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Aristotle, “On Trolling”
11–20 of 90 posts
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#12I was unaware that people trolled for any other reason than amusement. Is there an estimate of how frequently people troll for calculated (e.g. monetary) reasons? So my take is that she says trolls act as a kind of solvent to the natural bonds of community, and she lists a few frequently used constructions. I suppose the only beneficial use of trolls and trolling is to destroy communities of little worth. If trolls s…
What was called 'griefing' is now called trolling too, unfortunately.
I think trolling can be positive and well-done. I'd say Swift's "A Modest Proposal" is an example.
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#13Book one of Plato's Republic led to my lightbulb moment: witness Socrates's lilt of annoyance at Thrasymachus's behavior, which is not too far from what is being described here. People have not changed fundamentally in the last 2,500 years.
Reading that amused me to no end. Plato is how I was able to make peace with the legions of Internet message-board nerds. (And observe in myself the traits of a troll, at times.)
> no one is ever a troll involuntarily or by accident, but only an idiot who has posted in the wrong thread.
Then again -- was Thrasymachus just "posting in the wrong thread?"
The second lightbulb moment was reading some of Antonin Scalia's judicial opinions. My approximate train of thought: "Whait, am I actually reading this? This is like something I'd downvote on Hacker News. Well, justices are temperamental and opinionated people too, just like the rest of us..." RIP.
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#14for there is no art in what they do.
I couldn't disagree more. There is common trolling and there is sublime trolling. The ability to sow the perfect amount of strife to create real change is a thing of beauty. This goes beyond the tactics of information warfare -- for which trolling has its uses -- and reveals truth to those in ignorance. For most true knowledge cannot be learned by the advice of elders alone, but must be learned through the long and winding path. Many of life's truths are best revealed through fiction.
This essay reads like it fears trolls and their threats to social order. But the way of discord and strife is also true. Did Eris not troll Olympus most excellently with her golden apple? Did she not reveal that divine folly was no less than mortal folly? This is the awesome power that is trolling in a skilled hand.
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#15Sounds like Aristotle had a bad day with Socrates.
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#16"of all merely asks a simple question about the evidence for climate change"
i am working on 'an investigation into the sex life of sterile coat hangers with particular reference to climate change' myself.
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#17I was unaware that people trolled for any other reason than amusement. Is there an estimate of how frequently people troll for calculated (e.g. monetary) reasons? So my take is that she says trolls act as a kind of solvent to the natural bonds of community, and she lists a few frequently used constructions. I suppose the only beneficial use of trolls and trolling is to destroy communities of little worth. If trolls s…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1555005/Seven-chil...
Can we really call trolls evil if within a community they counteract group-think, wage a war on cliché, and subvert unthinking and tired stereotyping?
Perhaps Aristotelian virtue theory can help us answer these questions?
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#18Sounds like Aristotle had a bad day with Socrates.
Yes.
This post gives me words to express what I always thought: They killed Socrates for trolling.
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#19for there is no art in what they do. I couldn't disagree more. There is common trolling and there is sublime trolling. The ability to sow the perfect amount of strife to create real change is a thing of beauty. This goes beyond the tactics of information warfare -- for which trolling has its uses -- and reveals truth to those in ignorance. For most true knowledge cannot be learned by the advice of elders alone, but m…
Your comment relies on a misunderstanding of what Aristotle - or his proxie here - means by the term "art". In modern usage, something that has no art to it is base, simple, and requires no effort to achieve. However, art meant something more nuanced to Aristotle (that nuance is why people still make a living arguing over the implications of what he said). For Aristotle, an art was something that pointed to the Good. Politics was the art of governing men, Ethics was the art of ruling oneself. These things involved skill - the skill you allude to the troll possessing, the power to weave webs of words and manipulate people - but also involved something more - an understanding that the purpose of the art was to further a good in some way. When "Aristotle" says there's not art in the troll's activities, he means they do not point to the good, and they will in fact do harm.
PS apologies if this isn't well reasoned, I just got off a plane and am a bit jet lagged.
Re: Aristotle, “On Trolling”
#20> Trolls not to be fed. But though everyone knows this, everyone does it; for the desire to be right on the internet is natural and present to all.
Trolling is fed by frustration, not discourse. Discourse does not have to be frustrating. How you react to it is entirely up to you.
I'd argue there's no such thing as a troll. People aren't all bad or all good. Trolling is a concept of negativity that spreads when given more negativity.