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Why are so many people assuming that the initial list represented his comprehensive judgement of all films ever? Is it not far more likely that he added films

Why are so many people assuming that the initial list represented his comprehensive judgement of all films ever? Is it not far more likely that he added films as sufficiently important ones occurred to him, and at some point decided the list was fairly comprehensive and stopped? Then subsequently, someone pointed out that there weren't many films by female directors, and this prompt made him think of a bunch of other films worth adding?

RodericDay 11y ago
> JohnKacz 14 minutes ago He also asks backers to send in their suggestions for the list "because of course there's going to be stuff I left out." It's really amazing the degree to which many of us white dudes, over-represented in intellectual compendiums everywhere, react when we feel the slightest, feeblest threat.
- kelukelugames 11y ago
  Have you read the thread on the Github diversity slides.
- mc32 11y ago
  It's not that. He could have put up a list with mostly women, or mostly African films, people would mostly be okay with that. It's the perception of his giving in and revising in the face of dissent on something more or less personal. Let's say he put up a list of favorite foods. Then someone notices there are no lamb dishes and he adds lamb to it. Or there is no vegetarian dish and adds vegetarian dishes. It's not a big deal either way but people read "undue influence to change personal preferences"
  - RodericDay 11y ago
    You seem to be missing the point of me highlighting that Spike Lee himself asked for people to point out omissions "because of course there's going to be stuff I left out". If there's no lamb dishes, I request reminders, someone points out a lamb dish, and I add lamb, it's not healthy or reasonable to propose that I am being unduly influenced by the lamb lobby. It's within the realm of possibility, sure, but to bring it up reflects paranoia, scepticism towards lamb dishes, and possibly a persecution complex due to overexposure to lamb-related GitHub drama. It is a big deal, by the way. It makes HackerNews look like ReturnOfKings.
  - aninhumer 11y ago
    >Let's say he put up a list of favorite foods. The thing is, it's not a list of his personal "favourite" films, it's a list of "must watch" films. The latter is a more authoritative statement, and moreover it is a list in which diversity of art is to be expected. So it's not unreasonable to suggest a lack of diversity in artists might indicate some oversights.
    - mc32 11y ago
      It's still his personal take on what that list looks like. In any event, for me it's neither here nor there. He's free to put up a biased or unbiased list of his choosing or anyone else's. If I dont like his list I can add my favorites, maybe they'll all be Easter European and African with no western European or Asian films. He has imprimatur. Sure, but in the end it's an unscientific list. It's a starting point, it has a local cultural bias. If he had grown up in HK would his list be the same? No, and that's okay.
  - ethbro 11y ago
    Wait, what? Are we (the internet) actually simultaneously angry at a person for being un-politically correct and politically correct?
  - ant6n 11y ago
    Bs. If he posted a list of just African films and films by women then people would say 'what kind of fucked up list of obscure random shit is this!'. And that's kind of the problem.
coldtea 11y ago
>Why are so many people assuming that the initial list represented his comprehensive judgement of all films ever? That's not what the parent asked.
- aninhumer 11y ago
  The parent asked whether the added films were either considered worthy but subconsciously omitted from the initial list, or considered unworthy and then added to the subsequent list anyway. This question ignores the possibility that their worthiness was simply never considered at all in the creation of the initial list. EDIT: It's possible the parent didn't intend those options as a dichotomy but nonetheless, that's what is implied.
  - coldtea 11y ago
    >This question ignores the possibility that their worthiness was simply never considered at all in the creation of the initial list. And why would their worthiness not be considered at all in the creation of the initial list? The whole point of the initial (and the second) list was to list worthy films for filmmakers to see. Obviously, either a film comes to your mind when you're creating a list of what you consider the best films, or it doesn't. Whether the director was a woman doesn't come into play in this, unless you're a misogynist purposefully avoiding to list film by women filmmakers. Since (I assume) Lee is not the latter, here's what seems is the case. When Spike Lee thinks (on his own) of what the best films are, the first list is what comes to his mind. But after he was questioned about it, and to appease the "crowds", he subsequently added some films by women to balance the list. In other words he added them to meet some quota (regardless of the films inherent quality, which after is all is not to be judged by Spike Lee only. E.g. the might be masterpieces too -- just not Lee's original masterpieces, but some that he had to be nudged to list).
    - aninhumer 11y ago
      Firstly, it's a list of "must watch" films for artists, not "best" films. The criteria are slightly different. Secondly, whether a film "came to mind" is only somewhat related to whether he thinks it's worth inclusion in his list. Is it inconceivable to you that there could be films that did not initially occur to him, that he nonetheless considers worthy additions when he is reminded of them? Or do you suppose that Spike is a superhuman able to instantly recall all important films without fail?
mikeash 11y ago
This looks almost exactly like the typical statement I see in discussions about diversity in hiring. "If we go out of our way to hire more minorities, then we're deliberately passing on the best candidates." People seem to love to assume that everything can be perfectly ranked and compared.
- StavrosK 11y ago
  What's the typical counterargument to that?
  - mikeash 11y ago
    I have no idea what "typical" would be, but my counterargument is that candidate ranking is extremely noisy and imprecise, and because of that it necessarily already includes bias. A good diversity initiative is simply an attempt to compensate for the existing bias, not add bias to a perfect system.
dhimes 11y ago
Why are so many people assuming that the initial list represented his comprehensive judgement of all films ever? Because he's doing it in his role of NYU professor! If Donald Knuth released a list of "CS papers every professional should read," I would fully expect it to be his comprehensive judgement of all papers ever. Do you think that he may have missed one? Do you think Spike may have? In both cases it's their professional environment, and I would expect that it would have been discussed in their professional environments. To imply that they missed something important is to imply that their close colleagues missed it too. It could happen, of course, but not something that you think about when you read a list like that. Until you see that he missed "Captain Ron." Then all bets are off.
- aninhumer 11y ago
  I think you're vastly underestimating the amount of effort that would be involved in comprehensively judging an entire field.[0] Sure he's a professor, but he only has so much time in the day. At some point he has to say "Right, I think that covers everything important" and get on with teaching. Not to mention, according to a quote in this thread Spike himself disagrees with you: >He also asks backers to send in their suggestions for the list "because of course there's going to be stuff I left out." [0] Although I might just about expect such a thing from Knuth...
  - dhimes 11y ago
    "Right, I think that covers everything important" That would be comprehensive. As I said in a sister answer, I would expect a little tweaking of the list after criticism and feedback, but I wouldn't expect large changes to it. If Jim Shepard published a list of essential reading for literary fiction writers, I would expect it to be his best idea about what aspiring fiction writers should read to learn from. Writers who could emulate (or whatever writers do) the authors in that list would be well on their way to being good writers. It doesn't mean he has to have read every lit fic short story or novel out there. It does mean that these works form a comprehensive display of whatever it is that makes good fiction.
- lake99 11y ago

RodericDay 11y ago

> JohnKacz 14 minutes ago He also asks backers to send in their suggestions for the list "because of course there's going to be stuff I left out." It's really amazing the degree to which many of us white dudes, over-represented in intellectual compendiums everywhere, react when we feel the slightest, feeblest threat.

kelukelugames 11y ago
Have you read the thread on the Github diversity slides.
mc32 11y ago
It's not that. He could have put up a list with mostly women, or mostly African films, people would mostly be okay with that. It's the perception of his giving in and revising in the face of dissent on something more or less personal. Let's say he put up a list of favorite foods. Then someone notices there are no lamb dishes and he adds lamb to it. Or there is no vegetarian dish and adds vegetarian dishes. It's not a big deal either way but people read "undue influence to change personal preferences"
- RodericDay 11y ago
  You seem to be missing the point of me highlighting that Spike Lee himself asked for people to point out omissions "because of course there's going to be stuff I left out". If there's no lamb dishes, I request reminders, someone points out a lamb dish, and I add lamb, it's not healthy or reasonable to propose that I am being unduly influenced by the lamb lobby. It's within the realm of possibility, sure, but to bring it up reflects paranoia, scepticism towards lamb dishes, and possibly a persecution complex due to overexposure to lamb-related GitHub drama. It is a big deal, by the way. It makes HackerNews look like ReturnOfKings.
- aninhumer 11y ago
  >Let's say he put up a list of favorite foods. The thing is, it's not a list of his personal "favourite" films, it's a list of "must watch" films. The latter is a more authoritative statement, and moreover it is a list in which diversity of art is to be expected. So it's not unreasonable to suggest a lack of diversity in artists might indicate some oversights.
  - mc32 11y ago
    It's still his personal take on what that list looks like. In any event, for me it's neither here nor there. He's free to put up a biased or unbiased list of his choosing or anyone else's. If I dont like his list I can add my favorites, maybe they'll all be Easter European and African with no western European or Asian films. He has imprimatur. Sure, but in the end it's an unscientific list. It's a starting point, it has a local cultural bias. If he had grown up in HK would his list be the same? No, and that's okay.
- ethbro 11y ago
  Wait, what? Are we (the internet) actually simultaneously angry at a person for being un-politically correct and politically correct?
- ant6n 11y ago
  Bs. If he posted a list of just African films and films by women then people would say 'what kind of fucked up list of obscure random shit is this!'. And that's kind of the problem.

coldtea 11y ago

>Why are so many people assuming that the initial list represented his comprehensive judgement of all films ever? That's not what the parent asked.

aninhumer 11y ago
The parent asked whether the added films were either considered worthy but subconsciously omitted from the initial list, or considered unworthy and then added to the subsequent list anyway. This question ignores the possibility that their worthiness was simply never considered at all in the creation of the initial list. EDIT: It's possible the parent didn't intend those options as a dichotomy but nonetheless, that's what is implied.
- coldtea 11y ago
  >This question ignores the possibility that their worthiness was simply never considered at all in the creation of the initial list. And why would their worthiness not be considered at all in the creation of the initial list? The whole point of the initial (and the second) list was to list worthy films for filmmakers to see. Obviously, either a film comes to your mind when you're creating a list of what you consider the best films, or it doesn't. Whether the director was a woman doesn't come into play in this, unless you're a misogynist purposefully avoiding to list film by women filmmakers. Since (I assume) Lee is not the latter, here's what seems is the case. When Spike Lee thinks (on his own) of what the best films are, the first list is what comes to his mind. But after he was questioned about it, and to appease the "crowds", he subsequently added some films by women to balance the list. In other words he added them to meet some quota (regardless of the films inherent quality, which after is all is not to be judged by Spike Lee only. E.g. the might be masterpieces too -- just not Lee's original masterpieces, but some that he had to be nudged to list).
  - aninhumer 11y ago
    Firstly, it's a list of "must watch" films for artists, not "best" films. The criteria are slightly different. Secondly, whether a film "came to mind" is only somewhat related to whether he thinks it's worth inclusion in his list. Is it inconceivable to you that there could be films that did not initially occur to him, that he nonetheless considers worthy additions when he is reminded of them? Or do you suppose that Spike is a superhuman able to instantly recall all important films without fail?

mikeash 11y ago

This looks almost exactly like the typical statement I see in discussions about diversity in hiring. "If we go out of our way to hire more minorities, then we're deliberately passing on the best candidates." People seem to love to assume that everything can be perfectly ranked and compared.

StavrosK 11y ago
What's the typical counterargument to that?
- mikeash 11y ago
  I have no idea what "typical" would be, but my counterargument is that candidate ranking is extremely noisy and imprecise, and because of that it necessarily already includes bias. A good diversity initiative is simply an attempt to compensate for the existing bias, not add bias to a perfect system.

dhimes 11y ago

Why are so many people assuming that the initial list represented his comprehensive judgement of all films ever? Because he's doing it in his role of NYU professor! If Donald Knuth released a list of "CS papers every professional should read," I would fully expect it to be his comprehensive judgement of all papers ever. Do you think that he may have missed one? Do you think Spike may have? In both cases it's their professional environment, and I would expect that it would have been discussed in their professional environments. To imply that they missed something important is to imply that their close colleagues missed it too. It could happen, of course, but not something that you think about when you read a list like that. Until you see that he missed "Captain Ron." Then all bets are off.

aninhumer 11y ago
I think you're vastly underestimating the amount of effort that would be involved in comprehensively judging an entire field.[0] Sure he's a professor, but he only has so much time in the day. At some point he has to say "Right, I think that covers everything important" and get on with teaching. Not to mention, according to a quote in this thread Spike himself disagrees with you: >He also asks backers to send in their suggestions for the list "because of course there's going to be stuff I left out." [0] Although I might just about expect such a thing from Knuth...
- dhimes 11y ago
  "Right, I think that covers everything important" That would be comprehensive. As I said in a sister answer, I would expect a little tweaking of the list after criticism and feedback, but I wouldn't expect large changes to it. If Jim Shepard published a list of essential reading for literary fiction writers, I would expect it to be his best idea about what aspiring fiction writers should read to learn from. Writers who could emulate (or whatever writers do) the authors in that list would be well on their way to being good writers. It doesn't mean he has to have read every lit fic short story or novel out there. It does mean that these works form a comprehensive display of whatever it is that makes good fiction.
lake99 11y ago