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The down votes are likely for trying to invoke an ad hominem argument. No matter someone's credentials, it's still a logical fallacy and something to be avoided

The down votes are likely for trying to invoke an ad hominem argument. No matter someone's credentials, it's still a logical fallacy and something to be avoided. If he is an authority on the subject, it should show through in his comments. I'm sure he's a very smart and knowledgable person. But there are a lot of smart and knowledgable people here and by invoking his credentials, he's presuming that the people he's talking to are less knowledgable, intelligent or entitled to their opinions. It's insulting and he's earned his downs. Full disclosure: I downed his 'look me up' post and upped his more substantive posts.

eropple 9y ago
Except 'lisper wasn't making an argument. He was responding to a case of somebody being socially jerkish in a way that was pretty gentle, even for HN's coddling standards. That's important, because downvotes don't fix jerks--only pointing out the behavior does. Coming in hot with "oh but fallacies, hmm hmm, heaven forfend" when what's being suggested is "maybe don't be a jerk?" is not a great look, don't you think?
- curun1r 9y ago
  He was making an argument and its disingenuous for you to suggest otherwise. Go back and look at what he wrote. He basically said, "before you dismiss my idea as not having merit, go look me up." Ideas have merit independent of who has them. That's the point. He was citing his credentials to back up his earlier argument. I'm not saying that the comment that he was replying to was right or even civil and had he left off his second "Oh, BTW..." line, it would have been a reasonable response. But including it not only speaks to the comment he was replying to but also to everyone who disagrees with his idea. BTW...parodying what I said followed by condescension is also not a great look.
  - carapace 9y ago
    I'm sorry but I think your pattern matching for "Argument from Authority" is misfiring here. Lisper wasn't saying, "I'm right because I'm me." He was saying, "Adjust your prior[1] for my statement given additional data about its source." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_probability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_probability
    - curun1r 9y ago
      Quoting directly: > Oh, and BTW, before you completely dismiss the idea that my suggestion might have merit, you might want to look me up. He wasn't saying "I'm right because I'm me." He was saying, "I'm me so don't assume I'm wrong." It's still an appeal to authority. Had his credentials been part of the first line, where he was confirming that he was serious about his previous post, then your interpretation would be correct.
      - lisper 9y ago
        > Had his credentials been part of the first line, where he was confirming that he was serious about his previous post, then your interpretation would be correct. Wow, you have quite the exacting standards.
        curun1r 9y ago
        Hey...context matters. When you're talking about your own tendencies (whether you're likely to be serious or joking), who you are matters. When you're supporting your argument it doesn't. If you call that exacting standards, so be it. I call it reading comprehension.
        lisper 9y ago
        > Hey...context matters Indeed it does. So let's recall the context in which I made my original comment: > Are you seriously suggesting that, widgety though JS's implicit type conversions might be, if its booleans had three values then things would be better? That seemed to me to be a pretty non-constructive question, essentially a passive-aggressive way of saying, "You can't possibly be serious. You must be a complete newbie dweeb to come up with such a dumb idea." That's why I responded the way I did.
carapace 9y ago
> If he is an authority on the subject, it should show through in his comments. The comment speculating on the "OTHERWISE" clause is the kind of brilliant off-beat thinking that challenges the level of understanding of the reader. The people scoffing at and downvoting it are, however smart and knowledgeable they may be, ignorant or foolish. If they thought it through they might learn something. It's a perfectly valid response to say, "Hey wait a minute, I know what I'm talking about here." It's not appeal to authority, and it is certainly not an ad hominem since the people he's talking to have shown that they don't understand.
- curun1r 9y ago
  > brilliant off-beat thinking Those words must have new meaning since he was citing as an example a language that's existed since the 70s. Ternary booleans are far from a unique or novel concept. The main difference is that for most languages, including Javascript, that third value exists at the variable binding or expression level, not the value level. Other languages that don't allow nulls encode that third value in a Maybe type. SQL, being a thin abstraction over data storage that needs to be able to encode nulls, doesn't make that distinction. That his idea was poorly worded to state that the actual Javascript value would have a third possibility rather than the comparison expression being nullable doesn't add to his credibility. The distinction between an expression evaluation, variable binding and a value isn't exactly a newbie concept, but for someone with the credentials he's claiming, I'd expect him to know it and be more precise. > since the people he's talking to have shown that they don't understand. Perhaps you should go back and read the exchange. The comment he was replying to was specifically about the mixture of Javascript and ternary booleans, not just ternary booleans. Also, if you re-read the comment that you're calling ignorant in the context of the authors original confusing of expression evaluations and values there's at least the possibility that he's making a very valid point, albeit in a way that can be read as confrontational. Javascript could already add an otherwise block without adding a third boolean value...all that would be necessary is to allow comparison operators evaluate to null or undefined and then execute the otherwise block in that case. Adding a third value would mean that a boolean variable binding could now have 5 values, true, false, not_true_or_false, null or undefined. That's nonsensical and deserves to be called out. It's bad enough that the language has null and undefined, since it causes a ton of confusion that could have been avoided. Adding some special "not null but sort of null" boolean value would just add more confusion to the language.

eropple 9y ago

Except 'lisper wasn't making an argument. He was responding to a case of somebody being socially jerkish in a way that was pretty gentle, even for HN's coddling standards. That's important, because downvotes don't fix jerks--only pointing out the behavior does. Coming in hot with "oh but fallacies, hmm hmm, heaven forfend" when what's being suggested is "maybe don't be a jerk?" is not a great look, don't you think?

curun1r 9y ago
He was making an argument and its disingenuous for you to suggest otherwise. Go back and look at what he wrote. He basically said, "before you dismiss my idea as not having merit, go look me up." Ideas have merit independent of who has them. That's the point. He was citing his credentials to back up his earlier argument. I'm not saying that the comment that he was replying to was right or even civil and had he left off his second "Oh, BTW..." line, it would have been a reasonable response. But including it not only speaks to the comment he was replying to but also to everyone who disagrees with his idea. BTW...parodying what I said followed by condescension is also not a great look.
- carapace 9y ago
  I'm sorry but I think your pattern matching for "Argument from Authority" is misfiring here. Lisper wasn't saying, "I'm right because I'm me." He was saying, "Adjust your prior[1] for my statement given additional data about its source." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_probability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_probability
  - curun1r 9y ago
    Quoting directly: > Oh, and BTW, before you completely dismiss the idea that my suggestion might have merit, you might want to look me up. He wasn't saying "I'm right because I'm me." He was saying, "I'm me so don't assume I'm wrong." It's still an appeal to authority. Had his credentials been part of the first line, where he was confirming that he was serious about his previous post, then your interpretation would be correct.
    - lisper 9y ago
      > Had his credentials been part of the first line, where he was confirming that he was serious about his previous post, then your interpretation would be correct. Wow, you have quite the exacting standards.
      - curun1r 9y ago
        Hey...context matters. When you're talking about your own tendencies (whether you're likely to be serious or joking), who you are matters. When you're supporting your argument it doesn't. If you call that exacting standards, so be it. I call it reading comprehension.
        lisper 9y ago
        > Hey...context matters Indeed it does. So let's recall the context in which I made my original comment: > Are you seriously suggesting that, widgety though JS's implicit type conversions might be, if its booleans had three values then things would be better? That seemed to me to be a pretty non-constructive question, essentially a passive-aggressive way of saying, "You can't possibly be serious. You must be a complete newbie dweeb to come up with such a dumb idea." That's why I responded the way I did.

carapace 9y ago

> If he is an authority on the subject, it should show through in his comments. The comment speculating on the "OTHERWISE" clause is the kind of brilliant off-beat thinking that challenges the level of understanding of the reader. The people scoffing at and downvoting it are, however smart and knowledgeable they may be, ignorant or foolish. If they thought it through they might learn something. It's a perfectly valid response to say, "Hey wait a minute, I know what I'm talking about here." It's not appeal to authority, and it is certainly not an ad hominem since the people he's talking to have shown that they don't understand.

curun1r 9y ago
> brilliant off-beat thinking Those words must have new meaning since he was citing as an example a language that's existed since the 70s. Ternary booleans are far from a unique or novel concept. The main difference is that for most languages, including Javascript, that third value exists at the variable binding or expression level, not the value level. Other languages that don't allow nulls encode that third value in a Maybe type. SQL, being a thin abstraction over data storage that needs to be able to encode nulls, doesn't make that distinction. That his idea was poorly worded to state that the actual Javascript value would have a third possibility rather than the comparison expression being nullable doesn't add to his credibility. The distinction between an expression evaluation, variable binding and a value isn't exactly a newbie concept, but for someone with the credentials he's claiming, I'd expect him to know it and be more precise. > since the people he's talking to have shown that they don't understand. Perhaps you should go back and read the exchange. The comment he was replying to was specifically about the mixture of Javascript and ternary booleans, not just ternary booleans. Also, if you re-read the comment that you're calling ignorant in the context of the authors original confusing of expression evaluations and values there's at least the possibility that he's making a very valid point, albeit in a way that can be read as confrontational. Javascript could already add an otherwise block without adding a third boolean value...all that would be necessary is to allow comparison operators evaluate to null or undefined and then execute the otherwise block in that case. Adding a third value would mean that a boolean variable binding could now have 5 values, true, false, not_true_or_false, null or undefined. That's nonsensical and deserves to be called out. It's bad enough that the language has null and undefined, since it causes a ton of confusion that could have been avoided. Adding some special "not null but sort of null" boolean value would just add more confusion to the language.