Point taken. Its not raising the level of discourse on Less Wrong or this quote thread—its just a fun quote that pattern matches to approved Less Wrong virtues, as you say. I’m defending the quote mostly because your first reply seemed kinda uncharitable.
I mean, a quote I posted last month “If at first you don’t succeed, switch to power tools” got voted up to +14, and nobody said “Actually that is incorrect, there are situations where switching to power tools won’t help at all LOL.”
I mean, a quote I posted last month “If at first you don’t succeed, switch to power tools” got voted up to +14
Perhaps the difference in reception (and certainly the difference in my reception) is that this example barely even pretends to be a rationalist quote. It’s more a macho-engineer joke. The quote here on the other hand does pretend to be rationalist—giving advice and making declarations about optimal decision making. This means it triggers my ‘bullshit’ detectors. It is a claim being made for reasons completely independent of whether it is actually true or not. This means that while I don’t see why the power tools joke managed to get to +14 in a rationalists quote thread rather than, say +5, it isn’t going to outrage me to see it upvoted significantly.
, and nobody said “Actually that is incorrect, there are situations where switching to power tools won’t help at all LOL.”
Note that ancestor quote about causes made an absolute claim about the nature of reality whereas the power tools thing just offers a problem solving heuristic that works sometimes. There difference is significant (to some, including myself).
Point taken. Its not raising the level of discourse on Less Wrong or this quote thread—its just a fun quote that pattern matches to approved Less Wrong virtues, as you say. I’m defending the quote mostly because your first reply seemed kinda uncharitable.
I mean, a quote I posted last month “If at first you don’t succeed, switch to power tools” got voted up to +14, and nobody said “Actually that is incorrect, there are situations where switching to power tools won’t help at all LOL.”
Perhaps the difference in reception (and certainly the difference in my reception) is that this example barely even pretends to be a rationalist quote. It’s more a macho-engineer joke. The quote here on the other hand does pretend to be rationalist—giving advice and making declarations about optimal decision making. This means it triggers my ‘bullshit’ detectors. It is a claim being made for reasons completely independent of whether it is actually true or not. This means that while I don’t see why the power tools joke managed to get to +14 in a rationalists quote thread rather than, say +5, it isn’t going to outrage me to see it upvoted significantly.
Note that ancestor quote about causes made an absolute claim about the nature of reality whereas the power tools thing just offers a problem solving heuristic that works sometimes. There difference is significant (to some, including myself).
Fair enough. I will shut up now.