Well, he has written 9 discussion posts with >10 karma in the last 4 months or so. Do you not like any of them? Or think of it this way: if he is the kind of person we want to drive away instead of help better fit into our community, then where are we going to find those “better contrarians”?
Looking through his posts, most are downvoted, and the bulk of his karma seems to be coming from a conjunction fallacy post which says nothing new that wasn’t covered in previous posts by say Eliezer (or myself, in prediction-related posts), and another content-less post composed pretty much just of discussion (of a very low level). Brain shrinkage was a good topic, but unlike my essay on similar topics (covering brain shrinkage as a special case), Dmytry completely fails to bring the references. And so on.
I don’t want to mention specific posts, since that would probably get me involved in a debate over the exact merits of those posts, but it seems like you missed the two posts with the highest upvotes. And yes, most of his posts are downvoted, but my guess is that it’s easier to teach someone to avoid posting bad ideas than to come up with even semi-good ones.
Anyway, I don’t want to argue too much over this. If, all things considered, you (or wedrifid) don’t think there’s much chance that Dmytry could become someone that would make LW better instead of worse, that’s fine with me. I just wanted to make sure it was a considered decision on wedrifid’s part to push Dmytry to leave, and not just an emotional reaction.
I just wanted to make sure it was a considered decision on wedrifid’s part to push Dmytry to leave, and not just an emotional reaction.
Considered and strategic but not committed to and considered without awareness of your degree of personal interest. In such a circumstance if I knew there was someone with a particular interest in working with a (shall we call them ‘candidate’?) I would stand back and refrain from replying or interacting with the candidate except in those circumstances where they are directly hampering the contributions of others.
When it comes to handling such situations better in the future it occurs to me that the material you have written already in your various comments here would make a decent post (“How to be a productive contrarian?”). If that were available as a post then when when the next guy came along and started saying “You guys disagree with me therefore you are all a bunch of brainwashed group thinking fools” we could fog and say “It’s true, there is plenty of group think on lesswrong. Wei_Dai wrote this post on how he manages it.” That would be equally as true as the response “You’re actually getting downvoted because you’re wrong and acting like a dick. STFU.” but far more useful!
In fact, your advice (including what to do instead of worrying about ‘fairness’) generalizes well to dealing with new challenging social situations of all kinds.
Or think of it this way: if he is the kind of person we want to drive away instead of help better fit into our community, then where are we going to find those “better contrarians”?
In my experience you don’t find ‘better contrarians’ among people who are naturally contrary and have a chip on their shoulder. A good contrarian will mostly agrees with stuff (unless the community they are in really is defective) - but thinks things through and then carefully presents their contrary positions as though they are making a natural contribution.
Don’t seek the contrariness. Seek good thinking and willingness to contribute. You get the contrarian positions for free when the generally good thinking gets results. For example you get lukeprog.
I can’t say I noticed anything worthwhile. What has Dmytry said that you regard as promising?
Well, he has written 9 discussion posts with >10 karma in the last 4 months or so. Do you not like any of them? Or think of it this way: if he is the kind of person we want to drive away instead of help better fit into our community, then where are we going to find those “better contrarians”?
Looking through his posts, most are downvoted, and the bulk of his karma seems to be coming from a conjunction fallacy post which says nothing new that wasn’t covered in previous posts by say Eliezer (or myself, in prediction-related posts), and another content-less post composed pretty much just of discussion (of a very low level). Brain shrinkage was a good topic, but unlike my essay on similar topics (covering brain shrinkage as a special case), Dmytry completely fails to bring the references. And so on.
So again, what do you regard as promising?
I don’t want to mention specific posts, since that would probably get me involved in a debate over the exact merits of those posts, but it seems like you missed the two posts with the highest upvotes. And yes, most of his posts are downvoted, but my guess is that it’s easier to teach someone to avoid posting bad ideas than to come up with even semi-good ones.
Anyway, I don’t want to argue too much over this. If, all things considered, you (or wedrifid) don’t think there’s much chance that Dmytry could become someone that would make LW better instead of worse, that’s fine with me. I just wanted to make sure it was a considered decision on wedrifid’s part to push Dmytry to leave, and not just an emotional reaction.
Considered and strategic but not committed to and considered without awareness of your degree of personal interest. In such a circumstance if I knew there was someone with a particular interest in working with a (shall we call them ‘candidate’?) I would stand back and refrain from replying or interacting with the candidate except in those circumstances where they are directly hampering the contributions of others.
When it comes to handling such situations better in the future it occurs to me that the material you have written already in your various comments here would make a decent post (“How to be a productive contrarian?”). If that were available as a post then when when the next guy came along and started saying “You guys disagree with me therefore you are all a bunch of brainwashed group thinking fools” we could fog and say “It’s true, there is plenty of group think on lesswrong. Wei_Dai wrote this post on how he manages it.” That would be equally as true as the response “You’re actually getting downvoted because you’re wrong and acting like a dick. STFU.” but far more useful!
In fact, your advice (including what to do instead of worrying about ‘fairness’) generalizes well to dealing with new challenging social situations of all kinds.
In my experience you don’t find ‘better contrarians’ among people who are naturally contrary and have a chip on their shoulder. A good contrarian will mostly agrees with stuff (unless the community they are in really is defective) - but thinks things through and then carefully presents their contrary positions as though they are making a natural contribution.
Don’t seek the contrariness. Seek good thinking and willingness to contribute. You get the contrarian positions for free when the generally good thinking gets results. For example you get lukeprog.