I would add that acceding to the corrections of another is somewhat of a compliment—particularly to nerds. In fact it is a strong enough status signal that I don’t expect high status people to acknowledge such correction unless they cannot get away with not doing so. [emphasis added]
This is one of the things that bothers me most about LessWrong, and intelligent people in general. Of all the silly status games that I would think and hope people here are mature enough to see through and realize the silliness of playing in this environment, avoiding giving thanks and acknowledging errors is one that should be close to the top of the list—but sadly, it isn’t.
Alas there’s no escape from status games, silly or otherwise. The solution to the problem is to explicitly give high status to those who give thanks and correct errors. Ideally this force is sufficiently strong to more than counteract the status lost through revealing the original mistake or the need you are giving thanks for. I think we’re at least close to that for the level of thanks and error correction we want on this site.
I’m not sure if I agree. Sometimes these things are important parts of the learning process, and though it is possible to see through many social norms, many of them actually facilitate communication. (For example: politeness, showing that you are leaving a line of retreat, etc.)
The one that bothers me the most is when there’s an insightful criticism or question attached to a comment, and the criticism gets voted up because it makes a valid point that illustrates what seems like a fatal flaw in the parent comment’s argument, but the author of the parent comment never bothers to respond, because they’d rather just pretend they never saw the comment or that it doesn’t make a good point that needs addressing. I don’t see how one could argue that that is a way of “facilitating communication”.
Anyway, I think you switched the topic from status games to social norms, which are not quite the same thing. My example above of not responding to strong criticisms to avoid admitting error or weakness is a status game (a pathetic and silly one, in my opinion), but it’s not a social norm. I have no problem with stereotypical social norms like politeness.
Consider that some authors may have precommitted to not responding to such criticisms because they judged they would not have the emotional capacity to sanely respond.
The one that bothers me the most is when there’s an insightful criticism or question attached to a comment, and the criticism gets voted up because it makes a valid point that illustrates what seems like a fatal flaw in the parent comment’s argument, but the author of the parent comment never bothers to respond, because they’d rather just pretend they never saw the comment or that it doesn’t make a good point that needs addressing. I don’t see how one could argue that that is a way of “facilitating communication”.
I agree but at the same time would be wary about advocating a strong norm against not replying. Rules can and will be gamed. It is not hard for a clever arguer to exploit such norms and play the crowd with highly undesirable results.
I thought there actually was a strong norm already that was being flouted.
The model I had in mind was:
LW’s “Strong critique of comment in direct reply to a comment or post” is to “ignoring the critique and failing to reply”
as
Academia’s “Strong paper that criticizes methodology, etc., of a published paper” is to “not publishing a response to the critique”.
In academia, a researcher that habitually failed to address serious flaws in their publications would quickly lose status and become irrelevant. I thought something like that was a norm at LW.
The judgement behind ‘strong paper’ and ‘strong critique’ is important and similar judgement must be used to decide whether to reply to criticism. This is particularly the case when the critic is not acting in good faith (again, in your judgement) and has a talent for obfuscation and rhetoric.
I’m not advocating anything like “always respond”. I’m advocating that when people actually think it’s a strong critique, they should respond rather than playing the status game of pretending they don’t really think it’s a strong critique by ignoring it. Additionally, even if they don’t think it’s a strong critique, if many other people ‘whose judgment they would trust in other similar situations’ do think it’s a strong critique, then they should also respond.
I think voting tends to be a function of social norms rather than status games. For example: voting tends to follow the policy “upvote if you want to see more like this.”
I agree. My point thought was not primarily about the child comment being voted up, but about the child comment being an insightful critique of or counter-argument to the parent. In the example, the child comment being voted up was just meant as evidence that the comment actually ‘does’ make a great point that needs a response from the parent, which is why it’s so disappointing to see the comment ignored.
The status game I had in mind was “if I ignore that comment that points out serious flaws in my argument, people will be more likely to get the impression that the comment is not worthy of reply and that my argument really isn’t flawed, and I can avoid a response that might lower my status, even if that compromises the rational, educational aspect of this site.” The irony is that for many of us here, responding would actually be a status-enhancing act.
I think voting tends to be a function of social norms rather than status games.
Social norms only work because they piggy back on status games. They are also created and determined by status games and power plays. The trick is to accept that and harness that force the best we can!
I concur, and I don’t see that as much of a problem. Though it incentives signaling that you have changed your mind, that generally means that you have to actually change your mind, which is, after all, the whole point.
This is one of the things that bothers me most about LessWrong, and intelligent people in general. Of all the silly status games that I would think and hope people here are mature enough to see through and realize the silliness of playing in this environment, avoiding giving thanks and acknowledging errors is one that should be close to the top of the list—but sadly, it isn’t.
Alas there’s no escape from status games, silly or otherwise. The solution to the problem is to explicitly give high status to those who give thanks and correct errors. Ideally this force is sufficiently strong to more than counteract the status lost through revealing the original mistake or the need you are giving thanks for. I think we’re at least close to that for the level of thanks and error correction we want on this site.
Wow, I was wrong and you were right, thanks!
I’m not sure if I agree. Sometimes these things are important parts of the learning process, and though it is possible to see through many social norms, many of them actually facilitate communication. (For example: politeness, showing that you are leaving a line of retreat, etc.)
The one that bothers me the most is when there’s an insightful criticism or question attached to a comment, and the criticism gets voted up because it makes a valid point that illustrates what seems like a fatal flaw in the parent comment’s argument, but the author of the parent comment never bothers to respond, because they’d rather just pretend they never saw the comment or that it doesn’t make a good point that needs addressing. I don’t see how one could argue that that is a way of “facilitating communication”.
Anyway, I think you switched the topic from status games to social norms, which are not quite the same thing. My example above of not responding to strong criticisms to avoid admitting error or weakness is a status game (a pathetic and silly one, in my opinion), but it’s not a social norm. I have no problem with stereotypical social norms like politeness.
Consider that some authors may have precommitted to not responding to such criticisms because they judged they would not have the emotional capacity to sanely respond.
I agree but at the same time would be wary about advocating a strong norm against not replying. Rules can and will be gamed. It is not hard for a clever arguer to exploit such norms and play the crowd with highly undesirable results.
I thought there actually was a strong norm already that was being flouted.
The model I had in mind was:
LW’s “Strong critique of comment in direct reply to a comment or post” is to “ignoring the critique and failing to reply”
as
Academia’s “Strong paper that criticizes methodology, etc., of a published paper” is to “not publishing a response to the critique”.
In academia, a researcher that habitually failed to address serious flaws in their publications would quickly lose status and become irrelevant. I thought something like that was a norm at LW.
The judgement behind ‘strong paper’ and ‘strong critique’ is important and similar judgement must be used to decide whether to reply to criticism. This is particularly the case when the critic is not acting in good faith (again, in your judgement) and has a talent for obfuscation and rhetoric.
Strongly agree.
I’m not advocating anything like “always respond”. I’m advocating that when people actually think it’s a strong critique, they should respond rather than playing the status game of pretending they don’t really think it’s a strong critique by ignoring it. Additionally, even if they don’t think it’s a strong critique, if many other people ‘whose judgment they would trust in other similar situations’ do think it’s a strong critique, then they should also respond.
I think voting tends to be a function of social norms rather than status games. For example: voting tends to follow the policy “upvote if you want to see more like this.”
I agree. My point thought was not primarily about the child comment being voted up, but about the child comment being an insightful critique of or counter-argument to the parent. In the example, the child comment being voted up was just meant as evidence that the comment actually ‘does’ make a great point that needs a response from the parent, which is why it’s so disappointing to see the comment ignored.
The status game I had in mind was “if I ignore that comment that points out serious flaws in my argument, people will be more likely to get the impression that the comment is not worthy of reply and that my argument really isn’t flawed, and I can avoid a response that might lower my status, even if that compromises the rational, educational aspect of this site.” The irony is that for many of us here, responding would actually be a status-enhancing act.
Social norms only work because they piggy back on status games. They are also created and determined by status games and power plays. The trick is to accept that and harness that force the best we can!
I’ve gotten upvotes for publicly accepting correction.
I concur, and I don’t see that as much of a problem. Though it incentives signaling that you have changed your mind, that generally means that you have to actually change your mind, which is, after all, the whole point.