I’m inclined to agree with other commenters: While the concepts presented in the article are very useful, the name “garbage” information is itself cursed information, because if we tried to talk to someone about garbage information, they already have a very strong preconception that will be called up, which doesn’t align with what you’re trying to communicate.
You’re using “garbage” to mean that the noise to signal ratio is fundamentally unusable. However when others think of “garbage” information, they think of something like a malfunctioning sensor, where all of the data collected is useless and should be thrown away. Instead, you mean that there is good data there, but it gets lost under a pile of irrelevant information.
I would say the distinction is important to avoid incorrect intuitions.
On the one hand, I do see your point that in some cases it’s important not to make people think I’m referring to malfunctioning sensors. On the other hand, malfunctioning sensors would be an instance of the kind of thing I’m talking about, in the sense that information from a malfunctioning sensor is ~useless for real-world tasks (unless you don’t realize it’s malfunctioning, in which case it might be cursed).
I’ll think about alternative terms that clarify this.
I’m inclined to agree with other commenters: While the concepts presented in the article are very useful, the name “garbage” information is itself cursed information, because if we tried to talk to someone about garbage information, they already have a very strong preconception that will be called up, which doesn’t align with what you’re trying to communicate.
You’re using “garbage” to mean that the noise to signal ratio is fundamentally unusable. However when others think of “garbage” information, they think of something like a malfunctioning sensor, where all of the data collected is useless and should be thrown away. Instead, you mean that there is good data there, but it gets lost under a pile of irrelevant information.
I would say the distinction is important to avoid incorrect intuitions.
Maybe “barren information”?
On the one hand, I do see your point that in some cases it’s important not to make people think I’m referring to malfunctioning sensors. On the other hand, malfunctioning sensors would be an instance of the kind of thing I’m talking about, in the sense that information from a malfunctioning sensor is ~useless for real-world tasks (unless you don’t realize it’s malfunctioning, in which case it might be cursed).
I’ll think about alternative terms that clarify this.