I feel like Said not only has a personal distaste of that sort of “post that contains bits that aren’t pinned down,” but it also seemed like he wouldn’t get any closer to seeing the point of those posts or comments when it was explained in additional detail.
If a post starts off vague and exploratory, on a topic that isn’t very easy to think/write about, it would make sense that it usually couldn’t be clarified enough to meet Said’s standards within a few back-and-forth comments.
That’s pretty frustrating to deal with for authors and other commenters.
Yes, but I think that’s in part because of the nature of intellectual progress, and in part because there are so few people like Said who is incentivized (by his own personality) to push back hard and persistently on this kind of post (so people are not used to it). I think it’s also in part due to the tone that he typically employs, which he theoretically could change, but that seems connected with his personality in a way that we seemingly couldn’t get one without the other.
If a post starts off vague and exploratory, on a topic that isn’t very easy to think/write about, it would make sense that it usually couldn’t be clarified enough to meet Said’s standards within a few back-and-forth comments.
Yes, but I think that’s in part because of the nature of intellectual progress, and in part because there are so few people like Said who is incentivized (by his own personality) to push back hard and persistently on this kind of post (so people are not used to it). I think it’s also in part due to the tone that he typically employs, which he theoretically could change, but that seems connected with his personality in a way that we seemingly couldn’t get one without the other.