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Adversarial Collaboration

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Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#191

Post by nyokodo »

vanderZwan wrote: post #188
P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would immediately end a discussion if I were asked that question. If you want to dismiss me by trying to imply my opinion is driven by a want of something other than accuracy with reality, I can find other people to spend my time with.

That's... an interesting interpretation of what I said, because my motivation is the opposite. I had not considered it could come across as dismissive, thank you for pointing that out. However, when I ask this it is not to dismiss someone, it's because if I understand why something is important to them I am better at arguing in good faith without accidentally being dismissive of what matters to them. Which helps with…

> That's... an interesting interpretation of what I said

In a non-verbal exchange this choice of an explicit pause followed by the use of the phrase "interesting interpretation" could also be misconstrued as an underhanded compliment/sarcasm further undermining your alleged intention.

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#192

Post by deadpannini »

P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #187
deadpannini wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all beside the point at hand, but I suppose it's still about epistemology, so I'd like to stand up for my old position, even though I understand it looks foolish in retrospect. The fact that so much was unknown was part of the reason I thought testing might have a different effect than the flu. Well into the pandemic, the vast majority of people feared COVID much more than the flu, so it seemed they would be…

Your position looked foolish then. Consider that maybe you don't do well in situations without perfect information and take that into account in the future. The two most authoritarian countries on this earth (china and North Korea) were not able to get covid "to near zero". China literally had tanks rolling up and down their streets to enforce said curfew. The idea that somehow the US (or similar western countries) w…

I think you should perhaps cool down.

1) I am admitting that I was wrong and updated. That includes updating on my thought process, just like you are so ardently suggesting.

2) Ninety percent of your assumptions about me are wrong. I'm not sure what you're accusing me of, or what "many people were RIGHT" about.

> There's a canyon of difference between being wrong because you just didn't know and being wrong because the entire platform you were basing it on turned out to be wrong.

What is the "platform" I was basing it on?

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#193

Post by bombcar »

deadpannini wrote: post #192
P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your position looked foolish then. Consider that maybe you don't do well in situations without perfect information and take that into account in the future. The two most authoritarian countries on this earth (china and North Korea) were not able to get covid "to near zero". China literally had tanks rolling up and down their streets to enforce said curfew. The idea that somehow the US (or similar western countries) w…

I think you should perhaps cool down. 1) I am admitting that I was wrong and updated. That includes updating on my thought process, just like you are so ardently suggesting. 2) Ninety percent of your assumptions about me are wrong. I'm not sure what you're accusing me of, or what "many people were RIGHT" about. > There's a canyon of difference between being wrong because you just didn't know and being wrong because t…

If I were to be charitable to the post you're replying to, they're trying to show that your takeaway is wrong - instead of saying you changed your mind based on new evidence you should instead say "I was wrong to think I had the knowledge, training, or skills to make a decision and use that decision to influence others".

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#194

Post by nyokodo »

kmill wrote: post #185
P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would immediately end a discussion if I were asked that question. If you want to dismiss me by trying to imply my opinion is driven by a want of something other than accuracy with reality, I can find other people to spend my time with.

Where are you getting that they'd want to "dismiss you?" Smart and well-informed people can come to different interpretations of reality that are accurate in their own ways. It's interesting to know what sorts of consequences to such interpretations a person finds to be important for their worldview. Once we're talking about dismissing someone, we've long left the realm of good-faith discussion, which was assumed in…

> Where are you getting that they'd want to "dismiss you?"

Because that kind of information is used with a common rhetorical tactic called ad hominem.

> Once we're talking about dismissing someone, we've long left the realm of good-faith discussion, which was assumed in the situation you're responding to.

Assuming good faith is necessary and good for any kind of productive debate but it's not necessarily or need be accompanied by the trust necessary to answer personal questions. That kind of trust is developed over time with many people. Perhaps you are more trusting by default, all power to you, but it's naive to assume everyone ought to react the same way you do.

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#195

Post by suoduandao2 »

jasonzemos wrote: post #80
leaflets2 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a book called How to Win Friends and Influence People -- pay attention to the order :-) first become a group member, in the eyes of the other person, and then there's a chance he/she will be open to something new > almost not worth listening to their arguments At the same time, their arguments are likely the-least-dumb / most-intelligent things they've been able to come up with, to rationalize their group's i…

You make it sound so simple. Becoming a group member in this context means corrupting oneself. You are what you do. You are the last action you take. If you deceive the other externally while holding different positions internally, you are those external positions, and the internal is the deception. Those that lie to themselves this way have nothing to offer the group and will certainly never "make a change from the…

I don't see it that way - I think of it as a linguistic challenge. Every group's thoughts are limited by the language the group adopts. Learning a group's language makes one more prone to think as that group does, but it also allows one to keep those ideas at arm's length. And if an idea is difficult to communicate in a group's language, that doesn't make it deceptive to hold it, especially if one makes good-faith attempts to communicate important ideas using the group's language.

And while it is true that some groups hold language and ideas that are both infectious and dangerous, arms-length exposure to many such ideas is much less likely to result in pathology than close exposure to one. Refusing to learn an enemy tribe's language is an uninformed bet that you lucked into the best tribe by default.

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#196

Post by dredmorbius »

dang wrote: post #189
dredmorbius wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point. Has robot_head's comment been downweighted at all independent of member votes? If so, that would also be inappropriate.

It hasn't, but it easily could be and that would be standard HN moderation. We downweight unsubstantive, generic, and/or offtopic comments all the time. Btw, you rewrote your GP comment after I'd already replied to it. I don't know what you mean by "bad call".

I'll fairly frequently add to, and occasionally clarify, my comments. I wish HN had a better mechanism for indicating this. Usually it's to fix tyops (you've done that on my behalf at least once, with disclosure, in the past), add specific examples (the Edge searches, I believe, in this case), and just plain mind mush. I care enough that I'll comment to clarify even after the edit window's closed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32851082>

That said, I try not to be deceptive. I've got a 5 minute delay on my comments as well which I understand gives me a short window to edit before the content is publicly visible.

That said, the "bad call" was my interpretation of considering The Edge's Epstein connections as off-topic, apparently not your own meaning.

Conformant to your apparent intent, "why we allow posts from edge.org on HN" (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32984632>), I'd be willing to consider a down-ranking or outright ban of the site on the general principle that blind eyes to absolutely destructive criminality should carry a very strong social stigma, regardless of the merits of any given article. Again, the fact that The Edge fails to note this themselves, or make any clearly apparent apology despite playing a huge role in enabling Epstein's behaviour --- something I've been exploring in the course of this exchange and as a result of robot_head's comment --- is quite significant.

There's a huge harm done when people ignore gross harms done to others. All the more so when those doing so benefit directly from doing so.

HN itself seems to have largely ignored this issue until today:

https://hn.algolia.com/?q=edge%20epstein>

There've been 30 submission from The Edge since 19 October 2020 based on HN's own site link: https://news.ycombinator.com/from%3Fsite%3Dedge.org> (Archive: https://archive.ph/8adBm>)

The first post matching that search to break 20 comments (a minimal notability threshold we've discussed before) was posted 5 hours ago as I write:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32982155>

I can see a legitimate argument for damnatio memoriae for The Edge.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damnatio_memoriae>

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#197

Post by deadpannini »

bombcar wrote: post #193
deadpannini wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you should perhaps cool down. 1) I am admitting that I was wrong and updated. That includes updating on my thought process, just like you are so ardently suggesting. 2) Ninety percent of your assumptions about me are wrong. I'm not sure what you're accusing me of, or what "many people were RIGHT" about. > There's a canyon of difference between being wrong because you just didn't know and being wrong because t…

If I were to be charitable to the post you're replying to, they're trying to show that your takeaway is wrong - instead of saying you changed your mind based on new evidence you should instead say "I was wrong to think I had the knowledge, training, or skills to make a decision and use that decision to influence others".

Yes, and I agree that it's always important to keep that possibility in mind. I am generally keenly aware of uncertainty normally shy away from bad bets (predictions).

But taken too far, that principle leads to abdicating our responsibilities as citizens in a democracy, so while I was definitely chastened by the experience I will kindly decline the invitation to shut up: I choose to get better instead. The sum total of my influence on this matter has been, at worst, to encourage quicker and more widespread adoption of home tests, which falls very short of pernicious.

I'm quite puzzled by P5fRxh5kUvp2th's vitriol - maybe he or she is ardently pro-mask? Since I alluded to my low opinion of mask mandates (which I stand behind), that could explain it.

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#198

Post by xapata »

watwut wrote: post #141
LeonB wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Citation needed. Also - relevance? The tagline being questioned here is— “People don't change their minds” — the problem with which is not that it’s “simply untrue” but that it requires qualification, e.g. in the prose of the linked article it’s written: “To a good first approximation, people simply don't change their minds about anything that matters”

> Citation needed. Citation for personal preference? Or for claim that currently confidence is rewarded more then accuracy? > the problem with which is not that it’s “simply untrue” but that The statement is untrue, because people do change minds. People change minds also about stuff that matters. They dont do it often, but they do it.

> is moving away

I think the citation would be for "is moving away" as that's the most bold claim.

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#199

Post by xapata »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #59
LeonB wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is called a “rhetorical device” and you’d struggle to find a lengthy article that does not employ rhetorical devices. It’s a big part of how communication works.

What you call a "rhetorical device" I call clickbait, and frankly I'm getting tired of it. If the response to every title should be "You shouldn't judge us on the title, everyone knows titles are bullshit", then maybe folks should stop making bullshit titles, or else not feign innocence when they are judged on them. (Note I understand the submitted title is not the title of the article, which I think is a valid defen…

There's a difference between using a broadly true generalization as the title and using a bullshit statement as the title.

Re: Adversarial Collaboration

#200

Post by vanderZwan »

nyokodo wrote: post #191
vanderZwan wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's... an interesting interpretation of what I said, because my motivation is the opposite. I had not considered it could come across as dismissive, thank you for pointing that out. However, when I ask this it is not to dismiss someone, it's because if I understand why something is important to them I am better at arguing in good faith without accidentally being dismissive of what matters to them. Which helps with…

> That's... an interesting interpretation of what I said In a non-verbal exchange this choice of an explicit pause followed by the use of the phrase "interesting interpretation" could also be misconstrued as an underhanded compliment/sarcasm further undermining your alleged intention.

Sure, but at some point interpretation tells you just as much about the interpreter as about the person saying something, and I'm not responsible for the former.
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