You caught me—introspecting, I think the grandparent was written in a spirit of semi-deliberate irony. (“Semi” because it just felt like the “right” thing to say there; I don’t think I put a lot of effort into modeling how various readers would interpret it.)
Roland is speculating that the real reason for intentionally incomplete explanations in the handbook is different from the stated reason, and I offered a particularly blunt phrasing (“we don’t want to undercut our core product”) of the hypothesized true reason, and suggested that that’s what the handbook would have said in that case. I think I anticipated that a lot of readers would find my proposal intuitively preposterous: “everyone knows” that no one would matter-of-factly report such a self-interested rationale (especially when writing on behalf of an organization, rather than admitting a vice among friends). That’s why the earlierscenesinthe 2009 film The Invention of Lying, or your post “Act of Charity”, are (typically) experienced as absurdist comedy rather than an inspiring and heartwarming portrayal of a more truthful world.
But it shouldn’t be absurd for the stated reason and the real reason to be the same! Particularly for an organization like CfAR which is specifically about advancing the art of rationality. And, I don’t know—I think sometimes I talk in a way that makes me seem more politically naïve than I actually am, because I feel as if the “naïve” attitude is in some way normative? (“You really think someone would do that? Just go on the internet and tell lies?”) Arguably this is somewhat ironic (being deceptive about your ability to detect deception is probably not actually the same thing as honesty), but I haven’t heretofore analyzed this behavioral pattern of mine in enough detail to potentially decide to stop doing it??
I think another factor might be that I feel guilty about being “mean” to CfAR in the great-great-great grandparent comment? (CfAR isn’t a person and doesn’t have feelings, but my friend who works there is and does.) Such that maybe the emotional need to signal that I’m still fundamentally loyal to the “mainstream rationality” tribe (despite the underlying background situation where I’ve been collaborating with you and Ben and Michael to discuss what you see as fatal deficits of integrity in “the community” as presently organized) interacted with my preëxisting tendency towards semi-performative naiveté in a way that resulted in me writing a bad blog comment? It’s a good thing you were here to hold me to account for it!
I thought your comment was fine and the irony was obvious, but this kind of misunderstanding can be easily avoided by making the straightforward reading more boring, like so:
Given that CfAR is an organization which is specifically about seeking truth, one could safely assume that if the actual reason were “Many of the explanations here are intentionally approximate or incomplete because we predict that this handbook will be leaked and we don’t want to undercut our core product,” then the handbook would have just said that. To do otherwise would be to call the whole premise into question!
Yeah, I would have expected Jessica to get it, except that I suspect she’s also executing a strategy of habitual Socratic irony (but without my additional innovation of immediately backing down and unpacking the intent when challenged), which doesn’t work when both sides of a conversation are doing it.
I actually didn’t get it. I was confused but I didn’t consciously generate the hypothesis that it was ironic.
I think I don’t share the background assumption that it is overwhelmingly obvious that CFAR wouldn’t tell the truth about this in their handbook. I also reflectively endorse a policy of calling out things that could easily be mistaken for sincere (though not obvious sarcasm), in order to ensure common knowledge.
Quick note for your model of how people interpret various kinds of writing, my initial read of your comment was to put a 60% probability on “Zack is currently undergoing a pendulum swing in the direction away from calling people out on lying, and overcompensating.” (which was wrong and/or overconfident on my part)
You caught me—introspecting, I think the grandparent was written in a spirit of semi-deliberate irony. (“Semi” because it just felt like the “right” thing to say there; I don’t think I put a lot of effort into modeling how various readers would interpret it.)
Roland is speculating that the real reason for intentionally incomplete explanations in the handbook is different from the stated reason, and I offered a particularly blunt phrasing (“we don’t want to undercut our core product”) of the hypothesized true reason, and suggested that that’s what the handbook would have said in that case. I think I anticipated that a lot of readers would find my proposal intuitively preposterous: “everyone knows” that no one would matter-of-factly report such a self-interested rationale (especially when writing on behalf of an organization, rather than admitting a vice among friends). That’s why the earlier scenes in the 2009 film The Invention of Lying, or your post “Act of Charity”, are (typically) experienced as absurdist comedy rather than an inspiring and heartwarming portrayal of a more truthful world.
But it shouldn’t be absurd for the stated reason and the real reason to be the same! Particularly for an organization like CfAR which is specifically about advancing the art of rationality. And, I don’t know—I think sometimes I talk in a way that makes me seem more politically naïve than I actually am, because I feel as if the “naïve” attitude is in some way normative? (“You really think someone would do that? Just go on the internet and tell lies?”) Arguably this is somewhat ironic (being deceptive about your ability to detect deception is probably not actually the same thing as honesty), but I haven’t heretofore analyzed this behavioral pattern of mine in enough detail to potentially decide to stop doing it??
I think another factor might be that I feel guilty about being “mean” to CfAR in the great-great-great grandparent comment? (CfAR isn’t a person and doesn’t have feelings, but my friend who works there is and does.) Such that maybe the emotional need to signal that I’m still fundamentally loyal to the “mainstream rationality” tribe (despite the underlying background situation where I’ve been collaborating with you and Ben and Michael to discuss what you see as fatal deficits of integrity in “the community” as presently organized) interacted with my preëxisting tendency towards semi-performative naiveté in a way that resulted in me writing a bad blog comment? It’s a good thing you were here to hold me to account for it!
I thought your comment was fine and the irony was obvious, but this kind of misunderstanding can be easily avoided by making the straightforward reading more boring, like so:
Yeah, I would have expected Jessica to get it, except that I suspect she’s also executing a strategy of habitual Socratic irony (but without my additional innovation of immediately backing down and unpacking the intent when challenged), which doesn’t work when both sides of a conversation are doing it.
I actually didn’t get it. I was confused but I didn’t consciously generate the hypothesis that it was ironic.
I think I don’t share the background assumption that it is overwhelmingly obvious that CFAR wouldn’t tell the truth about this in their handbook. I also reflectively endorse a policy of calling out things that could easily be mistaken for sincere (though not obvious sarcasm), in order to ensure common knowledge.
Quick note for your model of how people interpret various kinds of writing, my initial read of your comment was to put a 60% probability on “Zack is currently undergoing a pendulum swing in the direction away from calling people out on lying, and overcompensating.” (which was wrong and/or overconfident on my part)