Here we evidently have another case study in misunderstanding. I’m guessing the person who downvoted the parent thought that I was somehow agreeing with the grandparent; in point of fact, however, just the opposite is true. The parent is actually a rebuke of the grandparent that simultaneously incorporates additional praise for Eliezer. It says, in effect, “the very fact that Eliezer garners this kind of tribute should tell you that maybe his lack of formal education does not have the significance it normally would; in fact, since a lack of formal education is generally a major disadvantage in earning status, the fact that Eliezer has apparently earned high status in this highly educated community despite not having any education himself should tell you just how awesome he must be.”
The downvoter should have known this was the intended meaning because:
(1) It’s the charitable assumption, which makes no less sense in the context than the assumption the downvoter made.
(2) The comment was written by me, and it should be clear from my commenting history that my view of this post and Eliezer is much closer to the many upvoters of this post and participants in the joke than to the dissenters and disapprovers, let alone the anti-Yudkowsky trolls.
Dude. I was the one who downvoted you, and here’s why:
1) You replied to a troll
2) It was a very old troll
3) You did not say anything new or interesting
4) I think “Yay EY” is the kind of thing we want to stay away from, and anyway I’m a contrarian so I reflexively dislike it
5) I don’t like that we even have a list of mostly-unfunny Chuck Norris jokes about EY, and I don’t like seeing it pop up in recent comments
It was just one downvote. Everyone gets ’em; I’ll probably get several here. No need to go into your “This demonstrates my superior rationality!” failure mode over it.
I wish you had added “in my opinion” to this sentence. Because I thought my comment was new and interesting: I took a trollish comment and turned it into a legitimate element of the list—thereby creating irony, which is interesting. Moreover, the particular list element that resulted—“EY is a high school dropout with no formal education in anything, and yet people write lists like this about him”—is distinguished from nearly all the others in being (almost) true, which makes it even more interesting.
Naturally, I don’t expect you to agree, given your opinions as expressed above. However, simply saying “you did not say anything new or interesting”, as if it were a fact beyond dispute, makes it sound like it should have been obvious to me that it wasn’t interesting, which is kind of a rude thing to suggest, given the fact that I actually thought it was interesting, and had a reasonable rationale for thinking so, as explained above. Indeed, given that you realize that you are a contrarian in disliking the post, I should rather have expected you to anticipate that not only I but also a fair number of other readers would have a different evaluation of my comment.
Furthermore:
I don’t like seeing [this post] pop up in recent comments
I do not consider this to be a legitimate reason for downvoting a comment; comments should be evaluated on their own merits, and not on those of the post to which they are attached.
Finally, despite the fact that I appreciate this comment explaining your reasons for downvoting—which, as you can see, I did not interpret correctly, something you should consider the next time you want to communicate a message with an unexplained vote—I do not appreciate this remark:
No need to go into your “This demonstrates my superior rationality!” failure mode over it.
I do not consider my comments here to represent either a failure mode or a demonstration of superior rationality.
I do not consider this to be a legitimate reason for downvoting a comment; comments should be evaluated on their own merits, and not on those of the post to which they are attached.
I’m not prepared to defend it as legitimate, but it was a factor in my decision to downvote, and I was trying to be reasonably honest.
Please note that I really don’t like talking about karma like it’s important, and this dialogue, qua dialogue, is now over.
I’m guessing the person who downvoted the parent thought that I was somehow agreeing with the grandparent; in point of fact, however, just the opposite is true...
The downvoter should have known this was the intended meaning because:
(1) It’s the charitable assumption, which makes no less sense in the context than the assumption the downvoter made.
I’m guessing the downvoter knew this was the intended meaning because it’s fairly obvious in context. Even if it weren’t, the charitable assumption to make is that the critic interpreted the comment correctly.
Perhaps “making the charitable assumption” is, in general, too narrow a phrasing.
Often it happens that someone reveals themselves to be either a twit or a fool, or ignorant or evil, or stupid or mired in delusion and fallacies, etc. In such cases, different people have different intuitions about which state would be worse.
For my part, valuing intelligence, I’d rather be a spiteful contrarian than stupid, largely because people with that problem have higher upside.
You think the downvoter agreed with the original comment? Given that comment’s score, the post’s score (for example), and the fact that I have been downvoted before due to misunderstanding, I think a misunderstanding is more likely.
(Of course this is less relevant now anyway, since the score has changed, implying to me that the misunderstanding has been dispelled.)
...and yet people write lists like this about him.
(Damn, I think that belongs on the list!)
Here we evidently have another case study in misunderstanding. I’m guessing the person who downvoted the parent thought that I was somehow agreeing with the grandparent; in point of fact, however, just the opposite is true. The parent is actually a rebuke of the grandparent that simultaneously incorporates additional praise for Eliezer. It says, in effect, “the very fact that Eliezer garners this kind of tribute should tell you that maybe his lack of formal education does not have the significance it normally would; in fact, since a lack of formal education is generally a major disadvantage in earning status, the fact that Eliezer has apparently earned high status in this highly educated community despite not having any education himself should tell you just how awesome he must be.”
The downvoter should have known this was the intended meaning because:
(1) It’s the charitable assumption, which makes no less sense in the context than the assumption the downvoter made.
(2) The comment was written by me, and it should be clear from my commenting history that my view of this post and Eliezer is much closer to the many upvoters of this post and participants in the joke than to the dissenters and disapprovers, let alone the anti-Yudkowsky trolls.
Dude. I was the one who downvoted you, and here’s why: 1) You replied to a troll 2) It was a very old troll 3) You did not say anything new or interesting 4) I think “Yay EY” is the kind of thing we want to stay away from, and anyway I’m a contrarian so I reflexively dislike it 5) I don’t like that we even have a list of mostly-unfunny Chuck Norris jokes about EY, and I don’t like seeing it pop up in recent comments
It was just one downvote. Everyone gets ’em; I’ll probably get several here. No need to go into your “This demonstrates my superior rationality!” failure mode over it.
Thank you for explaining. However:
I wish you had added “in my opinion” to this sentence. Because I thought my comment was new and interesting: I took a trollish comment and turned it into a legitimate element of the list—thereby creating irony, which is interesting. Moreover, the particular list element that resulted—“EY is a high school dropout with no formal education in anything, and yet people write lists like this about him”—is distinguished from nearly all the others in being (almost) true, which makes it even more interesting.
Naturally, I don’t expect you to agree, given your opinions as expressed above. However, simply saying “you did not say anything new or interesting”, as if it were a fact beyond dispute, makes it sound like it should have been obvious to me that it wasn’t interesting, which is kind of a rude thing to suggest, given the fact that I actually thought it was interesting, and had a reasonable rationale for thinking so, as explained above. Indeed, given that you realize that you are a contrarian in disliking the post, I should rather have expected you to anticipate that not only I but also a fair number of other readers would have a different evaluation of my comment.
Furthermore:
I do not consider this to be a legitimate reason for downvoting a comment; comments should be evaluated on their own merits, and not on those of the post to which they are attached.
Finally, despite the fact that I appreciate this comment explaining your reasons for downvoting—which, as you can see, I did not interpret correctly, something you should consider the next time you want to communicate a message with an unexplained vote—I do not appreciate this remark:
I do not consider my comments here to represent either a failure mode or a demonstration of superior rationality.
I’m not prepared to defend it as legitimate, but it was a factor in my decision to downvote, and I was trying to be reasonably honest.
Please note that I really don’t like talking about karma like it’s important, and this dialogue, qua dialogue, is now over.
I’m guessing the downvoter knew this was the intended meaning because it’s fairly obvious in context. Even if it weren’t, the charitable assumption to make is that the critic interpreted the comment correctly.
I have to agree with komponisto on this one. If the downvoter understood the comment and still voted down then he, or she, is a twit.
Perhaps “making the charitable assumption” is, in general, too narrow a phrasing.
Often it happens that someone reveals themselves to be either a twit or a fool, or ignorant or evil, or stupid or mired in delusion and fallacies, etc. In such cases, different people have different intuitions about which state would be worse.
For my part, valuing intelligence, I’d rather be a spiteful contrarian than stupid, largely because people with that problem have higher upside.
Surely you mean “too wide”, since your issue seems to be that different people understand it to mean different things in the same situation?
I should claim I meant to do that. Instead, I can honestly plead intoxication...but more likely I was thinking “too narrowing a phrasing”.
If they interpreted the comment correctly, then their downvote makes no sense. Hence attributing it to misunderstanding is actually more charitable.
(Unless you have a better explanation for the otherwise-mystifying downvote.)
By that reasoning, the original comment would never have been written.
You think the downvoter agreed with the original comment? Given that comment’s score, the post’s score (for example), and the fact that I have been downvoted before due to misunderstanding, I think a misunderstanding is more likely.
(Of course this is less relevant now anyway, since the score has changed, implying to me that the misunderstanding has been dispelled.)