At a more mild level, where the disrespectful tone is below the threshold of outright swearing and abuse, tone gives reliable indications of how the person is likely to respond to continued conversation. It’s a good indication of whether they will respond in good faith or need to be treated as a hostile rhetorician that is not vulnerable to persuasion (or learning).
You said that moderate differences in tone were good indicators of whether or not someone was rational enough to be capable to learn. You were vague about what specifically these indicators would be. I felt like that vagueness was suspicious, and could be used to justify over privileging commenters who sound familiar. This is not me arguing in bad faith, this is me attempting to fill in a blank spot in your argument. Admittedly, I framed it with words that made you sound wrong. However, I still believe this is your belief, more or less.
If I’m wrong in my belief about your belief, fix your argument; fill in the blank spot. Which parts of moderate differences in tone are so useful that they can clearly show us when someone is incapable of learning?
If my comment isn’t a wholly accurate portrayal, it still gets the general picture across. You responded to none of its content, choosing instead to dismiss it all as irrelevant and a strawman, and you chose to use this as a reason that people should stop listening to my arguments. But my comment was at worst unfair and my comment illustrates very well the potential dangers of your position and so I don’t think it should be ignored. People should take it with a grain of salt, perhaps, but don’t tell them to ignore it.
No. The quoted point cannot be interpreted as saying that (easily or otherwise) by someone who comprehends English and is intending to truthfully represent the words.
You literally said that “tone… [is] a good indication of whether they… need to be treated as a hostile rhetorician that is not vulnerable to persuasion (or learning).” You think that tone alone is enough to tell us whether or not someone can learn. You think that people with certain tones can reliably be considered stupid.
I don’t exactly agree. I think that tone has very limited use in assessing intelligence, and that evaluating argumentative content is a much more straightforward way of doing so. I distrust your and even my own intuitions about tone, also. I think that it’s very probable that you dismiss legitimately smart people based simply on neutral differences in tone.
You never stated that you think that people who speak like us are the smart ones. But I believe that you believe that, and I honestly wouldn’t trust you if you claimed otherwise, since it’s basically human nature to rally around things like tone. However, if similarity isn’t the brightline you’re using for evaluating what kinds of tones are good and what kinds of tones are bad, I still think the discussion would benefit from you specifying exactly what is.
You literally said that “tone… [is] a good indication of whether they… need to be treated as a hostile rhetorician that is not vulnerable to persuasion (or learning).”
You think that tone alone is enough to tell us whether or not someone can learn. You think that people with certain tones can reliably be considered stupid.
I think neither of those things. This isn’t about stupidity or intelligence. This is about how people will behave within a conversation. More intelligence granted to a debator set on winning an argument and securing status does not make them better at accepting and learning from information in the context. It makes them better at defending themselves from needing to. It makes them better and creating straw men and clever but irrelevant counter-arguments.
I wish lack of intelligence was the only thing that could prevent someone from comprehending something. Alas...
You never stated that you think that people who speak like us are the smart ones.
I’m not comfortable identifying with any group ‘us’ unless I know how that group is identified. I’d be surprised if I even willingly put myself in the same group as you (making a quoted-from-you ‘us’ unlikely). For better or worse I do not believe I relate to words, argument or communication in general the same way that you do. (And yes, I do believe that my ‘us’ would refer to the ‘smart ones’—or at least ones that are laudable in some way that I consider significant.)
I think neither of those things. This isn’t about stupidity or intelligence. This is about how people will behave within a conversation. More intelligence granted to a debator set on winning an argument and securing status does not make them better at accepting and learning from information in the context. It makes them better at defending themselves from needing to. It makes them better and creating straw men and clever but irrelevant counter-arguments.
I agree that tone can provide useful information. The difference between our positions is perhaps more one of emphasis than anything else, despite the stupid and superficial squabbling above. I’m focused on the dangers of relying on tone, whereas you’re focused on the benefits.
I’m focused on the dangers of tone since I think that our intuitions about such an inherently slippery concept are untrustworthy and I also think that it’s human nature to perceive neutral differences in things like tone as hostile differences. As previously mentioned, I also thing that LessWrongers allow tonal differences to cloud their judgement, and they feel justified in doing so because they are offended by other tones. Tone should be secondary to substance by a very long margin.
I am unsure to what extent you really disagree with any of this. You don’t seem to attempt to refute my arguments about how a reliance on tone can be dangerous. Instead, you take pot shots at my credibility, and you say that tone also has legitimate uses. I don’t want to deny or preclude legitimate uses of tone, so your position here doesn’t clash much with mine.
We also both seem to perceive norms on LessWrong surrounding tone differently. I see a lot of the dangerous type of attitude towards tone going on in this site, the above comment with someone who apparently strawmanned my comment 3 times being a good example. Judging from your overall position, you seem to perceive this as less common. I don’t know what could be done to resolve this aspect of our disagreement.
I’m not comfortable identifying with any group ‘us’ unless I know how that group is identified. I’d be surprised if I even willingly put myself in the same group as you (making a quoted-from-you ‘us’ unlikely). For better or worse I do not believe I relate to words, argument or communication in general the same way that you do. (And yes, I do believe that my ‘us’ would refer to the ‘smart ones’—or at least ones that are laudable in some way that I consider significant.)
I was using that language tongue-in-cheek, to display the sort of perspective that I perceive as dangerous and that I think you might be trying to justify, not as something that I actually believe. I also thought it was ironic and amusing to place myself in the same category as you, I did so with the belief that you would reject that association, which was exactly what made it funny to me.
The below words are yours:
You said that moderate differences in tone were good indicators of whether or not someone was rational enough to be capable to learn. You were vague about what specifically these indicators would be. I felt like that vagueness was suspicious, and could be used to justify over privileging commenters who sound familiar. This is not me arguing in bad faith, this is me attempting to fill in a blank spot in your argument. Admittedly, I framed it with words that made you sound wrong. However, I still believe this is your belief, more or less.
If I’m wrong in my belief about your belief, fix your argument; fill in the blank spot. Which parts of moderate differences in tone are so useful that they can clearly show us when someone is incapable of learning?
If my comment isn’t a wholly accurate portrayal, it still gets the general picture across. You responded to none of its content, choosing instead to dismiss it all as irrelevant and a strawman, and you chose to use this as a reason that people should stop listening to my arguments. But my comment was at worst unfair and my comment illustrates very well the potential dangers of your position and so I don’t think it should be ignored. People should take it with a grain of salt, perhaps, but don’t tell them to ignore it.
You literally said that “tone… [is] a good indication of whether they… need to be treated as a hostile rhetorician that is not vulnerable to persuasion (or learning).” You think that tone alone is enough to tell us whether or not someone can learn. You think that people with certain tones can reliably be considered stupid.
I don’t exactly agree. I think that tone has very limited use in assessing intelligence, and that evaluating argumentative content is a much more straightforward way of doing so. I distrust your and even my own intuitions about tone, also. I think that it’s very probable that you dismiss legitimately smart people based simply on neutral differences in tone.
You never stated that you think that people who speak like us are the smart ones. But I believe that you believe that, and I honestly wouldn’t trust you if you claimed otherwise, since it’s basically human nature to rally around things like tone. However, if similarity isn’t the brightline you’re using for evaluating what kinds of tones are good and what kinds of tones are bad, I still think the discussion would benefit from you specifying exactly what is.
I think neither of those things. This isn’t about stupidity or intelligence. This is about how people will behave within a conversation. More intelligence granted to a debator set on winning an argument and securing status does not make them better at accepting and learning from information in the context. It makes them better at defending themselves from needing to. It makes them better and creating straw men and clever but irrelevant counter-arguments.
I wish lack of intelligence was the only thing that could prevent someone from comprehending something. Alas...
I’m not comfortable identifying with any group ‘us’ unless I know how that group is identified. I’d be surprised if I even willingly put myself in the same group as you (making a quoted-from-you ‘us’ unlikely). For better or worse I do not believe I relate to words, argument or communication in general the same way that you do. (And yes, I do believe that my ‘us’ would refer to the ‘smart ones’—or at least ones that are laudable in some way that I consider significant.)
I agree that tone can provide useful information. The difference between our positions is perhaps more one of emphasis than anything else, despite the stupid and superficial squabbling above. I’m focused on the dangers of relying on tone, whereas you’re focused on the benefits.
I’m focused on the dangers of tone since I think that our intuitions about such an inherently slippery concept are untrustworthy and I also think that it’s human nature to perceive neutral differences in things like tone as hostile differences. As previously mentioned, I also thing that LessWrongers allow tonal differences to cloud their judgement, and they feel justified in doing so because they are offended by other tones. Tone should be secondary to substance by a very long margin.
I am unsure to what extent you really disagree with any of this. You don’t seem to attempt to refute my arguments about how a reliance on tone can be dangerous. Instead, you take pot shots at my credibility, and you say that tone also has legitimate uses. I don’t want to deny or preclude legitimate uses of tone, so your position here doesn’t clash much with mine.
We also both seem to perceive norms on LessWrong surrounding tone differently. I see a lot of the dangerous type of attitude towards tone going on in this site, the above comment with someone who apparently strawmanned my comment 3 times being a good example. Judging from your overall position, you seem to perceive this as less common. I don’t know what could be done to resolve this aspect of our disagreement.
I was using that language tongue-in-cheek, to display the sort of perspective that I perceive as dangerous and that I think you might be trying to justify, not as something that I actually believe. I also thought it was ironic and amusing to place myself in the same category as you, I did so with the belief that you would reject that association, which was exactly what made it funny to me.