It’s not that hard. DG is using ‘the Rational Wiki community’ for ‘we’, ‘your’ refers to ‘the LessWrong community’, and ‘distressed children’ presumably refers to Dmytry, XiXi and by now, probably some others.
No, “distressed children” refers to people upset by the basilisk who feel they can’t talk about it on LW so they email us, presumably as the only people on the Internet bothering to talk about LW. This was somewhat surprising.
I presume it would include things that David Gerard could not repeat here. After all that’s why the folk in question contacted people from the Rational Wiki community in the first place!
Actually, I may have just answered my own question by reading the RW page on the b*s*l*sk that three prominent blogs and a discussion forum recently all linked to. Does reading that calm them down?
The “So you’re worrying about the Basilisk” bit is a distillation of stuff that’s helped people and is specifically for that purpose. (e.g., the “Commit not to accept acausal blackmail” section strikes me as too in-universe, but XiXiDu says that idea’s actually been helpful to people who’ve come to him.) It could probably do with more. The probability discussion in the section above arguably belongs in it, but it’s still way too long.
so they email us, presumably as the only people on the Internet bothering to talk about LW.
Or more likely, because RW has been the only place you could actually learn about it in the first place (for the last two years at least). So, I really don’t think you have any reason to complain about getting those emails.
Haha, what is this offline you speak of? You’re correct that I didn’t think of that. However wouldn’t they then already have someone to talk to about this, and not need to email people on the internet?
Either way, my point still stands. If you co-author an article on any topic X and let that article be linked to a way of contacting you (by either email or PM), then you cannot complain about people contacting you regarding topic X.
(answered at greater length elsewhere, but) This is isomorphic to saying “describing what is morally reprehensible about the God of the Old Testament causes severe distress to some theists, so atheists shouldn’t talk about it either”. Sunlight disinfects.
I’d discuss the moral reprehensibility of God (in both the new and the old testament) if and only if I saw the estimated benefit in attempting to deconvert those people as outweighing the disutility of their potential distress.
If you see such benefits in telling the people of the basilisk, and are weighing them against the disutility of the potential distress caused by such information, and the benefits indeed outweigh the hazard, then fine.
Your essential theory seems to be that if someone shines a light on a pothole, then it’s their fault if people fall into it, not that of whoever dug it.
The strategy of attempting to keep it a secret has failed in every way it could possibly fail. It may be time to say “oops” and do something different.
Your essential theory seems to be that if someone shines a light on a pothole, then it’s their fault if people fall into it, not that of whoever dug it.
Or, for that matter, the fault of whoever forbade the construction of safety rails around it.
To me it’s unclear whether you believe:
a) that it’s bad to try to keep the basilisk because such attempt was doomed to failure, or
b) that it’s bad to try to keep it hidden because it’s always bad to keep any believed-to-be infohazard hidden, regardless of whether you’ll succeed or fail,
or
c) that it’s bad to try to keep this basilisk hidden, because it’s not a real infohazard, but it would be good to keep real infohazards hidden, which actually harm people you share them to.
Can you clarify to me which of (a), (b) or (c) you believe?
I didn’t claim my list was exhaustive. In particular, I was thinking of Dmytry and XiXiDu, both of whom are never far away from any discussion of LW and EY that takes place off-site. The better part of comments on the RW talk pages and Charles Stross’ blog concerning the basilisk are mostly copied and pasted from all their old remarks about the subject.
OK. What I heard in your earlier comment was that a wiki community was being held at fault for “opening their doors” to someone who criticized LW. Wikis are kind of known for opening their doors, and the skeptic community for being receptive to the literary genre of debunking.
That was a rather mind-killed comment.Wikis are suppoed to have open doors. RW is supposed to deal with pseudoscience, craziness and the pitfalls of religions. The Bsl*sk is easily all three.
How is merely stating it to be “mind-killed” supposed to change my mind?
You might care about that sort of thing, you might not. I don’ exactly have a complete knowledge of your psychology.
You’re misinformed.
That’s irrelevant. Wikis open thei doors to all contributors, and then eject those that don’t behave. That’s still an open door policy as opposed to invitation-only.
My comment wasn’t about whether or not RW should cover the Basilisk.
If it should cover the basilisk, why shouldn’t it have contributions from the “malcontents”.
If it should cover the basilisk, why shouldn’t it have contributions from the “malcontents”.
I didn’t make any such statement. Recall, DG was wondering where all this drama about the basilisk came from—I advised him that it came from two particular users, who are well-known for bringing up this drama in many other forums and have more-or-less dominated the RW talk pages on the subject.
RW didn’t push this at all. I have no idea why Warren Ellis latched onto it, though I expect that’s where Charlie Stross picked it up from.
The reason the RW article exists is because we’re getting the emails from your distressed children.
I can’t parse this. Who are “we”, “you”, and the “distressed children”? I don’t think I have any, even metaphorically.
It’s not that hard. DG is using ‘the Rational Wiki community’ for ‘we’, ‘your’ refers to ‘the LessWrong community’, and ‘distressed children’ presumably refers to Dmytry, XiXi and by now, probably some others.
No, “distressed children” refers to people upset by the basilisk who feel they can’t talk about it on LW so they email us, presumably as the only people on the Internet bothering to talk about LW. This was somewhat surprising.
Well then, that’s the reputation problem solved. If it’s only RationalWiki...
What do you tell them?
I presume it would include things that David Gerard could not repeat here. After all that’s why the folk in question contacted people from the Rational Wiki community in the first place!
Actually, I may have just answered my own question by reading the RW page on the b*s*l*sk that three prominent blogs and a discussion forum recently all linked to. Does reading that calm them down?
The “So you’re worrying about the Basilisk” bit is a distillation of stuff that’s helped people and is specifically for that purpose. (e.g., the “Commit not to accept acausal blackmail” section strikes me as too in-universe, but XiXiDu says that idea’s actually been helpful to people who’ve come to him.) It could probably do with more. The probability discussion in the section above arguably belongs in it, but it’s still way too long.
Or more likely, because RW has been the only place you could actually learn about it in the first place (for the last two years at least). So, I really don’t think you have any reason to complain about getting those emails.
That’s not strictly true; for instance, it may be discussed offline!
Haha, what is this offline you speak of? You’re correct that I didn’t think of that. However wouldn’t they then already have someone to talk to about this, and not need to email people on the internet?
Either way, my point still stands. If you co-author an article on any topic X and let that article be linked to a way of contacting you (by either email or PM), then you cannot complain about people contacting you regarding topic X.
Isn’t it on RW that these people read the basilisk in the first place?
(answered at greater length elsewhere, but) This is isomorphic to saying “describing what is morally reprehensible about the God of the Old Testament causes severe distress to some theists, so atheists shouldn’t talk about it either”. Sunlight disinfects.
I’d discuss the moral reprehensibility of God (in both the new and the old testament) if and only if I saw the estimated benefit in attempting to deconvert those people as outweighing the disutility of their potential distress.
If you see such benefits in telling the people of the basilisk, and are weighing them against the disutility of the potential distress caused by such information, and the benefits indeed outweigh the hazard, then fine.
Your essential theory seems to be that if someone shines a light on a pothole, then it’s their fault if people fall into it, not that of whoever dug it.
The strategy of attempting to keep it a secret has failed in every way it could possibly fail. It may be time to say “oops” and do something different.
Or, for that matter, the fault of whoever forbade the construction of safety rails around it.
To me it’s unclear whether you believe: a) that it’s bad to try to keep the basilisk because such attempt was doomed to failure,
or b) that it’s bad to try to keep it hidden because it’s always bad to keep any believed-to-be infohazard hidden, regardless of whether you’ll succeed or fail, or c) that it’s bad to try to keep this basilisk hidden, because it’s not a real infohazard, but it would be good to keep real infohazards hidden, which actually harm people you share them to.
Can you clarify to me which of (a), (b) or (c) you believe?
Yes, RW was just the forum that willingly opened their doors to various anti-LW malcontents, who are themselves pushing this for all it’s worth.
That’s overly specific. Mostly they’re folks who like to snicker at weird ideas — most of which I snicker at, too.
I didn’t claim my list was exhaustive. In particular, I was thinking of Dmytry and XiXiDu, both of whom are never far away from any discussion of LW and EY that takes place off-site. The better part of comments on the RW talk pages and Charles Stross’ blog concerning the basilisk are mostly copied and pasted from all their old remarks about the subject.
OK. What I heard in your earlier comment was that a wiki community was being held at fault for “opening their doors” to someone who criticized LW. Wikis are kind of known for opening their doors, and the skeptic community for being receptive to the literary genre of debunking.
That was a rather mind-killed comment.Wikis are suppoed to have open doors. RW is supposed to deal with pseudoscience, craziness and the pitfalls of religions. The Bsl*sk is easily all three.
In what way? How is merely stating it to be “mind-killed” supposed to change my mind?
You’re misinformed.
My comment wasn’t about whether or not RW should cover the Basilisk.
You might care about that sort of thing, you might not. I don’ exactly have a complete knowledge of your psychology.
That’s irrelevant. Wikis open thei doors to all contributors, and then eject those that don’t behave. That’s still an open door policy as opposed to invitation-only.
If it should cover the basilisk, why shouldn’t it have contributions from the “malcontents”.
I didn’t make any such statement. Recall, DG was wondering where all this drama about the basilisk came from—I advised him that it came from two particular users, who are well-known for bringing up this drama in many other forums and have more-or-less dominated the RW talk pages on the subject.