A critique in a high-ambiguity context is almost always (in all but the most technical domains where individual claims can be cheaply verified) a request to engage in a prolonged exchange
I don’t think so, I think critics usually see themselves as pointing out errors in the original and would be quite happy with an “oops, good pickup”. Extended exchanges happen because authors usually don’t agree. Often at least one of the parties is confused/motivated/doing a poor job for some reason, which means long exchanges are often frustrating and people are wary about getting into them. But the critique isn’t a request for an exchange.
I’m also a bit confused by this discussion. Is your position actually: you can only judge a critic by their papers or LessWrong posts? This seems odd, can’t you judge them by their other critiques? A critique seems much easier to evaluate than a paper.
This depends a lot on the style of the critique. One of the most common forms of critique is “ask a leading question”. Clearly that is an invitation for a prolonged exchange. Think of socratic exchanges.
There definitely exist critiques that can be self-contained, and stand on their own as a counterveiling perspective. I tried to point to that in some of the examples in my comments. It’s particularly common in technical domains.
In most other domains, there is enough adversarialness, combined with enough ambiguity that usually a critique requires multiple back and forths to come into focus (and also, it’s usually socially advantageous for critics to intentionally not make their critique maximally explicit or easy to judge in an attempt of making the reader fill in the gaps with whatever they think is weakest about the object of critique).
Even though all of that is true, it just seems like such a strange way to frame the problem. Yes, the commenter’s catalogue of top-level posts does provide some information about how productive a back and fourth would be. But if Said had two curated posts but commented in exactly the same style, the number of complaints about him would be no different; the only thing that would change is that people wouldn’t use the ‘he doesn’t write top level posts’ as a justification. (Do you actually doubt this?) Conversely if everyone thought his comments were insightful and friendly, no one would care about his top-level posts. The whole point about top level posts is at least 80% a rationalization/red herring.
I’m not sure that’s even true of leading questions. You can ask a leading question for the benefit of other readers who will see the question, understand the objection the question is implicitly raising, and then reflect on whether it’s reasonable.
I don’t think so, I think critics usually see themselves as pointing out errors in the original and would be quite happy with an “oops, good pickup”. Extended exchanges happen because authors usually don’t agree. Often at least one of the parties is confused/motivated/doing a poor job for some reason, which means long exchanges are often frustrating and people are wary about getting into them. But the critique isn’t a request for an exchange.
I’m also a bit confused by this discussion. Is your position actually: you can only judge a critic by their papers or LessWrong posts? This seems odd, can’t you judge them by their other critiques? A critique seems much easier to evaluate than a paper.
This depends a lot on the style of the critique. One of the most common forms of critique is “ask a leading question”. Clearly that is an invitation for a prolonged exchange. Think of socratic exchanges.
There definitely exist critiques that can be self-contained, and stand on their own as a counterveiling perspective. I tried to point to that in some of the examples in my comments. It’s particularly common in technical domains.
In most other domains, there is enough adversarialness, combined with enough ambiguity that usually a critique requires multiple back and forths to come into focus (and also, it’s usually socially advantageous for critics to intentionally not make their critique maximally explicit or easy to judge in an attempt of making the reader fill in the gaps with whatever they think is weakest about the object of critique).
Even though all of that is true, it just seems like such a strange way to frame the problem. Yes, the commenter’s catalogue of top-level posts does provide some information about how productive a back and fourth would be. But if Said had two curated posts but commented in exactly the same style, the number of complaints about him would be no different; the only thing that would change is that people wouldn’t use the ‘he doesn’t write top level posts’ as a justification. (Do you actually doubt this?) Conversely if everyone thought his comments were insightful and friendly, no one would care about his top-level posts. The whole point about top level posts is at least 80% a rationalization/red herring.
Well, I don’t have two curated posts, but I do have one…
EDIT: No, I actually do have two! I forgot about that one!
Didn’t even know that! (Which kind of makes my point.)
See edit of the grandparent. Turns out I do have two curated posts, who knew?!
I’m not sure that’s even true of leading questions. You can ask a leading question for the benefit of other readers who will see the question, understand the objection the question is implicitly raising, and then reflect on whether it’s reasonable.