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What if I’m wrong? (2023)

behavioralscientist.org

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Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#41

Post by bongodongobob »

XorNot wrote: post #4
ggm wrote: post #3

I've grown used to being corrected, to the point that it's a pleasant surprise to be told I might be right. What I notice more and more, is the "you're wrong" is used to buttress opinion masquerading as fact. If you preface "I think that.." to asserts it doesn't stop the "you're wrong" but it at least puts the discussion into the realms of conjecture about things, including facts, rather than simple asserts of facts…

"best-practice" is a specific, over-used term in the tech industry. People instinctively give opinions and say "well best-practice is..." to fortify it against being criticized, and then lean heavily on the fact that if you actually ask them to support that notion then they imply or accuse the questioner of being hostile. "It's best practice" should invite the question of "according to who, in which publications? Wha…

Nah. Best practice usually means "assume a spherical cow". The idea is to point in the right direction because there are no one size fits all solutions for anything. It's a starting point that isn't stupid and is backed by the blood of poor bastards from the past.

Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#42

Post by jyunwai »

javajosh wrote: post #31
delichon wrote: post #2

Ptolemy was wrong. But he was wrong with a large pile of actual measurements of celestial bodies, and a falsifiable theory. That made him wrong in the positive sense of wrong in the phrase "not even wrong", where wrong is just the first step of the ladder. I wish I could say the same about Freud, but that ladder is distressingly horizontal.

There is a strong analogy in software engineering here. Often the first implementation is "wrong" in the sense that it doesn't resolve the inherent tensions in the system. But that doesn't make it useless - in fact, it's quite useful because it actually showed you what is important. Plus, the people who attempt the initial solution to a problem deserve special honor, even if their work is eventually tossed away, spec…

A similar idea about the importance of planning as a way to improve your understanding of a problem was expressed by Dwight D. Eisenhower, said in a speech while he was in office as the US President in 1957 [1].

Reflecting on his experience in the Second World War, he said: "Plans are worthless, but planning is everything. There is a very great distinction because when you are planning for an emergency you must start with this one thing: the very definition of “emergency” is that it is unexpected, therefore it is not going to happen the way you are planning."

[1] https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/11/18/planning/

Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#45

Post by thfuran »

randomdata wrote: post #40
paulpauper wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have grown accustomed to being wrong a lot as well, especially online, but it would be nice being right more often too. It's like "Am I really that far off the mark? Maybe I am. Downvotes coming." I like to think my opinions are not that bad. Yet when it comes to investing in other aspects in life ,where money is at stake or making income, I have been right more often than not. So I guess I right where it matters m…

I’d rather not ever be right. If I am that means I learned nothing, making it a waste of time.

If you've never been right about anything, you might need to reconsider your approach to learning. I think you're doing it wrong.

Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#46

Post by layer8 »

JonChesterfield wrote: post #20

> if this novelty is worth understanding, somebody I trust will soon explain it to me in terms I can readily digest That's unsound. It prevents learning anything which is not widely known and simply explained. I don't know the author. All the context I have is the article up to that point where I lost interest. However yes, if all you try to learn are the trivial things everyone agrees on, for some circular definitio…

No, it means no single person needs to be a giant on which shoulders we stand. Instead we can form a pyramid of arbitrarily small dwarfs.

Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#47

Post by haswell »

ggm wrote: post #3

I've grown used to being corrected, to the point that it's a pleasant surprise to be told I might be right. What I notice more and more, is the "you're wrong" is used to buttress opinion masquerading as fact. If you preface "I think that.." to asserts it doesn't stop the "you're wrong" but it at least puts the discussion into the realms of conjecture about things, including facts, rather than simple asserts of facts…

> I also notice that argument by analogy is being over-used

This one seems especially pernicious, not because of extremely over-wrought comparisons, but because sometimes the analogy fits really well on the surface. But beyond the structural fit, it does not really help prove anything.

Too often I'll encounter an analogy wielded as if it proves the underlying point, when the reality is that it breaks down quickly if you dive into the details.

Analogies can be great to help establish new mental models, or to try out an idea with terminology that people already understand, but can be quite misleading. Better used for learning than trying to prove things.

Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#48

Post by bsder »

delichon wrote: post #2

Ptolemy was wrong. But he was wrong with a large pile of actual measurements of celestial bodies, and a falsifiable theory. That made him wrong in the positive sense of wrong in the phrase "not even wrong", where wrong is just the first step of the ladder. I wish I could say the same about Freud, but that ladder is distressingly horizontal.

Ptolemy was not "wrong". His model worked quite well within the margin of his measuring tools.

And, in fact, Ptolemy was more "right" than heliocentric circles (as opposed to ellipses).

You have to have both elliptical orbits and inverse square law forces to predict better than Ptolemy.

It wasn't until the telescope allowed seeing Venusian phases that geocentricity was actively disproven.

Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#49

Post by tsunamifury »

I applaud the author and thinker for taking on this timely and hard topic.

I struggle with this question in the same way I think as the author, but in technology we are afforded less time to ponder if we are wrong and more time to test if we are wrong.

However the author points out, even in testing as he does with his students, we can be wrong in a fundamental way that all the branches of my iterations stem from the wrong source.

So I’m left with: who thinks I’m wrong and why does that matter.

I’m finding that outside of reddit, very very few people will tell me im wrong and this is deeply frustrating. Really only my wife who is tired of my pondering fully engages in what might be wrong with what I’m working on and I’m thankful for that.

But I wish more people would help me be “constructively wrong” which means they understand the goal but want to correct the approach.

Most online merely want to point out irrelevant wrongness for sport.

Re: What if I’m wrong? (2023)

#50

Post by ben_w »

haswell wrote: post #47
ggm wrote: post #3

I've grown used to being corrected, to the point that it's a pleasant surprise to be told I might be right. What I notice more and more, is the "you're wrong" is used to buttress opinion masquerading as fact. If you preface "I think that.." to asserts it doesn't stop the "you're wrong" but it at least puts the discussion into the realms of conjecture about things, including facts, rather than simple asserts of facts…

> I also notice that argument by analogy is being over-used This one seems especially pernicious, not because of extremely over-wrought comparisons, but because sometimes the analogy fits really well on the surface. But beyond the structural fit, it does not really help prove anything. Too often I'll encounter an analogy wielded as if it proves the underlying point, when the reality is that it breaks down quickly if…

Analogies are like a box of chocolates: overused clichés, but we hand them out and gobble them down with delight.
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