To be clear, I endorse you doing that, but I would like you to do it without sleight-of-hand-frame-control.
(I do agree you could probably have written the second half of the post without relying on the first half’s structure, but, that’s not what you did)
I have on my todo list to write up a post that’s like “hey guys here is an explanation of Frame Control/Manipulation that is more rigorous and more neutrally worded than Aella’s post about it, and here’s why I think we should have a habit of noticing it.”.
And then, maybe afterwards, a post going: “Hey, I think ‘notice your own frame control, and be a bit careful about it’ should graduate to a thing you are obligated to learn, as a good LW citizen. What do people think of that?”, and get some sense of how The People think about it. And, depending on how that goes, maybe it becomes an actual LW norm.
I haven’t done that and doesn’t seem fair to rush it or assume how that’ll play out, so, currently this is more of a suggestion that I think you should probably agree to on your own terms rather than something I’m enforcing as a moderator, but, flagging that that’s a longer term agenda of mine.
In your view, is there an important difference between frame control, and the author having a particular frame that they use in a particular essay?
I’m proud of this blog post. I think it’s a good blog post that clearly explains my ideas in a way that’s engaging to read. If someone wants to talk about my motivations for writing this post and why I chose the analogies I did, I’m happy to have that discussion in the comment section, like we’re doing now.
But it seems to me that a blog post that talked about my objections to Bensinger’s Goodwill element, without first explaining the “motors” and “martial arts” analogies as illustrations of how I’m thinking about the topic, would be worse than this post, primarily because it would be less faithful to how I’m thinking about the topic, but also because it would just be less interesting to read.
If someone thinks my choice of analogies (or “frames”; I’m not sure if there’s a specific definition of “frame” I’m supposed to be familar with in this context) is misleading for some specific reason, they’re welcome to argue that in the comment section. So far, you have not persuaded me that I should have made any different writing choices.
a thing you are obligated to learn, as a good LW citizen
I mean, it’s your website. (Or maybe it’s Oli’s or Vaniver’s website? I’m not keeping track of the power structure.) If think you can obligate your users to learn something in order to maintain some “good citizen” status, that’s definitely a thing you can try to do.
For myself, I use this website because I’m interested in the study of human rationality (as that study was articulated by Yudkowsky in 2007–2009), and this seems like a pretty good website for posting my thoughts and reading other people’s thoughts about that topic, and also because I have a long history here (and therefore a large investment in the local jargon, &c.).
I consider myself to have obligations under the moral law to think and write clearly. I do not consider myself to have any obligations whatsoever “as a good LW citizen”.
a post that’s like “hey guys here is an explanation of Frame Control/Manipulation that is more rigorous and more neutrally worded than Aella’s post about it, and here’s why I think we should have a habit of noticing it.”.
That sounds like a good blog post! I eagerly look forward to reading it.
In your view, is there an important difference between frame control, and the author having a particular frame that they use in a particular essay?
Yep!
Distinctions in Frame Control
I’m still working through this, which is part of why the post isn’t written up yet. I’m also not sure if I’m actually going to use the phrase ‘frame control’ because it might just be too easy to weaponize in a way that makes it more unhelpful than helpful. (i.e. the concept I have in mind here is something it makes to have the norm of ‘notice when you do it, and be careful with it’, not ‘don’t do it ever’)
But, here are my current thoughts on how I currently carve up the space here:
having a strongly held/presented frame, such as by speaking confidently/authoritatively (which many people who don’t hold their own frames very strongly sometimes find disorienting)
having an insistently held frame (where when someone tries to say/imply ‘hey, my frame is X’ you’re like ‘no, the frame is Y’ and if they’re like ‘no, it’s X’)
frame manipulation (where you change someone else’s frame in a subtle way without them noticing, i.e. presenting a set of assumptions in a way that aren’t natural to question, or equivocating on definitions of words in ways that change what sort of questions to think about without people noticing you’ve done so)
#2, #3 and #4 can be mixed and matched.
The places where people tend to use the word ‘frame control’ most often refer to #3 and #4, frame-manipulation and frame-insistence. I’m a bit confused about how to think about ‘strong frames’ – I think there’s nothing inherently wrong with them, but if Alice is ‘weaker willed’ than Bob, she may end up adopting his frame in ways that subtly hurt her. This isn’t that different from, like, some people being physically bigger and more likely to accidentally hurt a smaller person. I wouldn’t want society to punish people for happening-to-be-big, but it feels useful to at least notice ‘bigness privilege’ sometimes.
That said, strongly held frames that are also manipulative or insistent can be pretty hard for many people to be resilient against, and I think it’s worth noticing that.
Re: this particular post
This post felt like (mild) frame manipulation to me, here:
Contemplating these basics, it should be clear that there’s just not going to be anything like a unique style of “rationalist discourse”, any more than there is a unique “physicist motor.”
Where I think this objection only quite makes sense if you’re considering “rationalist discourse” to be “rationalist-as-scientist-studying-laws”, instead of “applied-rationalist”.
A thing that would have fixed it is noting “Duncan seems to be using a different definition of ‘rationalist’ and ‘basics’ here. But I think those definitions are less useful because [reasons].
(Note: I don’t think you actually need the ‘frame’ frame, or the ‘frame control’ frame, to object to your post on these grounds. Equivocation / changing definitions also just seems, like, ‘deceptive’)
I do want to flag: I also think Duncan’s ‘The Basics of Rationalist Discourse’ is also somewhat frame-manipulative while also being somewhat strongly held, by my definition here. I went out of my way to try and counter-the-frame-control in my curation notice. (I have some complicated thoughts on whether this was fine, whether it was more or less fine than my complaint here, but it’d take awhile more to put them into legible form)
I’m definitely doing #2. I can see your case that the paragraph starting with “But there’s a reason for that” is doing #4. But … I’m not convinced that this kind of “frame manipulation” is particularly bad?
If someone is unhappy with the post’s attempt to “grab the frame” (by acting as if my conception of rationalist is the correct one), I’m happy to explain why I did that in the comments. Do I have to disclaim it in the post? That just seems like it would be worse writing.
I think in isolation it wouldn’t be particularly bad, no. I think it’d rise to the level of ‘definitely better to avoid’ (given [probably?] shared assumptions about truthseeking and honesty), but, it’s within the set of mistakes I think are fairly normal to make.
I feel like it is part of a broader pattern that (I think probably) adds up to something noticeably bad, but it’d take me awhile of active effort to find all the things that felt off to me and figure out if I endorse criticizing it as a whole.
(So, like, for now I’m not trying to make a strong argument that there’s a particular thing that’s wrong, but, like, I think you have enough self-knowledge to notice ‘yeah something is off in a sticky way here’ and figure it out yourself. ((But, as previously stated, I don’t have a strong belief that this makes sense to be your priority atm)))
A thing that would have fixed it is noting “Duncan seems to be using a different definition of ‘rationalist’ and ‘basics’ here. But I think those definitions are less useful because [reasons].
Oh, also to clarify, in my current view, you don’t need to tack on the ‘because [reasons]’ to avoid it being frame manipulation. Simply noting that you think it makes more sense to use a different definition is enough to dispel the sleight of hand feeling. (Although listing reasons may make it more persuasive that people use this definition rather than another one)
To be clear, I endorse you doing that, but I would like you to do it without sleight-of-hand-frame-control.
(I do agree you could probably have written the second half of the post without relying on the first half’s structure, but, that’s not what you did)
I have on my todo list to write up a post that’s like “hey guys here is an explanation of Frame Control/Manipulation that is more rigorous and more neutrally worded than Aella’s post about it, and here’s why I think we should have a habit of noticing it.”.
And then, maybe afterwards, a post going: “Hey, I think ‘notice your own frame control, and be a bit careful about it’ should graduate to a thing you are obligated to learn, as a good LW citizen. What do people think of that?”, and get some sense of how The People think about it. And, depending on how that goes, maybe it becomes an actual LW norm.
I haven’t done that and doesn’t seem fair to rush it or assume how that’ll play out, so, currently this is more of a suggestion that I think you should probably agree to on your own terms rather than something I’m enforcing as a moderator, but, flagging that that’s a longer term agenda of mine.
In your view, is there an important difference between frame control, and the author having a particular frame that they use in a particular essay?
I’m proud of this blog post. I think it’s a good blog post that clearly explains my ideas in a way that’s engaging to read. If someone wants to talk about my motivations for writing this post and why I chose the analogies I did, I’m happy to have that discussion in the comment section, like we’re doing now.
But it seems to me that a blog post that talked about my objections to Bensinger’s Goodwill element, without first explaining the “motors” and “martial arts” analogies as illustrations of how I’m thinking about the topic, would be worse than this post, primarily because it would be less faithful to how I’m thinking about the topic, but also because it would just be less interesting to read.
If someone thinks my choice of analogies (or “frames”; I’m not sure if there’s a specific definition of “frame” I’m supposed to be familar with in this context) is misleading for some specific reason, they’re welcome to argue that in the comment section. So far, you have not persuaded me that I should have made any different writing choices.
I mean, it’s your website. (Or maybe it’s Oli’s or Vaniver’s website? I’m not keeping track of the power structure.) If think you can obligate your users to learn something in order to maintain some “good citizen” status, that’s definitely a thing you can try to do.
For myself, I use this website because I’m interested in the study of human rationality (as that study was articulated by Yudkowsky in 2007–2009), and this seems like a pretty good website for posting my thoughts and reading other people’s thoughts about that topic, and also because I have a long history here (and therefore a large investment in the local jargon, &c.).
I consider myself to have obligations under the moral law to think and write clearly. I do not consider myself to have any obligations whatsoever “as a good LW citizen”.
That sounds like a good blog post! I eagerly look forward to reading it.
Yep!
Distinctions in Frame Control
I’m still working through this, which is part of why the post isn’t written up yet. I’m also not sure if I’m actually going to use the phrase ‘frame control’ because it might just be too easy to weaponize in a way that makes it more unhelpful than helpful. (i.e. the concept I have in mind here is something it makes to have the norm of ‘notice when you do it, and be careful with it’, not ‘don’t do it ever’)
But, here are my current thoughts on how I currently carve up the space here:
having a frame, at all [i.e. set of ways to conceptualize a problem or solution-space or what questions to ask]
having a strongly held/presented frame, such as by speaking confidently/authoritatively (which many people who don’t hold their own frames very strongly sometimes find disorienting)
having an insistently held frame (where when someone tries to say/imply ‘hey, my frame is X’ you’re like ‘no, the frame is Y’ and if they’re like ‘no, it’s X’)
frame manipulation (where you change someone else’s frame in a subtle way without them noticing, i.e. presenting a set of assumptions in a way that aren’t natural to question, or equivocating on definitions of words in ways that change what sort of questions to think about without people noticing you’ve done so)
#2, #3 and #4 can be mixed and matched.
The places where people tend to use the word ‘frame control’ most often refer to #3 and #4, frame-manipulation and frame-insistence. I’m a bit confused about how to think about ‘strong frames’ – I think there’s nothing inherently wrong with them, but if Alice is ‘weaker willed’ than Bob, she may end up adopting his frame in ways that subtly hurt her. This isn’t that different from, like, some people being physically bigger and more likely to accidentally hurt a smaller person. I wouldn’t want society to punish people for happening-to-be-big, but it feels useful to at least notice ‘bigness privilege’ sometimes.
That said, strongly held frames that are also manipulative or insistent can be pretty hard for many people to be resilient against, and I think it’s worth noticing that.
Re: this particular post
This post felt like (mild) frame manipulation to me, here:
Where I think this objection only quite makes sense if you’re considering “rationalist discourse” to be “rationalist-as-scientist-studying-laws”, instead of “applied-rationalist”.
A thing that would have fixed it is noting “Duncan seems to be using a different definition of ‘rationalist’ and ‘basics’ here. But I think those definitions are less useful because [reasons].
(Note: I don’t think you actually need the ‘frame’ frame, or the ‘frame control’ frame, to object to your post on these grounds. Equivocation / changing definitions also just seems, like, ‘deceptive’)
I do want to flag: I also think Duncan’s ‘The Basics of Rationalist Discourse’ is also somewhat frame-manipulative while also being somewhat strongly held, by my definition here. I went out of my way to try and counter-the-frame-control in my curation notice. (I have some complicated thoughts on whether this was fine, whether it was more or less fine than my complaint here, but it’d take awhile more to put them into legible form)
I’m definitely doing #2. I can see your case that the paragraph starting with “But there’s a reason for that” is doing #4. But … I’m not convinced that this kind of “frame manipulation” is particularly bad?
If someone is unhappy with the post’s attempt to “grab the frame” (by acting as if my conception of rationalist is the correct one), I’m happy to explain why I did that in the comments. Do I have to disclaim it in the post? That just seems like it would be worse writing.
I think in isolation it wouldn’t be particularly bad, no. I think it’d rise to the level of ‘definitely better to avoid’ (given [probably?] shared assumptions about truthseeking and honesty), but, it’s within the set of mistakes I think are fairly normal to make.
I feel like it is part of a broader pattern that (I think probably) adds up to something noticeably bad, but it’d take me awhile of active effort to find all the things that felt off to me and figure out if I endorse criticizing it as a whole.
(So, like, for now I’m not trying to make a strong argument that there’s a particular thing that’s wrong, but, like, I think you have enough self-knowledge to notice ‘yeah something is off in a sticky way here’ and figure it out yourself. ((But, as previously stated, I don’t have a strong belief that this makes sense to be your priority atm)))
Oh, also to clarify, in my current view, you don’t need to tack on the ‘because [reasons]’ to avoid it being frame manipulation. Simply noting that you think it makes more sense to use a different definition is enough to dispel the sleight of hand feeling. (Although listing reasons may make it more persuasive that people use this definition rather than another one)