I’d like to think that one should be nice simply for the sake of being nice. But it also seems to me that in this case it’s rational to be nice; or, to put it differently, that if Less Wrong’s discussion culture drives away interesting posters such as Phil then that culture is not very rational.
Hence I think we should have a discussion about what the rational, or optimal, discussion culture is. This would be somewhat related to the ask vs guess gulture discussion, where I side with the guess culture (which says that you should try to think of how what you say is likely to be received) rather than with the ask culture (which encourages you to be “frank” and not be overly concerned with the consequences of this frankness). As a guesser, I think that you often have to restrain yourself from asking for things bluntly (even if you think it’s a reasonable request). Similarly, I think that even if “step 7 fails”, you shouldn’t point that out in that blunt fashion (“Aha, I’ve found a case for which your step 7 fails! GOTCHA!”).
Interesting post. Please do stick around; you seem to have interesting ideas.
This very good and thought-provoking post is relevant: http://lesswrong.com/lw/3h/why_our_kind_cant_cooperate/
I’d like to think that one should be nice simply for the sake of being nice. But it also seems to me that in this case it’s rational to be nice; or, to put it differently, that if Less Wrong’s discussion culture drives away interesting posters such as Phil then that culture is not very rational.
Hence I think we should have a discussion about what the rational, or optimal, discussion culture is. This would be somewhat related to the ask vs guess gulture discussion, where I side with the guess culture (which says that you should try to think of how what you say is likely to be received) rather than with the ask culture (which encourages you to be “frank” and not be overly concerned with the consequences of this frankness). As a guesser, I think that you often have to restrain yourself from asking for things bluntly (even if you think it’s a reasonable request). Similarly, I think that even if “step 7 fails”, you shouldn’t point that out in that blunt fashion (“Aha, I’ve found a case for which your step 7 fails! GOTCHA!”).