Roko was arguing somewhat casually but I don’t think he is actually reasoning casually. Its fine to discourage this type of comment with a downvote, but starting your reply with the words “Logical fallacy” is unnecessarily harsh in my opinion.
Roko’s comment seems to contain a logical fallacy. While there might be a reason to make the distinction between the reasoning going on in Roko’s argument and the reasoning going on in Roko’s head, I have no access to the latter and so must evaluate the former. I don’t see what’s wrong with Annoyance pointing that out, and calling a fallacious argument fallacious is hardly ‘harsh’; at least, it’s no harsher than is called for.
While there might be a reason to make the distinction between the reasoning going on in Roko’s argument and the reasoning going on in Roko’s head, I have no access to the latter and so must evaluate the former.
Even if you had access to the latter, that has no bearing on your evaluation of the former. It’s the explicit claims that we’re looking at, the ones that are actually communicated, not what the person meant inside their head or what we think they might mean.
I encourage efforts to maintain high standards of reasoning, and fairly explicit reasoning. In evaluating harshness, we need to strike a balance between at least three goals: 1. clarity of thought, 2. creating proper incentives for quality contributions which requires punishing mistakes / undesirable contributions, and 3. creating a friendly and respectful atmosphere.
For the record, calling Annoyance’s comment, “unnecessarily harsh” was meant to be a minor criticism. There are many factors to consider, in this case I would have suggested that Annoyance replace “Logical fallacy” with “Nitpick.” Also see my new comment for Annoyance.
Roko was arguing somewhat casually but I don’t think he is actually reasoning casually. Its fine to discourage this type of comment with a downvote, but starting your reply with the words “Logical fallacy” is unnecessarily harsh in my opinion.
Roko’s comment seems to contain a logical fallacy. While there might be a reason to make the distinction between the reasoning going on in Roko’s argument and the reasoning going on in Roko’s head, I have no access to the latter and so must evaluate the former. I don’t see what’s wrong with Annoyance pointing that out, and calling a fallacious argument fallacious is hardly ‘harsh’; at least, it’s no harsher than is called for.
Even if you had access to the latter, that has no bearing on your evaluation of the former. It’s the explicit claims that we’re looking at, the ones that are actually communicated, not what the person meant inside their head or what we think they might mean.
I encourage efforts to maintain high standards of reasoning, and fairly explicit reasoning. In evaluating harshness, we need to strike a balance between at least three goals: 1. clarity of thought, 2. creating proper incentives for quality contributions which requires punishing mistakes / undesirable contributions, and 3. creating a friendly and respectful atmosphere.
For the record, calling Annoyance’s comment, “unnecessarily harsh” was meant to be a minor criticism. There are many factors to consider, in this case I would have suggested that Annoyance replace “Logical fallacy” with “Nitpick.” Also see my new comment for Annoyance.