I find that people sometimes misread my intent (perhaps I am not clear enough) or use words in a different way to me. So continuing the discussion wouldn’t increase their knowledge of the world apart from the little bit that refers to me, which doesn’t seem worthwhile.
I feel a forum where no argument is unresolved would work better if there was a way of splitting people into groups with different view points. Then anyone from that group could make arguments on its behalf.
On the other hand, I often find that it is because people have assumed I am arguing on behalf of a specific group that they don’t understand me. I quickly lose patience in such situations.
Doesn’t the group dynamics depend on how the people are split up? I’m thinking of something along the lines of agreeing with a comment and the list of people that agree with a comment being considered one team. In comments down that thread anyone on the top-level post gets associated with posts by that team, although they could disassociate themselves from certain messages. Groups would be tenuous and transient. You could even allow wiki like editing of comments by members of the same group.
I’m interested in forms of discussion that will scale up (with more than the tens of active participants we have at the moment), and also leave something useful for people to read later on.
I would like to pronounce to one and all that I am now and always will be my own team. Other people or teams thereof may be considered allies of my team and warrant reciprocation when that they agree with me or, while disagreeing, do so respectfully.
My team hereby places itself in opposition to all attempts to formalize party systems or official groupings transient or otherwise. Human instincts provide this by default and such dynamics are evident and healthily so on LessWrong.com already.
The system I proposed wasn’t for lesswrong. It was for the hypothetical place where no argument can be left unanswered.
You don’t like teams I get it. Feel free to suggest a system that encourages people to counter all points they don’t agree with, with the following properties
1) Doesn’t create too much noise
2) Allows people to see all current open points that they may be interested in countering, i.e. serves the equivalent purpose of replies in lesswrong, but also allows people to see other peoples relevant orphaned arguments.
I quite like your point, now that you put it minus the rigidity. Your argument, first looked like what SilasBarta said. But I agree with you on trying to make this debating smarter.
There is certainly scope to improve the way comments are structured at lesswrong. May be showing who voted up a comment would be a good start. Then we can move to associating certain messages with a group of people who agree to that point. And yes, it is important to maintain flexibility while making these changes.
Given that we’re not supposed to be using voting to express agreement or disagreement, I propose that a second voting system should be put in place if we go this route.
we’re not supposed to be using voting to express agreement or disagreement
While I encouraged the use of voting mechanisms to in a more nuanced manner than mere agreement I am not willing to accept shame or guilt for doing so on occasion. Mostly because to do so would be a recipe for bitterness and contempt. Human instincts for hypocrisy and self deception being what they are people will vote based on disagreement even if they happen to do cry foul or sulk if others reciprocate.
For my part a vote means “I would like to see more posts similar to this one”. This is not quite the nash equilibrium of “this vote best serves my social agenda” which does come close to being the most useful model of the dynamics at times.Nevertheless, the “I want more of this” is a voting attitude which can be maintained with little frustration and serves to enable precisely mechanism that karma systems are intended for.
I propose that a second voting system should be put in place if we go this route.
My tangent aside, I totally agree with your conclusion and for more or less the same reason.
No disagreement: We’re strongly enough wired, I think, to use a simple voting system like this one in a particular way that a strong but unenforceable social norm against doing so won’t do anything but cause unnecessary emotional turmoil. On the other hand, the existing weak norm is useful and relevant, which is why I tried to evoke it—obviously not clearly enough, though.
You can just view a person’s profile and see their past posts. That way you can check quickly what side of a previous argument they argued.
Given that people can change their minds over time, and rationalists especially are likely to do so as data and evidence mounts, having a readily visible viewpoint-signature strikes me as a bad idea.
Offline of course, this happens all the time. For instance, if women are most likely to support X, so a female entering a debate is probably supporting X.
I’m not sure what you are responding to here. I don’t want to give people a label of non-foom believer or whatever. That would be one way of splitting people into groups but not the way I was thinking of.
I find that people sometimes misread my intent (perhaps I am not clear enough) or use words in a different way to me. So continuing the discussion wouldn’t increase their knowledge of the world apart from the little bit that refers to me, which doesn’t seem worthwhile.
I feel a forum where no argument is unresolved would work better if there was a way of splitting people into groups with different view points. Then anyone from that group could make arguments on its behalf.
On the other hand, I often find that it is because people have assumed I am arguing on behalf of a specific group that they don’t understand me. I quickly lose patience in such situations.
I was thinking more for a way to self-identify as supporting certain statements.
Like with what wedrifid said, that sounds like a recipe for tribalism (“refute the Xers!”) and misclassification of others’ beliefs.
If someone else addresses an argument the same way you would have, then just say so if you want to make clear that that’s your position.
Doesn’t the group dynamics depend on how the people are split up? I’m thinking of something along the lines of agreeing with a comment and the list of people that agree with a comment being considered one team. In comments down that thread anyone on the top-level post gets associated with posts by that team, although they could disassociate themselves from certain messages. Groups would be tenuous and transient. You could even allow wiki like editing of comments by members of the same group.
I’m interested in forms of discussion that will scale up (with more than the tens of active participants we have at the moment), and also leave something useful for people to read later on.
I would like to pronounce to one and all that I am now and always will be my own team. Other people or teams thereof may be considered allies of my team and warrant reciprocation when that they agree with me or, while disagreeing, do so respectfully.
My team hereby places itself in opposition to all attempts to formalize party systems or official groupings transient or otherwise. Human instincts provide this by default and such dynamics are evident and healthily so on LessWrong.com already.
The system I proposed wasn’t for lesswrong. It was for the hypothetical place where no argument can be left unanswered.
You don’t like teams I get it. Feel free to suggest a system that encourages people to counter all points they don’t agree with, with the following properties
1) Doesn’t create too much noise
2) Allows people to see all current open points that they may be interested in countering, i.e. serves the equivalent purpose of replies in lesswrong, but also allows people to see other peoples relevant orphaned arguments.
3) Doesn’t require too much time.
I quite like your point, now that you put it minus the rigidity. Your argument, first looked like what SilasBarta said. But I agree with you on trying to make this debating smarter.
There is certainly scope to improve the way comments are structured at lesswrong. May be showing who voted up a comment would be a good start. Then we can move to associating certain messages with a group of people who agree to that point. And yes, it is important to maintain flexibility while making these changes.
Given that we’re not supposed to be using voting to express agreement or disagreement, I propose that a second voting system should be put in place if we go this route.
While I encouraged the use of voting mechanisms to in a more nuanced manner than mere agreement I am not willing to accept shame or guilt for doing so on occasion. Mostly because to do so would be a recipe for bitterness and contempt. Human instincts for hypocrisy and self deception being what they are people will vote based on disagreement even if they happen to do cry foul or sulk if others reciprocate.
For my part a vote means “I would like to see more posts similar to this one”. This is not quite the nash equilibrium of “this vote best serves my social agenda” which does come close to being the most useful model of the dynamics at times.Nevertheless, the “I want more of this” is a voting attitude which can be maintained with little frustration and serves to enable precisely mechanism that karma systems are intended for.
My tangent aside, I totally agree with your conclusion and for more or less the same reason.
No disagreement: We’re strongly enough wired, I think, to use a simple voting system like this one in a particular way that a strong but unenforceable social norm against doing so won’t do anything but cause unnecessary emotional turmoil. On the other hand, the existing weak norm is useful and relevant, which is why I tried to evoke it—obviously not clearly enough, though.
You can just view a person’s profile and see their past posts. That way you can check quickly what side of a previous argument they argued.
Given that people can change their minds over time, and rationalists especially are likely to do so as data and evidence mounts, having a readily visible viewpoint-signature strikes me as a bad idea.
Offline of course, this happens all the time. For instance, if women are most likely to support X, so a female entering a debate is probably supporting X.
I’m not sure what you are responding to here. I don’t want to give people a label of non-foom believer or whatever. That would be one way of splitting people into groups but not the way I was thinking of.