One solution might be a “designated area” for hashing out disagreements
I think this is a better idea than just having people taking it to PM..… maybe we could have a “dead horses” thread—an alternative open thread specifically for these kinds of things. That way they don’t drown out the signal to noise ratio on article’s comments, but still allow debate to visible to the subset of the public that’s interested.
The problem with telling people to take it to PM is that it then becomes a 1 on 1 debate, and a lot of these debates involve more than 2 people… and even if they start out 1 on 1, it can sometimes be useful to have other people’s perspectives.
Dead horses are much better dealt with using top-level posts presenting the arguments as clearly as possible, in a reusable form. This allows to stop the rehashing with a link, and simplifies getting into the debate for newcommers.
I think we’re using different definitions of “dead horses” here… I was referring to the OP’s reference to “long, uninspiring, and seemingly-childish debates”… i.e. about things that don’t directly relate to human rationality. The implementation could be via top-level posts, but if so, they should be posts segregated into their own section, not included in the main article flow.
The only worse use of my LW time than participating in a dead-horse debate, would be participating in a debate about how to continue dead-horse debates.
I think we should definitely start a flamewar about this. Unfortunately, I don’t know enough about you to be able to effectively launch any ad hominem attacks or personal insults in your direction, so maybe you could go first, just to get the ball rolling.
Note for the humor-impaired: this is not a serious suggestion.
Are you honestly trying to suggest that you know just as much about me as you do about Hitler? Really? Have you ever watched a documentary about me on the History Channel? Read about me in school? Compared people to me on internet message boards? I think not. Obviously this ridiculous assertion is the product of an irrational mind!
I think this is a better idea than just having people taking it to PM..… maybe we could have a “dead horses” thread—an alternative open thread specifically for these kinds of things. That way they don’t drown out the signal to noise ratio on article’s comments, but still allow debate to visible to the subset of the public that’s interested.
The problem with telling people to take it to PM is that it then becomes a 1 on 1 debate, and a lot of these debates involve more than 2 people… and even if they start out 1 on 1, it can sometimes be useful to have other people’s perspectives.
Dead horses are much better dealt with using top-level posts presenting the arguments as clearly as possible, in a reusable form. This allows to stop the rehashing with a link, and simplifies getting into the debate for newcommers.
I think we’re using different definitions of “dead horses” here… I was referring to the OP’s reference to “long, uninspiring, and seemingly-childish debates”… i.e. about things that don’t directly relate to human rationality. The implementation could be via top-level posts, but if so, they should be posts segregated into their own section, not included in the main article flow.
The only worse use of my LW time than participating in a dead-horse debate, would be participating in a debate about how to continue dead-horse debates.
(Doh! I think I just did.)
I think we should definitely start a flamewar about this. Unfortunately, I don’t know enough about you to be able to effectively launch any ad hominem attacks or personal insults in your direction, so maybe you could go first, just to get the ball rolling.
Note for the humor-impaired: this is not a serious suggestion.
I don’t know much about you either; and I don’t know much about Hitler. Ergo, you are like Hitler.
Are you honestly trying to suggest that you know just as much about me as you do about Hitler? Really? Have you ever watched a documentary about me on the History Channel? Read about me in school? Compared people to me on internet message boards? I think not. Obviously this ridiculous assertion is the product of an irrational mind!