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The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. At issue here is a fundamental problem that humans have been struggling with since recorded history, who dec

The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. At issue here is a fundamental problem that humans have been struggling with since recorded history, who decides what's true? When we have demonstrated bad actors at every level of discussion, from authoritative sources down to internet trolls - how do we identify truth, especially with all of it's nuance, without degeneration into a Ministry of Truth, and punishing dissent? While I understand that the constant battle against misinformation and disinformation is exhausting, isn't that what you're signing up for by engaging in a medium that encourages discussion? If you don't want discussion and contrasting viewpoints, perhaps you're better served by publishing a blog, or a book, or academic paper where discussion is much slower and involves published responses? Edit: the irony of a comment like this being downvoted isn't lost on me. That's ok, I knew when I wrote it that it would be.

Pfhreak 5y ago
> The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. This is true if and only if there is sufficient bandwidth to process all those ideas AND the actors are all people who are trying to learn/seek truth. Expertise and conversation time is limited, and it's considerably cheaper to ask questions and sow doubt than it is to fully address those questions. Given that asymmetry, it feels more than reasonable to accept certain things as ground truth and eliminate time wasted on dealing with trolls.
claudiawerner 5y ago
> The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. I can easily imagine situations where that's not true; besides that, you'd have to admit that people being convinced of bad (and potentially deadly ideas, e.g. anti-vaccination) will happen for some period of time. This concept of "more ideas" is time-based, it relies on the hypothesis that things work out to "the truth" in the end. I don't think that's the case much of the time, and I can see why people don't like the idea of holding that hope for some statements. There is reason to believe that some authorities - such as scientific ones and even judicial ones, do a better job of finding truth than other venues of discussion. I think AskHistorians desires to be a microcosm of that. There is an excellent paper by Fred Schauer about the "search for truth" defence of free speech, and how it relates to time[0]. [0] "Free Speech, the Search for Truth, and the Problem of Collective Knowledge" (2017): https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4682&context=smulr https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4682&con...
- claytongulick 5y ago
  I mostly agree with you, the problem is that the alternative is worse. Every time in history that we've institutionalized suppressing speech in support of official truth, it has gone horribly wrong. The problem with nuanced issues like this is that there isn't really a "right" or "wrong" answer, there's just bad and less bad.
AlotOfReading 5y ago
Many, many more people read posts than answer them. Leaving those posts up will give some proportion of readers the idea that such questions are reasonable, open holes in our knowledge. Even if there's an answer provided (potentially hours later), the damage would have already been done. The forum is a place for education. Leaving bad faith questions up hurts that goal and there aren't many practical alternatives, especially given the massive asymmetry in effort by contributors. Did you know that posts often take multiple hours to write? It would only take a couple dozen malicious posters to completely overwhelm the relatively small contributor base without mod intervention.
UncleMeat 5y ago
How many more ideas? There's been 80 years of continuous demonstration that holocaust denial is ahistorical garbage. Yet people continue to believe it because it allows them to justify their hatred. When can we stop? Surely at some point people are allowed to say "no, go home" to the person who had nearly unlimited opportunity to educate themselves and refused.
- nailer 5y ago
  Or just post a set of links refuting the most common claims. As you’ve said by now the topic has come up frequently enough.
- jjcon 5y ago
  > There's been 80 years of continuous demonstration that holocaust denial is ahistorical garbage. Yet people continue to believe it because it allows them to justify their hatred. You are suggesting that our liberal approach to free speech has failed so we might as well go full authoritarian and shut down the crazy… all to prevent another tide of nazi authoritarianism? That is hilariously contradictory.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - UncleMeat 5y ago
    Full authoritarian? No. It is a subreddit. At what point would you stop allowing somebody clearly engaging in bad faith from wasting your time? Never?

Pfhreak 5y ago

> The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. This is true if and only if there is sufficient bandwidth to process all those ideas AND the actors are all people who are trying to learn/seek truth. Expertise and conversation time is limited, and it's considerably cheaper to ask questions and sow doubt than it is to fully address those questions. Given that asymmetry, it feels more than reasonable to accept certain things as ground truth and eliminate time wasted on dealing with trolls.

claudiawerner 5y ago

> The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. I can easily imagine situations where that's not true; besides that, you'd have to admit that people being convinced of bad (and potentially deadly ideas, e.g. anti-vaccination) will happen for some period of time. This concept of "more ideas" is time-based, it relies on the hypothesis that things work out to "the truth" in the end. I don't think that's the case much of the time, and I can see why people don't like the idea of holding that hope for some statements. There is reason to believe that some authorities - such as scientific ones and even judicial ones, do a better job of finding truth than other venues of discussion. I think AskHistorians desires to be a microcosm of that. There is an excellent paper by Fred Schauer about the "search for truth" defence of free speech, and how it relates to time[0]. [0] "Free Speech, the Search for Truth, and the Problem of Collective Knowledge" (2017): https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4682&context=smulr https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4682&con...

claytongulick 5y ago
I mostly agree with you, the problem is that the alternative is worse. Every time in history that we've institutionalized suppressing speech in support of official truth, it has gone horribly wrong. The problem with nuanced issues like this is that there isn't really a "right" or "wrong" answer, there's just bad and less bad.

AlotOfReading 5y ago

Many, many more people read posts than answer them. Leaving those posts up will give some proportion of readers the idea that such questions are reasonable, open holes in our knowledge. Even if there's an answer provided (potentially hours later), the damage would have already been done. The forum is a place for education. Leaving bad faith questions up hurts that goal and there aren't many practical alternatives, especially given the massive asymmetry in effort by contributors. Did you know that posts often take multiple hours to write? It would only take a couple dozen malicious posters to completely overwhelm the relatively small contributor base without mod intervention.

UncleMeat 5y ago

How many more ideas? There's been 80 years of continuous demonstration that holocaust denial is ahistorical garbage. Yet people continue to believe it because it allows them to justify their hatred. When can we stop? Surely at some point people are allowed to say "no, go home" to the person who had nearly unlimited opportunity to educate themselves and refused.

nailer 5y ago
Or just post a set of links refuting the most common claims. As you’ve said by now the topic has come up frequently enough.
jjcon 5y ago
> There's been 80 years of continuous demonstration that holocaust denial is ahistorical garbage. Yet people continue to believe it because it allows them to justify their hatred. You are suggesting that our liberal approach to free speech has failed so we might as well go full authoritarian and shut down the crazy… all to prevent another tide of nazi authoritarianism? That is hilariously contradictory.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- UncleMeat 5y ago
  Full authoritarian? No. It is a subreddit. At what point would you stop allowing somebody clearly engaging in bad faith from wasting your time? Never?