I’m in a similar situation—I comment (sometimes) on reddit and HNews, and have occasionally posted a few sentences to OB, but I am much less likely to comment here. The high quality of the posts and comments leads me to agonize a bit overmuch about every part of a comment, and sometimes I will write, edit, and rewrite a comment before deciding to just not comment at all. I, too, often feel I would not be contributing anything original.
(I should also note in this comment that I am male.)
Well, I’m female and I agree with what you say. I often get the feeling that I’m barely well-read enough to follow a conversation here, and the comments I make are only on side-issues, or ones that I have experience of from “the outside” (eg IT or on being female).
I’ve made a few witty quips and minor points elsewhere… but they really aren’t part of a full discussion.
I get the feeling that I am a complete and total novice (not a problem), and that I need to have at least read all the way through all the sequences (million words or thereabouts wasn’t it?) before I can even get around a lot of the nuances brought up by the other commenters… and if I try posting before then, I’ll get it wrong, get some rather swift kicks in the premises (which are a downer even if well-intended) and feel less likely to stick my neck out the next time...
there’s an awfully steep learning curve here, and it feels very hard to break in unless you’re still suffering from serious overconfidence bias ;)
I lurked on lesswrong for about a year, because I used to be worried about losing karma and looking like an idiot. I guess I got used to it after enough terrific failures. If you want to appear consistently intelligent, this is a very hard site to do it on (even after you do the research)
I feel absolutely the same way but contribute it partly to having english as only second language. Although I am told to have a better grasp of it than most of my english-speaking peers, the high-level-concepts and language need a lot more time, and formulating original, coherent answers is even harder. I am male.
I’m in a similar situation—I comment (sometimes) on reddit and HNews, and have occasionally posted a few sentences to OB, but I am much less likely to comment here. The high quality of the posts and comments leads me to agonize a bit overmuch about every part of a comment, and sometimes I will write, edit, and rewrite a comment before deciding to just not comment at all. I, too, often feel I would not be contributing anything original.
(I should also note in this comment that I am male.)
Well, I’m female and I agree with what you say. I often get the feeling that I’m barely well-read enough to follow a conversation here, and the comments I make are only on side-issues, or ones that I have experience of from “the outside” (eg IT or on being female).
I’ve made a few witty quips and minor points elsewhere… but they really aren’t part of a full discussion.
I get the feeling that I am a complete and total novice (not a problem), and that I need to have at least read all the way through all the sequences (million words or thereabouts wasn’t it?) before I can even get around a lot of the nuances brought up by the other commenters… and if I try posting before then, I’ll get it wrong, get some rather swift kicks in the premises (which are a downer even if well-intended) and feel less likely to stick my neck out the next time...
there’s an awfully steep learning curve here, and it feels very hard to break in unless you’re still suffering from serious overconfidence bias ;)
I lurked on lesswrong for about a year, because I used to be worried about losing karma and looking like an idiot. I guess I got used to it after enough terrific failures. If you want to appear consistently intelligent, this is a very hard site to do it on (even after you do the research)
I feel absolutely the same way but contribute it partly to having english as only second language. Although I am told to have a better grasp of it than most of my english-speaking peers, the high-level-concepts and language need a lot more time, and formulating original, coherent answers is even harder. I am male.