No. Please, just no. This is the worst possible form of fighting the hypothetical. If you’re going to just say “it’s all hypothetical, who cares!” then please do everyone a favor and just don’t even bother to respond. It’s a waste of everyone’s time, and incredibly rude to everyone else who was trying to have a serious discussion with you. If you make a claim, an your reasoning is shown to be inconsistent, the correct response is never to pretend it was all just a big joke the whole time. Either own up to having made a mistake (note: having made a mistake in the past is way higher status than making a mistake now. Saying “I was wrong” is just another way to say “but now I’m right”. You will gain extra respect on this site from noticing your own mistakes as well.) or refute the arguments against your claim (or ask for clarification or things along those lines). If you can’t handle doing either of those then tap out of the conversation. But seriously, taking up everyone’s time with a counter-intuitive claim and then laughing it off when people try to engage you seriously is extremely rude and a waste of everyone’s time, including yours.
And then sometimes I’m reminded why I love this site. Only on LessWrong does a (well-founded) rant about bad form or habits actually end up accomplishing the original goal.
What’s involved here is dying in a fire in a hypothetical situation.
No. Please, just no. This is the worst possible form of fighting the hypothetical. If you’re going to just say “it’s all hypothetical, who cares!” then please do everyone a favor and just don’t even bother to respond. It’s a waste of everyone’s time, and incredibly rude to everyone else who was trying to have a serious discussion with you. If you make a claim, an your reasoning is shown to be inconsistent, the correct response is never to pretend it was all just a big joke the whole time. Either own up to having made a mistake (note: having made a mistake in the past is way higher status than making a mistake now. Saying “I was wrong” is just another way to say “but now I’m right”. You will gain extra respect on this site from noticing your own mistakes as well.) or refute the arguments against your claim (or ask for clarification or things along those lines). If you can’t handle doing either of those then tap out of the conversation. But seriously, taking up everyone’s time with a counter-intuitive claim and then laughing it off when people try to engage you seriously is extremely rude and a waste of everyone’s time, including yours.
You’re completely right. I retract my remark.
And then sometimes I’m reminded why I love this site. Only on LessWrong does a (well-founded) rant about bad form or habits actually end up accomplishing the original goal.
Only on LessWrong would I hope to never see a statement that begins, ‘Only on LessWrong’.