Why so many minds think alike
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Why so many minds think alike
1–10 of 17 posts
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#2Also answered in this article:
- Why exactly you're getting downvoted on HN for that unpopular opinion you just posted
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#3Also answered in this article: - Why exactly you're getting downvoted on HN for that unpopular opinion you just posted
i run a site where articles are voted on. we don't show scores in the 'voting' part of the site. people have to make up their own minds. also, a user that participates in a discussion relinquishes past and future votes in that area.
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#4Also answered in this article: - Why exactly you're getting downvoted on HN for that unpopular opinion you just posted
A fact that reflects well on YC News, IMHO, is that it's not only having a dissenting opinion that gets you voted down, but rather being poorly reasoned, inadequately substantiated, badly stated, etc...
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#5My take on why so many people think alike and any idea you have is usually thought up already; is that people get the same inputs.
We all read practically the same news, read the same top ten books, watch the same Tv. talk about the same subjects. Sure we all have different areas(Software Entrepenuers -> HN) but in reality we all have the same inputs and outputs no matter how special we feel.
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#6My take on why so many people think alike and any idea you have is usually thought up already; is that people get the same inputs. We all read practically the same news, read the same top ten books, watch the same Tv. talk about the same subjects. Sure we all have different areas(Software Entrepenuers -> HN) but in reality we all have the same inputs and outputs no matter how special we feel.
You didn't RTFA, did you?
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#7This seems to explain why many brilliant people also have such unusual quirks. They do not gravitate towards this "average" mentality (at least in some fields), and this allows them to develop greater than average ideas in other fields. Of course, none of them can truly be said to be "perfect" in their resistance to to the norm, but there seems to be a correlation. Just my $.02
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#8Also answered in this article: - Why exactly you're getting downvoted on HN for that unpopular opinion you just posted
A fact that reflects well on YC News, IMHO, is that it's not only having a dissenting opinion that gets you voted down, but rather being poorly reasoned, inadequately substantiated, badly stated, etc...
If you re-frame this idea a little, you can come up with a better idea of how this bit of brain function probably operates in real life. (Experiments like this are carried out in pretty artificial circumstances, after all)
HN formed after reddit started getting... frivolous. Lightweight. Unserious. Dumb and trollish. We're here in part to have fun, but it's a forebrain kind of fun.
So rather than saying that you get voted down on HN for sloppy thinking, inarticulate, lazy, or generally being a dick [1], it might be more appropriate to say that, the community punishes people for violating its norms.
Or to get pedantic about it, the community assumes each of its members will behave this way, and steps in to punish those who aren't averse enough to being different in unacceptable ways.
[1] I think one of the site's official policies used to be "just don't be a dick. You know what that means," or some such, but it seems to be gone now.
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#9This explains a lot, in my mind, about how otherwise intelligent people can get pulled into cults and various other troublesome situations that rely on a prevalent group-think. It's not that you can't think of why something is wrong, but there's a strong natural impulse to go along with the crowd regardless of how wrong it is and you may know it to be.
Re: Why so many minds think alike
#10Also answered in this article: - Why exactly you're getting downvoted on HN for that unpopular opinion you just posted
A fact that reflects well on YC News, IMHO, is that it's not only having a dissenting opinion that gets you voted down, but rather being poorly reasoned, inadequately substantiated, badly stated, etc...
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