One of the things I worry about the LW community is that we’ll get too enamored of signaling rationality and become afraid to bounce ideas off each other that we’re not quite sure are rigorous enough. This thought is brought on by the seemingly small number of top level posts that people try to make (given how many members we have). Are people refraining from posting after they see that one such thread gets voted down? I know how discouraging that can be, and it seems to me that it would be worse for the budding rationalist who is unsure of themselves. To some extent these monthly open threads help, but even in these comments seem pretty conservative. What say you LW? Are we capable of entertaining ideas without adopting them or is the risk of diluting the signal to noise ratio too high?
edit: it occurs to me that maybe I’d like to see another tab up top called “passing thoughts” or some such. The S:N ratio of the regular posts could be kept up and shorter posts could go there. We could all agree simply to not hold it against each other if we make a gaffe in these shorter posts (obvious mistake). I think this would be valuable because even if an idea is flawed it can generate great discussion (one of the reasons I enjoy hacker news). As an added bonus, this could serve as a space for “Ask LW” posts without disrupting anything.
This thought is brought on by the seemingly small number of top level posts that people try to make (given how many members we have). Are people refraining from posting after they see that one such thread gets voted down?
Having posted five top-level posts so far and having two half-written ones pending, I’d estimate that writing a good post takes me about 20 times as much time and effort as writing a long comment. Many people simply can’t commit that much time, or can’t maintain focus for that long. I don’t think fear of rejection is the problem.
I’d estimate that writing a good post takes me about 20 times as much time
and effort as writing a long comment. Many people simply can’t commit that much
time [...] I don’t think fear of rejection is the problem. (my emphasis)
I take nazgulnarsil’s comment as suggesting that there may be value to more people writing posts that aren’t necessarily “good”… in which case that sort of rejection may not be optimal.
I like the “passing thoughts” segment idea. “Ask LW” sounds great too—a community advice column without the Yahoo! Answers nonsensical noise could be a great draw for new contributors, too.
One of the things I worry about the LW community is that we’ll get too enamored of signaling rationality and become afraid to bounce ideas off each other that we’re not quite sure are rigorous enough. This thought is brought on by the seemingly small number of top level posts that people try to make (given how many members we have). Are people refraining from posting after they see that one such thread gets voted down? I know how discouraging that can be, and it seems to me that it would be worse for the budding rationalist who is unsure of themselves. To some extent these monthly open threads help, but even in these comments seem pretty conservative. What say you LW? Are we capable of entertaining ideas without adopting them or is the risk of diluting the signal to noise ratio too high?
edit: it occurs to me that maybe I’d like to see another tab up top called “passing thoughts” or some such. The S:N ratio of the regular posts could be kept up and shorter posts could go there. We could all agree simply to not hold it against each other if we make a gaffe in these shorter posts (obvious mistake). I think this would be valuable because even if an idea is flawed it can generate great discussion (one of the reasons I enjoy hacker news). As an added bonus, this could serve as a space for “Ask LW” posts without disrupting anything.
Having posted five top-level posts so far and having two half-written ones pending, I’d estimate that writing a good post takes me about 20 times as much time and effort as writing a long comment. Many people simply can’t commit that much time, or can’t maintain focus for that long. I don’t think fear of rejection is the problem.
I take nazgulnarsil’s comment as suggesting that there may be value to more people writing posts that aren’t necessarily “good”… in which case that sort of rejection may not be optimal.
I like the “passing thoughts” segment idea. “Ask LW” sounds great too—a community advice column without the Yahoo! Answers nonsensical noise could be a great draw for new contributors, too.