M. Y. Zuo comments on Sentience matters

[M. Y. Zuo]

And then M. Y. Zuo started talking about credibility, which still leaves me confused about what’s going on, despite some clarifying back and forth.

A reference implies some associated credibility, as in the example found in comment #4:

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has no reference entry for “boundary concept” nor any string matches at all to “deontological agent” or “deontological agent design”.

e.g. referencing entries in an encyclopedia, usually presumed to be authoritative to some degree, which grants some credibility to what’s written regarding the topic

By the way, I’m not implying Andrew_Critch’s credibility is zero, but it’s certainly a lot lower then SEP, so much so that I think most LW readers, who likely haven’t heard of him, would sooner group his writings with random musings then SEP entries.

Hence why I was surprised.

[Vladimir_Nesov]

Well, I’m pretty sure that’s not what the word means, but in any case that’s not what I meant by it, so that point isn’t relevant to any substantive disagreement, which does seem present; it’s best to taboo “reference” in this context.

[M. Y. Zuo]

Well, I’m pretty sure that’s not what the word means,

It appears you linked to tvtropes.org?

I’m fairly certain the widely accepted definition of ‘reference’ encompasses the idea of referencing entries in an encyclopedia. So in this case I wouldn’t trust ‘TVTropes’ at all.

Here’s Merriam-Webster:

reference

1 of 3

noun

ref·​er·​ence ˈre-fərn(t)s

ˈre-f(ə-)rən(t)s

1: the act of referring or consulting

2: a bearing on a matter : RELATION

in reference to your recent letter

3: something that refers: such as

a: ALLUSION, MENTION

b: something (such as a sign or indication) that refers a reader or consulter to another source of information (such as a book or passage)

c: consultation of sources of information

4: one referred to or consulted: such as

a: a person to whom inquiries as to character or ability can be made

b: a statement of the qualifications of a person seeking employment or appointment given by someone familiar with the person

c(1): a source of information (such as a book or passage) to which a reader or consulter is referred

(2): a work (such as a dictionary or encyclopedia) containing useful facts or information