Reminder: If a person is not willing to explain their voting decisions, you are under no obligation to waste cognition trying to figure them out. They don’t deserve that. They probably don’t even want that.
That depends on what norm is in place. If the norm is to explain downvoting, then people should explain, otherwise there is no issue in not doing so. So the claim you are making is that the norm should be for people to explain. The well-known counterargument is that this disincentivizes downvoting.
you are under no obligation to waste cognition trying to figure them out
There is rarely an obligation to understand things, but healthy curiosity ensures progress on recurring events, irrespective of morality of their origin. If an obligation would force you to actually waste cognition, don’t accept it!
So the claim you are making is that the norm should be for people to explain
I’m not really making that claim. A person doesn’t have to do anything condemnable to be in a state of not deserving something. If I don’t pay the baker, I don’t deserve a bun. I am fine with not deserving a bun, as I have already eaten.
The baker shouldn’t feel like I am owed a bun.
Another metaphor is that the person who is beaten on the street by silent, masked assailants should not feel like they owe their oppressors an apology.
Do you mean anything by this beyond “you don’t have an obligation to figure out why people voted one way or another, period”? (Or do you think that I [i.e., the general Less Wrong commenter] do have such an obligation?)
Edit: Also, the “They don’t deserve that” bit confuses me. Are you suggesting that understanding why people upvoted or downvoted your comment is a favor that you are doing for them?
Sometimes a person wont want to reply and say outright that they thought the comment was bad, because it’s just not pleasant, and perhaps not necessary. Instead, they might just reply with information that they think you might be missing, which you could use to improve, if you chose to. With them, an engaged interlocutor will be able to figure out what isn’t being said. With them, it can be productive to try to read between the lines.
Are you suggesting that understanding why people upvoted or downvoted your comment is a favor that you are doing for them?
Isn’t everything relating to writing good comments a favor, that you are doing for others. But I don’t really think in terms of favors. All I mean to say is that we should write our comments for the sorts of people who give feedback. Those are the good people. Those are the people who’re a part of a good faith self-improving discourse. Their outgroup are maybe not so good, and we probably shouldn’t try to write for their sake.
I think I disagree. If you are getting downvoted by 5 people and one of them explains why, then even if the other 4 are not explaining their reasoning it’s often reasonable to assume that more than just the one person had the same complaints, and as such you likely want to update more that it’s better for you to change what you are doing.
Reminder: If a person is not willing to explain their voting decisions, you are under no obligation to waste cognition trying to figure them out. They don’t deserve that. They probably don’t even want that.
That depends on what norm is in place. If the norm is to explain downvoting, then people should explain, otherwise there is no issue in not doing so. So the claim you are making is that the norm should be for people to explain. The well-known counterargument is that this disincentivizes downvoting.
There is rarely an obligation to understand things, but healthy curiosity ensures progress on recurring events, irrespective of morality of their origin. If an obligation would force you to actually waste cognition, don’t accept it!
I’m not really making that claim. A person doesn’t have to do anything condemnable to be in a state of not deserving something. If I don’t pay the baker, I don’t deserve a bun. I am fine with not deserving a bun, as I have already eaten.
The baker shouldn’t feel like I am owed a bun.
Another metaphor is that the person who is beaten on the street by silent, masked assailants should not feel like they owe their oppressors an apology.
Do you mean anything by this beyond “you don’t have an obligation to figure out why people voted one way or another, period”? (Or do you think that I [i.e., the general Less Wrong commenter] do have such an obligation?)
Edit: Also, the “They don’t deserve that” bit confuses me. Are you suggesting that understanding why people upvoted or downvoted your comment is a favor that you are doing for them?
Sometimes a person wont want to reply and say outright that they thought the comment was bad, because it’s just not pleasant, and perhaps not necessary. Instead, they might just reply with information that they think you might be missing, which you could use to improve, if you chose to. With them, an engaged interlocutor will be able to figure out what isn’t being said. With them, it can be productive to try to read between the lines.
Isn’t everything relating to writing good comments a favor, that you are doing for others. But I don’t really think in terms of favors. All I mean to say is that we should write our comments for the sorts of people who give feedback. Those are the good people. Those are the people who’re a part of a good faith self-improving discourse. Their outgroup are maybe not so good, and we probably shouldn’t try to write for their sake.
I think I disagree. If you are getting downvoted by 5 people and one of them explains why, then even if the other 4 are not explaining their reasoning it’s often reasonable to assume that more than just the one person had the same complaints, and as such you likely want to update more that it’s better for you to change what you are doing.
We don’t disagree.
Cool