a stretch.
No, not really at all, I was just playing around. I don’t really get offended; I get the impression that you don’t either. And yeah upon reflection your hypothesis was reasonable, I probably only thought it was absurd ‘cuz I have insider knowledge. (ETA: Reasoning about counterfactual states of knowledge is really hard; not only practically speaking ’cuz brains aren’t meant to do that, but theoretically too, which is why people get really confused about anthropics. The latter point deserves a post I mean Facebook status update at some point.)
That’s true. It’s tricky enough that Eliezer seems to get confused about it (or at least I thought he was confusing himself back when he wrote a post or two on the subject.)
That actually sounds like a lot of fun, if followed up with a specific denial of having done that.
I guess that sounds fun? Or why do you think it sounds fun? I think it’d only be worth if if the thread was really public, like when that Givewell dude made that one post about naive EU maximization and charity.
Why does that sound fun? I don’t know. I do know that when I am less-than-lucid, I am liable to lead individuals on conversational wild-goose chases. Within these conversations, I will use a variety of tactics to draw the other partner deeper into the conversation. No tactic in particular is fun, except in-so-far as it confuses the other person. Of course, when I am of sound mind, I do not find this game to be terribly fun.
I assume that you play similar games on Lesswrong. Purposely upvoting one’s own comments in an obvious way, followed by then denying that one did it, seems like a good way to confuse and frustrate other people. I know that if the thought occurred to me when I was less-than-lucid, and if I were the sort of person to play such games on Lesswrong, I probably would try the tactic out.
This seems more likely than you having a cadre of silent, but upvoting, admirers.
Both seem unlikely. I’m still confused. I think God likes trolling, maybe He did it? Not sure what mechanism He’d use though so it’s not a particularly good explanation.
Oh. That is certainly a possibility I failed to initially consider. Thank you for pointing this out.
Wedrifid said that too. I don’t have a model that predicts that. I think that most of the time my comments get upvoted to somewhere between 1 and 5 and then drop off as people who aren’t Less Wrong regulars read through; that the reverse would happen for a few hours at least is odd. It’s possible that the not-particularly-intelligent people who normally downvote my posts when they’re insightful also tend to upvote my posts when they’re “worthless”. ETA: thomblake’s hypothesis about regional differences in aesthetics seems more plausible than mine.