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>he plays fast and loose with the facts I don't expect essays to be scientific papers. The term comes from the French verb essayer 'to attempt, to try'. It's a

by Funes- 6y ago

>he plays fast and loose with the facts I don't expect essays to be scientific papers. The term comes from the French verb essayer 'to attempt, to try'. It's a genre widely known for being exactly that: a (mostly) brief rundown of ideas, without an exhaustive empirical demonstration being necessary nor expected. On top of that, it's a ~1500-word blog post on his own website. Get real.

ziddoap 6y ago
I don't think scientific papers are the only place that should be expected to, when purporting something as fact, be well... factual. Funny enough, all throughout my many years in academia I had to provide sources for anything I stated as a fact in an essay (including opinion pieces). I should of just let my professors know that I wasn't providing them a scientific paper -- I was just attempting/trying to provide a brief rundown of ideas and they were wrong to expect empirical evidence of anything I claimed as fact.
- Funes- 6y ago
  >Funny enough, all throughout my many years in academia I had to provide sources for anything I stated as a fact in an essay (including opinion pieces). That requirement obeyed that academic institution's criteria, not the genre's traditional nature. You either were being tested by them or published something with their name attached to it, so it's only normal that they established the empirical validity of your writings. It makes sense that an academic institution, of all places, would want only rigorous content linked to it. Paul Graham, on the other hand, is just publishing a simple essay on his very own website; of course I don't expect an exhaustive empirical demonstration on his part, though any kind of factual data can be welcome. >I should of I hope your "many years in academia" weren't spent in anything even remotely related to linguistics. And that your editors there corrected your grammar, as well.
  - ziddoap 6y ago
    Oh boy you sure got me by calling out my grammar. I'm writhing in embarrassment. Good to know that outside of academia that things stated as fact have no requirement or expectation of being factual. I will temper my expectations in the future.
    - Funes- 6y ago
      >Good to know that outside of academia that things stated as fact have no requirement or expectation of being factual. Stop putting words in my mouth. I have no desire to keep pointing out straw man fallacies. Academia tends to have formal requirements of that kind. Personal blogs don't, for instance. That's the explanation behind me--and other people, surely--not expecting an elaborate empirical demonstration of everything the man writes on his site. I don't think it's that hard to stick to what's being said in my comments instead of twisting my words for the sake of sarcasm and preserving your own ego.
      - ziddoap 6y ago
        >>he plays fast and loose with the facts >Essays aren't scientific papers. Seems like you are alluding that essays do not require facts. I guess I misinterpreted. >expecting an elaborate empirical demonstration of everything the man writes on his site Talk about putting words in someones mouth. Nowhere did I say everything written on his site needs "elaborate empirical demonstration". Are you unable to finish a comment without throwing some sort of insult?
  - wtetzner 6y ago
    > I hope your "many years in academia" weren't spent in anything even remotely related to linguistics. And that your editors there corrected your grammar, as well. Please don't use personal attacks.
kerkeslager 6y ago
Who cares? If your argument is that essays aren't concerned with facts, then that's a great argument for ignoring the entire genre of essays. Ideas without basis in reality aren't worth anything. Luckily, some essayists are concerned with facts, so we don't have to throw out the whole genre. But we should absolutely ignore the essays that don't concern themselves with facts.
- Funes- 6y ago
  > If your argument is that essays aren't concerned with facts, then that's a great argument for ignoring the entire genre of essays. [...] Luckily, some essayists are concerned with facts, so we don't have to throw out the whole genre. But we should absolutely ignore the essays that don't concern themselves with facts. >If your argument is <something undesirable or unreasonable>, then <slippery slope>. Luckily, <me and the majority or authority figures disagree with you>, so <positive outcome>. That's a straw man fallacy if I've ever seen one. It's a textbook example. Congratulations. My reply to another user regarding that: >Paul Graham, on the other hand, is just publishing a simple essay on his very own website; of course I don't expect an exhaustive empirical demonstration on his part, though any kind of factual data can be welcome. Look, it's not a binary decision (facts/no facts), but a qualitative distinction: it's how I expect facts--whatever those are, but that's another discussion--to be dealt with in a short essay on a personal blog, instead of expecting or wanting essays to be deliberately unconcerned with them.
  - kerkeslager 6y ago
    > That's a straw man fallacy if I've ever seen one. It's a textbook example. Congratulations. Everyone can read the conversation and see what was said. > Look, it's not a binary decision (facts/no facts), but a qualitative distinction: it's how I expect facts--whatever those are, but that's another discussion--to be dealt with in a short essay on a personal blog, instead of expecting or wanting essays to be deliberately unconcerned with them. Okay, if that's what you're saying, I didn't understand that previously, and I'll take some blame for thinking I understood instead of asking clarifying questions. But, I'll say, the qualitative discussion of "how facts are dealt with" is pretty irrelevant if there aren't any facts to deal with. It's very much not clear that much of PG says in this essay is based in facts at all. Even if you want to argue that quality of evidence is a spectrum, the can still be a 0 value on that spectrum.
erikerikson 6y ago
Is there not a spectrum of levels of accuracy/voracity in essays? Is it not valid to have a preference for authors alignments to parts of that spectrum? Description of the world seems necessarily a compression of facts. I read this critique as stating more or less, "I find that PG tends to bias the data selected for the compression to support the conclusions he is inclined to promote". I agree that essays have a wider allowable not-grounded-in-demonstrable-reality-ness compared to scientific papers but if an author seems to one to cherry pick, it seems reasonable for the one to declare that as a criticism of the author. This is an important thing to know, especially since those compression statements are usually the premises the theses of the essays depend.

by Funes- 6y ago

ziddoap 6y ago

I don't think scientific papers are the only place that should be expected to, when purporting something as fact, be well... factual. Funny enough, all throughout my many years in academia I had to provide sources for anything I stated as a fact in an essay (including opinion pieces). I should of just let my professors know that I wasn't providing them a scientific paper -- I was just attempting/trying to provide a brief rundown of ideas and they were wrong to expect empirical evidence of anything I claimed as fact.

Funes- 6y ago
>Funny enough, all throughout my many years in academia I had to provide sources for anything I stated as a fact in an essay (including opinion pieces). That requirement obeyed that academic institution's criteria, not the genre's traditional nature. You either were being tested by them or published something with their name attached to it, so it's only normal that they established the empirical validity of your writings. It makes sense that an academic institution, of all places, would want only rigorous content linked to it. Paul Graham, on the other hand, is just publishing a simple essay on his very own website; of course I don't expect an exhaustive empirical demonstration on his part, though any kind of factual data can be welcome. >I should of I hope your "many years in academia" weren't spent in anything even remotely related to linguistics. And that your editors there corrected your grammar, as well.
- ziddoap 6y ago
  Oh boy you sure got me by calling out my grammar. I'm writhing in embarrassment. Good to know that outside of academia that things stated as fact have no requirement or expectation of being factual. I will temper my expectations in the future.
  - Funes- 6y ago
    >Good to know that outside of academia that things stated as fact have no requirement or expectation of being factual. Stop putting words in my mouth. I have no desire to keep pointing out straw man fallacies. Academia tends to have formal requirements of that kind. Personal blogs don't, for instance. That's the explanation behind me--and other people, surely--not expecting an elaborate empirical demonstration of everything the man writes on his site. I don't think it's that hard to stick to what's being said in my comments instead of twisting my words for the sake of sarcasm and preserving your own ego.
    - ziddoap 6y ago
      >>he plays fast and loose with the facts >Essays aren't scientific papers. Seems like you are alluding that essays do not require facts. I guess I misinterpreted. >expecting an elaborate empirical demonstration of everything the man writes on his site Talk about putting words in someones mouth. Nowhere did I say everything written on his site needs "elaborate empirical demonstration". Are you unable to finish a comment without throwing some sort of insult?
- wtetzner 6y ago
  > I hope your "many years in academia" weren't spent in anything even remotely related to linguistics. And that your editors there corrected your grammar, as well. Please don't use personal attacks.

kerkeslager 6y ago

Who cares? If your argument is that essays aren't concerned with facts, then that's a great argument for ignoring the entire genre of essays. Ideas without basis in reality aren't worth anything. Luckily, some essayists are concerned with facts, so we don't have to throw out the whole genre. But we should absolutely ignore the essays that don't concern themselves with facts.

Funes- 6y ago
> If your argument is that essays aren't concerned with facts, then that's a great argument for ignoring the entire genre of essays. [...] Luckily, some essayists are concerned with facts, so we don't have to throw out the whole genre. But we should absolutely ignore the essays that don't concern themselves with facts. >If your argument is <something undesirable or unreasonable>, then <slippery slope>. Luckily, <me and the majority or authority figures disagree with you>, so <positive outcome>. That's a straw man fallacy if I've ever seen one. It's a textbook example. Congratulations. My reply to another user regarding that: >Paul Graham, on the other hand, is just publishing a simple essay on his very own website; of course I don't expect an exhaustive empirical demonstration on his part, though any kind of factual data can be welcome. Look, it's not a binary decision (facts/no facts), but a qualitative distinction: it's how I expect facts--whatever those are, but that's another discussion--to be dealt with in a short essay on a personal blog, instead of expecting or wanting essays to be deliberately unconcerned with them.
- kerkeslager 6y ago
  > That's a straw man fallacy if I've ever seen one. It's a textbook example. Congratulations. Everyone can read the conversation and see what was said. > Look, it's not a binary decision (facts/no facts), but a qualitative distinction: it's how I expect facts--whatever those are, but that's another discussion--to be dealt with in a short essay on a personal blog, instead of expecting or wanting essays to be deliberately unconcerned with them. Okay, if that's what you're saying, I didn't understand that previously, and I'll take some blame for thinking I understood instead of asking clarifying questions. But, I'll say, the qualitative discussion of "how facts are dealt with" is pretty irrelevant if there aren't any facts to deal with. It's very much not clear that much of PG says in this essay is based in facts at all. Even if you want to argue that quality of evidence is a spectrum, the can still be a 0 value on that spectrum.

erikerikson 6y ago

Is there not a spectrum of levels of accuracy/voracity in essays? Is it not valid to have a preference for authors alignments to parts of that spectrum? Description of the world seems necessarily a compression of facts. I read this critique as stating more or less, "I find that PG tends to bias the data selected for the compression to support the conclusions he is inclined to promote". I agree that essays have a wider allowable not-grounded-in-demonstrable-reality-ness compared to scientific papers but if an author seems to one to cherry pick, it seems reasonable for the one to declare that as a criticism of the author. This is an important thing to know, especially since those compression statements are usually the premises the theses of the essays depend.