In other words, you have a hypothesis that the purpose of a “LessWrong”-type site is to provide a space for debate, and the data disagrees with your hypothesis. Whereupon you’ve decided to challenge the data...
I’m a relative newcomer to LW, having stumbled across it a couple months ago. Take it from this newbie: it’s entirely unclear at the start what you are supposed to do in top-level posts and comments. This community operates on norms that (as far as I could tell) are tacit rather than explicit, and the post above suggests that these norms are unclear to the community itself.
For instance, at one point I thought that comments provided an opportunity for readers to offer constructive feedback to authors. In this view, a comment isn’t intended to signal agreement or disagreement; rather its job is to help the author improve his or her exposition of the point they wanted to make, to be as clear, informative and convincing as possible.
My advice: authors of top-level posts could clarify what kind of response they expect (constructive feedback, agreement/disagreement, having their mistakes pointed out and corrected, elaboration of their theses by people who agree, etc.). Authors would then take responsibility for declaring cloture of this process, if appropriate.
In other words, you have a hypothesis that the purpose of a “LessWrong”-type site is to provide a space for debate, and the data disagrees with your hypothesis. Whereupon you’ve decided to challenge the data...
That doesn’t seem like a valid interpretation of my post. Less Wrong is obviously a place for debate, as well as other things. My point is that that the form of the debate isn’t as optimal as I think it could be.
My advice: authors of top-level posts could clarify what kind of response they expect (constructive feedback, agreement/disagreement, having their mistakes pointed out and corrected, elaboration of their theses by people who agree, etc.).
Why shouldn’t comments do all of those things? Can you give an example of a situation where an author might want to rule out one of those categories of comments?
Perhaps you misinterpreted my suggestion as trying to turn Less Wrong into a place only for debate. That’s certainly not my intention.
Yes, observations will confirm that debate happens here.
However to say that it is a forum intended to support debate is a different matter, and there’s nothing “obvious” about that. Where is the forum’s charter ? The most available place to look for it is the “About” page.
What content guidelines does that page offer ? “We suggest submitting links with a short description.” That is hardly an encouragement to debate.
More generally, I respectfully submit that the “About” page, as written, is more misleading than helpful as to the type of top-level posts that will be appreciated by the LW audience, and that newbies could be given more appropriate guidance. If you (I mean you-the-LW-community, not you-Wei) wanted posters and commenters to abide by certain norms, you could probably improve your results by setting out those norms explicitly in the “About” page.
Can you give an example of a situation where an author might want to rule out one of those categories of comments?
Yes. If I submit a “fiction” type post, then the feedback I want is going to be one particular kind (in my case, I would want to know how readers have interpreted my writing, so that I can improve the writing to convey a more appropriate message). If I submit a post to further my own learning, I’m not interested in agreement or disagreement, I’m interested in new ideas and pointers to information. If I submit a post to put together a virtual study group to study Jaynes’ book, the response I want is yet again dfferent.
Generally, the author knows better than commenters what kind of feedback is appropriate, because the author is best judge of their own intent. So it seems more effective to leave it up to the author to encourage a certain type of comment, seek cloture or not, and recognize cloture when it has occurred.
However to say that it is a forum intended to support debate is a different matter, and there’s nothing “obvious” about that.
Well, the motto of this blog (right in the header graphic) is “refining the art of human rationality”. How could we possibly do that without debate and argument?
“We suggest submitting links with a short description.”
I think the intended meaning of this sentence is “If you submit a link, then please include a short description.” and not “We most welcome submissions that consist of a link with a short description.” This should probably be clarified.
Generally, the author knows better than commenters what kind of feedback is appropriate, because the author is best judge of their own intent.
I disagree, because the comments are visible not just to the author, but to other readers as well, and are often intended more for the benefit of other readers than for the author. Debates often occur in the comments between persons who are not the post author, and I think those debates should be supported as well.
I hope I’m not crossing some LW norm by posting too many comments (I remember some guideline to this effect from the period when these discussions happened on OB), but anyway, here goes.
Well, the motto of this blog (right in the header graphic) is “refining the art of human rationality”. How could we possibly do that without debate and argument?
I can think of at least two ways to achieve this, other than debate and argument. I will list them below, rot13′d. What I would like you to do is to think of two by yourself before reading mine.
My intent in setting you this challenge is to show that “How could we possibly...” questions are a habit best repressed, as they tend to be rhetorical questions. I strongly suspect you can think of other ways yourself, and if you went to that effort you would agree with me that “obvious” doesn’t apply.
Additionally, this may show that debate could be structured in ways different (and possibly more effective) than “I (dis)agree because X” statements.
Bar jnl gb ersvar gur neg bs engvbanyvgl vf gb fghql eryrinag grkgf. Guvf erdhverf ab qrongr be nethzrag, whfg chggvat gbtrgure n tebhc bs yrnearef, vqrnyyl jvgu fbzrbar (n grnpure be zber nqinaprq fghqrag) jub pna uryc gurz bire qvssvphyg gbcvpf be rkrepvfrf.
Nabgure jnl gb ersvar gur neg bs engvbanyvgl vf gb qrivfr tnzrf be rkcrevragvny fvzhyngvbaf juvpu punyyratr gur cynlref’ fxvyyf va engvbanyvgl. Ab qrongr be nethzrag vf gura erdhverq, va snpg nethzragf jvyy or frggyrq abg ireonyyl ohg ol ybbxvat ng zrnfhenoyr bhgpbzrf.
I agree that “debate” can be useful. However, the form it typically takes in online fora can be quite distorted. To take one example, we are both using selective quoting of each other’s comments. This selection is an obvious source of bias if we aren’t careful.
So, I agree with your points (and the original post) in some respects: a) that norms and standards of behaviour can make debate more useful than it usually is, and b) that the LW “welcome” pages could be clarified to convey existing norms better.
My point about authors should also be clarified: “the author knows better than commenters what kind of feedback the author wants”. That is why I think authors are responsible for framing and moderating discussion arising from their post.
This generalizes to commenters: if you write a comment saying “I disagree, because X” you know better than anyone else what your aim is in doing that: helping the author improve their post, or starting a debate aiming at some kind of resolution, or perhaps signaling the extent of your knowledge, or signaling your feelings about the author or about some other commenter. If those aims are unstated, you’re confusing the authors and possibly other commenters.
(One possible reason people may have for choosing the “Ignore” option, by the way, is that a discussion without explicit framing and moderation becomes overly confusing, and the best rational use of their time is to simply walk away from it.)
Therefore, it seems to me, both authors and commenters are better served by the author’s framing the discussion. If the commenters want to have a debate and that isn’t what the original author wanted, all they have to do is write a new top-level post.
It should be clear that I don’t think debate is the only way to refine human rationality (or I wouldn’t have posted a piece of fiction), but I can’t think of anything that can replace the essential function that debate serves, in clarifying people’s positions and arguments, getting them to reassess in light of new information, and possibly reaching a consensus that updates on all relevant information. We’re certainly not at a point where we already know what rationality is, and the only remaining task is for everyone to learn how to practice it.
I agree with you that online debates can easily become distorted due to the nature of the medium, and I think we should try to find ways to reduce that effect. I submit that one of these distorting effects is how easy it is to ignore a contrary argument. (I think it’s probably even easier to ignore contrary arguments in academia, and we should try to fix that as well, although that’s a much more difficult job.)
If the commenters want to have a debate and that isn’t what the original author wanted, all they have to do is write a new top-level post.
I still don’t like this idea (of having the author moderate the discussion), but others might, and it seems largely independent of my suggestion of a disagreement status indicator. You should probably propose this in a more prominent place and get other people’s feedback.
In other words, you have a hypothesis that the purpose of a “LessWrong”-type site is to provide a space for debate, and the data disagrees with your hypothesis. Whereupon you’ve decided to challenge the data...
I’m a relative newcomer to LW, having stumbled across it a couple months ago. Take it from this newbie: it’s entirely unclear at the start what you are supposed to do in top-level posts and comments. This community operates on norms that (as far as I could tell) are tacit rather than explicit, and the post above suggests that these norms are unclear to the community itself.
For instance, at one point I thought that comments provided an opportunity for readers to offer constructive feedback to authors. In this view, a comment isn’t intended to signal agreement or disagreement; rather its job is to help the author improve his or her exposition of the point they wanted to make, to be as clear, informative and convincing as possible.
My advice: authors of top-level posts could clarify what kind of response they expect (constructive feedback, agreement/disagreement, having their mistakes pointed out and corrected, elaboration of their theses by people who agree, etc.). Authors would then take responsibility for declaring cloture of this process, if appropriate.
That doesn’t seem like a valid interpretation of my post. Less Wrong is obviously a place for debate, as well as other things. My point is that that the form of the debate isn’t as optimal as I think it could be.
Why shouldn’t comments do all of those things? Can you give an example of a situation where an author might want to rule out one of those categories of comments?
Perhaps you misinterpreted my suggestion as trying to turn Less Wrong into a place only for debate. That’s certainly not my intention.
Yes, observations will confirm that debate happens here.
However to say that it is a forum intended to support debate is a different matter, and there’s nothing “obvious” about that. Where is the forum’s charter ? The most available place to look for it is the “About” page.
What content guidelines does that page offer ? “We suggest submitting links with a short description.” That is hardly an encouragement to debate.
More generally, I respectfully submit that the “About” page, as written, is more misleading than helpful as to the type of top-level posts that will be appreciated by the LW audience, and that newbies could be given more appropriate guidance. If you (I mean you-the-LW-community, not you-Wei) wanted posters and commenters to abide by certain norms, you could probably improve your results by setting out those norms explicitly in the “About” page.
Yes. If I submit a “fiction” type post, then the feedback I want is going to be one particular kind (in my case, I would want to know how readers have interpreted my writing, so that I can improve the writing to convey a more appropriate message). If I submit a post to further my own learning, I’m not interested in agreement or disagreement, I’m interested in new ideas and pointers to information. If I submit a post to put together a virtual study group to study Jaynes’ book, the response I want is yet again dfferent.
Generally, the author knows better than commenters what kind of feedback is appropriate, because the author is best judge of their own intent. So it seems more effective to leave it up to the author to encourage a certain type of comment, seek cloture or not, and recognize cloture when it has occurred.
Well, the motto of this blog (right in the header graphic) is “refining the art of human rationality”. How could we possibly do that without debate and argument?
I think the intended meaning of this sentence is “If you submit a link, then please include a short description.” and not “We most welcome submissions that consist of a link with a short description.” This should probably be clarified.
I disagree, because the comments are visible not just to the author, but to other readers as well, and are often intended more for the benefit of other readers than for the author. Debates often occur in the comments between persons who are not the post author, and I think those debates should be supported as well.
I hope I’m not crossing some LW norm by posting too many comments (I remember some guideline to this effect from the period when these discussions happened on OB), but anyway, here goes.
I can think of at least two ways to achieve this, other than debate and argument. I will list them below, rot13′d. What I would like you to do is to think of two by yourself before reading mine.
My intent in setting you this challenge is to show that “How could we possibly...” questions are a habit best repressed, as they tend to be rhetorical questions. I strongly suspect you can think of other ways yourself, and if you went to that effort you would agree with me that “obvious” doesn’t apply.
Additionally, this may show that debate could be structured in ways different (and possibly more effective) than “I (dis)agree because X” statements.
Bar jnl gb ersvar gur neg bs engvbanyvgl vf gb fghql eryrinag grkgf. Guvf erdhverf ab qrongr be nethzrag, whfg chggvat gbtrgure n tebhc bs yrnearef, vqrnyyl jvgu fbzrbar (n grnpure be zber nqinaprq fghqrag) jub pna uryc gurz bire qvssvphyg gbcvpf be rkrepvfrf.
Nabgure jnl gb ersvar gur neg bs engvbanyvgl vf gb qrivfr tnzrf be rkcrevragvny fvzhyngvbaf juvpu punyyratr gur cynlref’ fxvyyf va engvbanyvgl. Ab qrongr be nethzrag vf gura erdhverq, va snpg nethzragf jvyy or frggyrq abg ireonyyl ohg ol ybbxvat ng zrnfhenoyr bhgpbzrf.
I agree that “debate” can be useful. However, the form it typically takes in online fora can be quite distorted. To take one example, we are both using selective quoting of each other’s comments. This selection is an obvious source of bias if we aren’t careful.
So, I agree with your points (and the original post) in some respects: a) that norms and standards of behaviour can make debate more useful than it usually is, and b) that the LW “welcome” pages could be clarified to convey existing norms better.
My point about authors should also be clarified: “the author knows better than commenters what kind of feedback the author wants”. That is why I think authors are responsible for framing and moderating discussion arising from their post.
This generalizes to commenters: if you write a comment saying “I disagree, because X” you know better than anyone else what your aim is in doing that: helping the author improve their post, or starting a debate aiming at some kind of resolution, or perhaps signaling the extent of your knowledge, or signaling your feelings about the author or about some other commenter. If those aims are unstated, you’re confusing the authors and possibly other commenters.
(One possible reason people may have for choosing the “Ignore” option, by the way, is that a discussion without explicit framing and moderation becomes overly confusing, and the best rational use of their time is to simply walk away from it.)
Therefore, it seems to me, both authors and commenters are better served by the author’s framing the discussion. If the commenters want to have a debate and that isn’t what the original author wanted, all they have to do is write a new top-level post.
It should be clear that I don’t think debate is the only way to refine human rationality (or I wouldn’t have posted a piece of fiction), but I can’t think of anything that can replace the essential function that debate serves, in clarifying people’s positions and arguments, getting them to reassess in light of new information, and possibly reaching a consensus that updates on all relevant information. We’re certainly not at a point where we already know what rationality is, and the only remaining task is for everyone to learn how to practice it.
I agree with you that online debates can easily become distorted due to the nature of the medium, and I think we should try to find ways to reduce that effect. I submit that one of these distorting effects is how easy it is to ignore a contrary argument. (I think it’s probably even easier to ignore contrary arguments in academia, and we should try to fix that as well, although that’s a much more difficult job.)
I still don’t like this idea (of having the author moderate the discussion), but others might, and it seems largely independent of my suggestion of a disagreement status indicator. You should probably propose this in a more prominent place and get other people’s feedback.
As I still think of myself as a newbie here, I’ll wait and observe a little while first, but thanks for the encouragement.