And while there’s nothing wrong with an arbitrary or unjustified rule
Why is there nothing wrong with an unjustified rule? If a rule is unjustified, then surely there’s something wrong with it? I don’t think I understand what you’re saying.
I agree that blindly following norms without ever considering their value is bad but that’s not what I did. I brought up that norm because, having spent a little time thinking about it and evaluating its usefulness, I’ve concluded that it is useful. I think it’s a great decomposition. You may disagree and I would like to hear your thoughts on it (if you’re interested in sharing them) since you may have noticed a problem with it I haven’t.
But I don’t understand why, when I presented a template for why I thought a post was not good for LW, you concluded that my use of that template must mean that I’m bound by rules/norms that I’m unaware of. I’m definitely aware of the norm and the fact that it’s a norm—that’s why I brought it up!
Why is there nothing wrong with an unjustified rule? If a rule is unjustified, then surely there’s something wrong with it? I don’t think I understand what you’re saying.
For it to be right and proper to follow a rule, it is not necessary that all, or even most, or even anyone, of those who are subject to this rule, agree that the rule is justified.
In this sense, there is nothing wrong with an unjustified rule.
Conversely, for it to be right and proper to follow a norm, it is necessary that most of those who are subject to this norm, agree that the norm is justified.
I brought up that norm because, having spent a little time thinking about it and evaluating its usefulness, I’ve concluded that it is useful. I think it’s a great decomposition.
My objection was not to this, but to the implication, as I perceived it, that this was in fact already a norm, i.e. had been accepted by this community as binding upon us. I am aware of no such state of affairs.
You may disagree and I would like to hear your thoughts on it (if you’re interested in sharing them) since you may have noticed a problem with it I haven’t.
I will try to do that in a sibling comment, when I have a bit of time to properly formulate my view on the matter.
But I don’t understand why, when I presented a template for why I thought a post was not good for LW, you concluded that my use of that template must mean that I’m bound by rules/norms that I’m unaware of. I’m definitely aware of the norm and the fact that it’s a norm—that’s why I brought it up!
It goes like this:
Scott instituted this rule on Slate Star Codex. That is his right, as SSC is his personal blog, created and operated entirely by him. He owes his readers no justifications for the rules of his blogs, and has no obligation whatever to gain anyone’s acquiescence or approval when instituting rules. So far, so good.
Then, however, certain readers of SSC (it’s not just you, by any means; I’ve noticed this pattern numerous times), apparently judging this rule to be excellent, adopt it as a general norm of behavior, and—crucially—come to have an impression that it has been accepted, by others, as a general norm of behavior. They begin to police the behavior of others, in other online spaces, according to this norm.
The critical step that is missing is the part where the communities at those other spaces ever agree to adopt this norm, or discuss the matter at all, or even are informed that they are now expected to abide by it.
Indeed, the norm may be a good one (or it may not). But where did it come from? How, in other words, was this norm, in particular, picked out of the vast space of possible community / discussion norms? Well, it came from Slate Star Codex, clearly. But because the rules of SSC are arbitrarily imposed by Scott (as, again, is his unquestionable right), that means that this norm originated as an un-discussed, un-questioned, un-justified rule. (Any claim that this norm was arrived at by considering, from first principles, what norms may be good for a community to adopt, would not be even slightly credible.)
Insofar as those SSC readers who behave in this way are not fully cognizant of this dynamic (as I believe most are not), what can we say about the reasons for their behavior? This: that they are bound by the rules of Slate Star Codex, without knowing it.
For it to be right and proper to follow a rule, it is not necessary that all, or even most, or even anyone, of those who are subject to this rule, agree that the rule is justified.
Thanks for the clarification. I strongly disagree with this but have no interest or expectation that we’ll resolve it talking here since it probably comes down to fundamental values concerning authority.
It goes like this:
Aha! Now I understand what you’re saying. From your perspective, I criticized the post based on a norm that is not accepted as widely as those who use it seem to think it is. I agree this is bad because it lends undue weight to an argument—it comes across as “everyone agrees you should do X” when really it’s “some people from some community agree you should do X”, which is obviously less persuasive/relevant.
But I was not trying to make an argument from authority. Apparently I should be clearer in the future since that’s how it came across. I was trying to make a purely logic-based (as in, not evidence-based or authority-based, etc.) argument and cited the SSC rule as a shortcut to what I was trying to explain. Rather than write a long post explaining exactly why I felt the post was unjustified given its expected impact, I thought that citing something most people here are familiar with would be an easier/faster explanation.
I meant my original point to read something like: I expect this post to be harmful to the discourse here for reasons most easily summarized by saying that it fails the SSC 2-out-of-3 rule. I was not suggesting that everyone does or should follow that rule.
As a loose analogy, it would be like bringing up a fake framework not because everyone does or should think through that lens but merely because the point being made is most easily expressed through that lens. It would be fine, and actually encouraged, for people who don’t like that fake framework to translate the point into other frameworks.
But I was not trying to make an argument from authority. Apparently I should be clearer in the future since that’s how it came across. I was trying to make a purely logic-based (as in, not evidence-based or authority-based, etc.) argument and cited the SSC rule as a shortcut to what I was trying to explain. Rather than write a long post explaining exactly why I felt the post was unjustified given its expected impact, I thought that citing something most people here are familiar with would be an easier/faster explanation.
Indeed. This clarifies things, thanks. I agree that it would be helpful to be more clear about this in the future—though I question the wisdom of making reference to such rules at all, due to what I said about “privileging the hypothesis”.
I meant my original point to read something like: I expect this post to be harmful to the discourse here for reasons most easily summarized by saying that it fails the SSC 2-out-of-3 rule.
But you see, this is precisely the problem. What are the reasons (for why a post might be harmful to the discourse) that are summarized by saying that something fails the SSC rule? It’s not clear that we know—certainly I don’t!
Or, put it this way: since you assumed that your interlocutor (and, possibly, other readers of Less Wrong) would know what those reasons are (since you expected that your shorthand would be decoded properly), it must therefore be true (in your view) that these reasons have been discussed and elucidated, prominently and publicly. Could you provide some links to such prominent and public discussions?
… it would be like bringing up a fake framework …
It will probably not surprise you to learn that I take rather a dim view of “fake frameworks”.
it must therefore be true (in your view) that these reasons have been discussed and elucidated, prominently and publicly
If I wanted to ensure that every interlocutor understood (or could easily understand given a small amount of time) my point, then this would have to be true. You can’t decode the message if you don’t have the key, so if you want everyone to decode the message then the key must be as public and prominent as possible.
But I didn’t want to ensure that because doing so would take a lot more effort than I spent on that first comment. I am totally OK with only some people decoding the message if it reduces what would have been a significant writing effort into a quick comment. Please correct me if I’m mistaken, but you seem to think that sending messages like this—messages that are easier to decode for some than others—harms the discourse. But couldn’t that argument be made for any message that requires investment to understand?
For instance, LW contains many posts that assume a solid understanding of linear algebra, something that very few people (out of, say, all people who can read English and access the internet) have. To those unfamiliar with linear algebra, most of those LA-heavy posts are unintelligible. Should we avoid posting LA-heavy posts?
It’s actually a little funny because thinking through this has made me realize that a math-heavy post creates a polarized response (those who understand the math enough to get something out of the post vs those who don’t) in the same way that a political post does. And by your argument, referencing a framework that not everyone understands / agrees with / believes is useful also polarizes the response in a similar way.
Given that I see no problem with referencing math or disputed frameworks as a means of communicating with some people at the expense of losing others, this makes me much less confident that posts expected to produce politically polarized responses are problematic. If people unfamiliar with LA can skip LA-heavy posts, people with partisan biases/feelings can skip posts that touch on those.
Please correct me if I’m mistaken, but you seem to think that sending messages like this—messages that are easier to decode for some than others—harms the discourse.
Well… no, I don’t think I’d say that. It’s just that, if what you say is “hard to decode” in a certain way that will result in some people misunderstanding you as saying something which you are not actually saying, then, if you say something that—interpreted as intended—does not “harm the discourse”, nevertheless some people may misinterpret you as saying something different—something which does “harm the discourse”.
Which seems to be what happened here. (I think? There seem to have been several layers of misinterpretation, and I confess to having somewhat lost track. Which is, of course, itself a problem…)
I… think… I am not sure, but I think that, with all the corrections and clearings-up-of-misinterpretations that we’ve managed to muddle through, I no longer have any problem with your intended meaning. (My confidence in this is not high at all, but I’d judge it as more likely than the opposite.)
For instance, LW contains many posts that assume a solid understanding of linear algebra, something that very few people (out of, say, all people who can read English and access the internet) have. To those unfamiliar with linear algebra, most of those LA-heavy posts are unintelligible. Should we avoid posting LA-heavy posts?
This analogy is fundamentally flawed, and here is why.
As I’ve said before, the problem is not opacity, or the possibility of misunderstanding, per se; the problem is the double illusion of transparency. Consider that if I read a post filled with talk of linear algebra, then I know perfectly well that I don’t understand it. I don’t know much of linear algebra, so if you start saying things about vector spaces, then it’s clear to me that I don’t know what you’re talking about. And so it’s clear enough that a post like this one is simply not aimed at me.
Whereas when I read a comment that is not math-heavy, and is phrased in what seems to be perfectly ordinary plain English, and makes reference to ideas and words and phrases with which I am familiar, and does not seem confusing, then… how am I to know that the comment is actually not aimed at me? Why would I assume that it isn’t?
What’s more, consider the consequence of a norm that approved of communicating in this way. It would no longer be required of participants in Less Wrong, that they make their writing comprehensible. Why would they? Should anyone question them, they simply respond that their comment was aimed only and exclusively at those who already understand them. You would turn us all into Zizek, or perhaps Nasruddin! (Admirable figures, the both of them, each in his own way… but hardly role models for the Less Wrong commenter!)
Whereas when I read a comment that is not math-heavy, and is phrased in what seems to be perfectly ordinary plain English, and makes reference to ideas and words and phrases with which I am familiar, and does not seem confusing, then… how am I to know that the comment is actually not aimed at me? Why would I assume that it isn’t?
Is that what happened here, though? I posted a comment referencing the SSC rule and you objected to its use in that context. We both knew what I was referring to. The confusion seems to have arisen because I was intending the reference as a shortcut through my reasoning and you interpreted it as me smuggling a foreign norm into the discourse as if it were already widely accepted.
If I had been clearer about how I was using the reference, would there by any illusion of transparency, much less a double illusion? I didn’t expect anyone unfamiliar or not on board with the reference to understand my logic and you didn’t think you understood my point while actually misunderstanding it—in fact, you very clearly expressed that you didn’t understand my point. So both of us were aware of the lack of transparency from the get-go, I think.
It would no longer be required of participants in Less Wrong, that they make their writing comprehensible.
I mean this in the least sarcastic way possible: to 99% of people I talk to, LW writing is incomprehensible. I have tried many times to introduce LW-related concepts to people unfamiliar with LW and, in my experience, it’s insanely difficult to export anything from here to the rest of the world. Obviously my success also depends on how well I explain things, but the only subjects I have similar difficulty explaining to people are very technical things from my own field.
To be clear, I’m not saying “well everything’s already too hard to explain so let’s go full Zizek!” It is always better to be more comprehensible, all else equal. But all else is not equal—unwrapping explanations to the extent that they are understandable to someone with no familiarity with the subject comes at a great cost. It’s good to have develop jargon and shorthand to expedite communication between people in the know, and when the jargon is explicitly jargon (e.g., “the 2-out-of-3 rule from SSC”), I don’t think there is any illusion of transparency.
Sorry for the wall of text—I’m trying to keep these responses as short as possible but I also want to be clear. One more thing:
Should anyone question them, they simply respond that their comment was aimed only and exclusively at those who already understand them
If I’m trying to explain X but end up only explaining it to people who understand X, then yes, this is pointless and silly. But if I’m trying to explain Y and end up only explaining it to people who understand X, that is useful, especially when many people understand X.
[Brief mod note: I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the thread so far, but it’s approaching a point where I’m somewhat worried, mostly for high-context reasons relating to past threads involving site norms. I don’t have a specific ask at this point but am trying to err in the direction of publicly flagging when I feel worried earlier than I have in the past]
Why is there nothing wrong with an unjustified rule? If a rule is unjustified, then surely there’s something wrong with it? I don’t think I understand what you’re saying.
I agree that blindly following norms without ever considering their value is bad but that’s not what I did. I brought up that norm because, having spent a little time thinking about it and evaluating its usefulness, I’ve concluded that it is useful. I think it’s a great decomposition. You may disagree and I would like to hear your thoughts on it (if you’re interested in sharing them) since you may have noticed a problem with it I haven’t.
But I don’t understand why, when I presented a template for why I thought a post was not good for LW, you concluded that my use of that template must mean that I’m bound by rules/norms that I’m unaware of. I’m definitely aware of the norm and the fact that it’s a norm—that’s why I brought it up!
For it to be right and proper to follow a rule, it is not necessary that all, or even most, or even anyone, of those who are subject to this rule, agree that the rule is justified.
In this sense, there is nothing wrong with an unjustified rule.
Conversely, for it to be right and proper to follow a norm, it is necessary that most of those who are subject to this norm, agree that the norm is justified.
My objection was not to this, but to the implication, as I perceived it, that this was in fact already a norm, i.e. had been accepted by this community as binding upon us. I am aware of no such state of affairs.
I will try to do that in a sibling comment, when I have a bit of time to properly formulate my view on the matter.
It goes like this:
Scott instituted this rule on Slate Star Codex. That is his right, as SSC is his personal blog, created and operated entirely by him. He owes his readers no justifications for the rules of his blogs, and has no obligation whatever to gain anyone’s acquiescence or approval when instituting rules. So far, so good.
Then, however, certain readers of SSC (it’s not just you, by any means; I’ve noticed this pattern numerous times), apparently judging this rule to be excellent, adopt it as a general norm of behavior, and—crucially—come to have an impression that it has been accepted, by others, as a general norm of behavior. They begin to police the behavior of others, in other online spaces, according to this norm.
The critical step that is missing is the part where the communities at those other spaces ever agree to adopt this norm, or discuss the matter at all, or even are informed that they are now expected to abide by it.
Indeed, the norm may be a good one (or it may not). But where did it come from? How, in other words, was this norm, in particular, picked out of the vast space of possible community / discussion norms? Well, it came from Slate Star Codex, clearly. But because the rules of SSC are arbitrarily imposed by Scott (as, again, is his unquestionable right), that means that this norm originated as an un-discussed, un-questioned, un-justified rule. (Any claim that this norm was arrived at by considering, from first principles, what norms may be good for a community to adopt, would not be even slightly credible.)
Insofar as those SSC readers who behave in this way are not fully cognizant of this dynamic (as I believe most are not), what can we say about the reasons for their behavior? This: that they are bound by the rules of Slate Star Codex, without knowing it.
Thanks for the clarification. I strongly disagree with this but have no interest or expectation that we’ll resolve it talking here since it probably comes down to fundamental values concerning authority.
Aha! Now I understand what you’re saying. From your perspective, I criticized the post based on a norm that is not accepted as widely as those who use it seem to think it is. I agree this is bad because it lends undue weight to an argument—it comes across as “everyone agrees you should do X” when really it’s “some people from some community agree you should do X”, which is obviously less persuasive/relevant.
But I was not trying to make an argument from authority. Apparently I should be clearer in the future since that’s how it came across. I was trying to make a purely logic-based (as in, not evidence-based or authority-based, etc.) argument and cited the SSC rule as a shortcut to what I was trying to explain. Rather than write a long post explaining exactly why I felt the post was unjustified given its expected impact, I thought that citing something most people here are familiar with would be an easier/faster explanation.
I meant my original point to read something like: I expect this post to be harmful to the discourse here for reasons most easily summarized by saying that it fails the SSC 2-out-of-3 rule. I was not suggesting that everyone does or should follow that rule.
As a loose analogy, it would be like bringing up a fake framework not because everyone does or should think through that lens but merely because the point being made is most easily expressed through that lens. It would be fine, and actually encouraged, for people who don’t like that fake framework to translate the point into other frameworks.
Indeed. This clarifies things, thanks. I agree that it would be helpful to be more clear about this in the future—though I question the wisdom of making reference to such rules at all, due to what I said about “privileging the hypothesis”.
But you see, this is precisely the problem. What are the reasons (for why a post might be harmful to the discourse) that are summarized by saying that something fails the SSC rule? It’s not clear that we know—certainly I don’t!
Or, put it this way: since you assumed that your interlocutor (and, possibly, other readers of Less Wrong) would know what those reasons are (since you expected that your shorthand would be decoded properly), it must therefore be true (in your view) that these reasons have been discussed and elucidated, prominently and publicly. Could you provide some links to such prominent and public discussions?
It will probably not surprise you to learn that I take rather a dim view of “fake frameworks”.
If I wanted to ensure that every interlocutor understood (or could easily understand given a small amount of time) my point, then this would have to be true. You can’t decode the message if you don’t have the key, so if you want everyone to decode the message then the key must be as public and prominent as possible.
But I didn’t want to ensure that because doing so would take a lot more effort than I spent on that first comment. I am totally OK with only some people decoding the message if it reduces what would have been a significant writing effort into a quick comment. Please correct me if I’m mistaken, but you seem to think that sending messages like this—messages that are easier to decode for some than others—harms the discourse. But couldn’t that argument be made for any message that requires investment to understand?
For instance, LW contains many posts that assume a solid understanding of linear algebra, something that very few people (out of, say, all people who can read English and access the internet) have. To those unfamiliar with linear algebra, most of those LA-heavy posts are unintelligible. Should we avoid posting LA-heavy posts?
It’s actually a little funny because thinking through this has made me realize that a math-heavy post creates a polarized response (those who understand the math enough to get something out of the post vs those who don’t) in the same way that a political post does. And by your argument, referencing a framework that not everyone understands / agrees with / believes is useful also polarizes the response in a similar way.
Given that I see no problem with referencing math or disputed frameworks as a means of communicating with some people at the expense of losing others, this makes me much less confident that posts expected to produce politically polarized responses are problematic. If people unfamiliar with LA can skip LA-heavy posts, people with partisan biases/feelings can skip posts that touch on those.
Well… no, I don’t think I’d say that. It’s just that, if what you say is “hard to decode” in a certain way that will result in some people misunderstanding you as saying something which you are not actually saying, then, if you say something that—interpreted as intended—does not “harm the discourse”, nevertheless some people may misinterpret you as saying something different—something which does “harm the discourse”.
Which seems to be what happened here. (I think? There seem to have been several layers of misinterpretation, and I confess to having somewhat lost track. Which is, of course, itself a problem…)
I… think… I am not sure, but I think that, with all the corrections and clearings-up-of-misinterpretations that we’ve managed to muddle through, I no longer have any problem with your intended meaning. (My confidence in this is not high at all, but I’d judge it as more likely than the opposite.)
This analogy is fundamentally flawed, and here is why.
As I’ve said before, the problem is not opacity, or the possibility of misunderstanding, per se; the problem is the double illusion of transparency. Consider that if I read a post filled with talk of linear algebra, then I know perfectly well that I don’t understand it. I don’t know much of linear algebra, so if you start saying things about vector spaces, then it’s clear to me that I don’t know what you’re talking about. And so it’s clear enough that a post like this one is simply not aimed at me.
Whereas when I read a comment that is not math-heavy, and is phrased in what seems to be perfectly ordinary plain English, and makes reference to ideas and words and phrases with which I am familiar, and does not seem confusing, then… how am I to know that the comment is actually not aimed at me? Why would I assume that it isn’t?
What’s more, consider the consequence of a norm that approved of communicating in this way. It would no longer be required of participants in Less Wrong, that they make their writing comprehensible. Why would they? Should anyone question them, they simply respond that their comment was aimed only and exclusively at those who already understand them. You would turn us all into Zizek, or perhaps Nasruddin! (Admirable figures, the both of them, each in his own way… but hardly role models for the Less Wrong commenter!)
Is that what happened here, though? I posted a comment referencing the SSC rule and you objected to its use in that context. We both knew what I was referring to. The confusion seems to have arisen because I was intending the reference as a shortcut through my reasoning and you interpreted it as me smuggling a foreign norm into the discourse as if it were already widely accepted.
If I had been clearer about how I was using the reference, would there by any illusion of transparency, much less a double illusion? I didn’t expect anyone unfamiliar or not on board with the reference to understand my logic and you didn’t think you understood my point while actually misunderstanding it—in fact, you very clearly expressed that you didn’t understand my point. So both of us were aware of the lack of transparency from the get-go, I think.
I mean this in the least sarcastic way possible: to 99% of people I talk to, LW writing is incomprehensible. I have tried many times to introduce LW-related concepts to people unfamiliar with LW and, in my experience, it’s insanely difficult to export anything from here to the rest of the world. Obviously my success also depends on how well I explain things, but the only subjects I have similar difficulty explaining to people are very technical things from my own field.
To be clear, I’m not saying “well everything’s already too hard to explain so let’s go full Zizek!” It is always better to be more comprehensible, all else equal. But all else is not equal—unwrapping explanations to the extent that they are understandable to someone with no familiarity with the subject comes at a great cost. It’s good to have develop jargon and shorthand to expedite communication between people in the know, and when the jargon is explicitly jargon (e.g., “the 2-out-of-3 rule from SSC”), I don’t think there is any illusion of transparency.
Sorry for the wall of text—I’m trying to keep these responses as short as possible but I also want to be clear. One more thing:
If I’m trying to explain X but end up only explaining it to people who understand X, then yes, this is pointless and silly. But if I’m trying to explain Y and end up only explaining it to people who understand X, that is useful, especially when many people understand X.
[Brief mod note: I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the thread so far, but it’s approaching a point where I’m somewhat worried, mostly for high-context reasons relating to past threads involving site norms. I don’t have a specific ask at this point but am trying to err in the direction of publicly flagging when I feel worried earlier than I have in the past]