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What makes you think HN is more susceptible to confirmation bias than any other social media site? Any publisher based on clicks/upvotes/likes etc is a confirm

What makes you think HN is more susceptible to confirmation bias than any other social media site? Any publisher based on clicks/upvotes/likes etc is a confirmation bias engine for its user base.

wolverine876 4y ago
I think there is some miscommunication somewhere between our comments: I did not mean to comment on confirmation bias, I don't see how it's involved (what inherent bias would it be confirming?); I wasn't comparing HN to other sites; I'm not sure what publisher is involved here - HN didn't publish the studies, etc.
- fullshark 4y ago
  The bias that psychology/social science is not a real science and its findings are mostly bunk. The publisher is HN which is a website/aggregator that publishes a page of links its readership enjoys reading. They promote/uprank the stuff that its readership finds particularly interesting, things like that the entire field of psychology is bunk and its findings are not reproducible. Edit: this a fun twist on that preconceived notion. Not only is it bunk but a study that you thought shows it is bunk is also bunk! It’s bunk all the way down.
  - wolverine876 4y ago
    I see what you mean now, thanks. I guess that leaps over my question: Why is HN so biased toward thinking scholarly research - including science, social science, humanities - is 'bunk'? I don't think it's limited to social science; it happens with all research. I guess that we see social science targeted more because the non-HN, Internet-wide reactionary movement specifically targets social science (presumably because the reactionaries dislike the research results), and therefore the HN population has more fodder and momentum to work with - denigrating social science is more normative than denigrating natural science, there's a social tide that carries you along, which is apparently all that's needed today to make a decision. > Edit: this a fun twist on that preconceived notion. Not only is it bunk but a study that you thought shows it is bunk is also bunk! It’s bunk all the way down. Perhaps you know already, but that is exactly the goal of trolls and more professional propagandists: Disrupt - disrupt all institutions, sources of knowledge, authority, civil society, civil conversation, social trust, etc. It's not to persuade people of their position - like reactionaries, there is no position except 'anti-' whatever is said. Bunk all the way down is exactly what they want people to think. Look at the results with vaccines. Look at the despair people have of everything, of even the notion of progress or change, of even trying to have a civil conversation.
    - fullshark 4y ago
      Funny you use the word "disrupt" in your ending paragraph, given the HN community is so full of aspirational start up founders and engineers who prided themselves on being "disrupters" at least that was the rallying call for a decade. You can read what Peter Thiel or Marc Andressen have to say about academic findings and you can see that attitude re: academia has basically propagated down. Ultimately, a lot of people are scoring points online calling academic research bunk because a lot of it is bunk, published for professional gain instead of pushing human knowledge further which is the entire supposed reason for the author's grant and their institution even existing. I singled out social science cause engineers/hard scientists always have thumbed their nose at social scientists, sometimes for very good reasons (they hijack the language and techniques of hard science to give themselves credibility even when its not appropriate) and sometimes for not good reasons (they can't code as well as me so they are invalid).
      - wolverine876 4y ago
        > Funny you use the word "disrupt" in your ending paragraph, given the HN community is so full of aspirational start up founders and engineers who prided themselves on being "disrupters" at least that was the rallying call for a decade. I don't think it's coincidence. What was a tool has become a religious practice for which the original purpose has been forgotten, and which powerful people have twisted to their own desires - more power and wealth for them by shifting it away from democratic government, the public, by making themselves arbiters of truth who judge, in their monumental, blinding genius, all of the world's scholars - all they need to do is say something disparaging. Now they disrupt everything, including democracy, truth, and freedom. > a lot of people are scoring points online calling academic research bunk because a lot of it is bunk, published for professional gain instead of pushing human knowledge further Isn't that just repeating Thiel's and Andressen's claims (as you describe them)? You say it like it's assumed, but other than everyone repeating it, I don't see much evidence of it. Of course it's flawed, like every human endeavor is flawed, including Thiel's and Andressen's.

What makes you think HN is more susceptible to confirmation bias than any other social media site? Any publisher based on clicks/upvotes/likes etc is a confirmation bias engine for its user base.

wolverine876 4y ago

I think there is some miscommunication somewhere between our comments: I did not mean to comment on confirmation bias, I don't see how it's involved (what inherent bias would it be confirming?); I wasn't comparing HN to other sites; I'm not sure what publisher is involved here - HN didn't publish the studies, etc.

fullshark 4y ago
The bias that psychology/social science is not a real science and its findings are mostly bunk. The publisher is HN which is a website/aggregator that publishes a page of links its readership enjoys reading. They promote/uprank the stuff that its readership finds particularly interesting, things like that the entire field of psychology is bunk and its findings are not reproducible. Edit: this a fun twist on that preconceived notion. Not only is it bunk but a study that you thought shows it is bunk is also bunk! It’s bunk all the way down.
- wolverine876 4y ago
  I see what you mean now, thanks. I guess that leaps over my question: Why is HN so biased toward thinking scholarly research - including science, social science, humanities - is 'bunk'? I don't think it's limited to social science; it happens with all research. I guess that we see social science targeted more because the non-HN, Internet-wide reactionary movement specifically targets social science (presumably because the reactionaries dislike the research results), and therefore the HN population has more fodder and momentum to work with - denigrating social science is more normative than denigrating natural science, there's a social tide that carries you along, which is apparently all that's needed today to make a decision. > Edit: this a fun twist on that preconceived notion. Not only is it bunk but a study that you thought shows it is bunk is also bunk! It’s bunk all the way down. Perhaps you know already, but that is exactly the goal of trolls and more professional propagandists: Disrupt - disrupt all institutions, sources of knowledge, authority, civil society, civil conversation, social trust, etc. It's not to persuade people of their position - like reactionaries, there is no position except 'anti-' whatever is said. Bunk all the way down is exactly what they want people to think. Look at the results with vaccines. Look at the despair people have of everything, of even the notion of progress or change, of even trying to have a civil conversation.
  - fullshark 4y ago
    Funny you use the word "disrupt" in your ending paragraph, given the HN community is so full of aspirational start up founders and engineers who prided themselves on being "disrupters" at least that was the rallying call for a decade. You can read what Peter Thiel or Marc Andressen have to say about academic findings and you can see that attitude re: academia has basically propagated down. Ultimately, a lot of people are scoring points online calling academic research bunk because a lot of it is bunk, published for professional gain instead of pushing human knowledge further which is the entire supposed reason for the author's grant and their institution even existing. I singled out social science cause engineers/hard scientists always have thumbed their nose at social scientists, sometimes for very good reasons (they hijack the language and techniques of hard science to give themselves credibility even when its not appropriate) and sometimes for not good reasons (they can't code as well as me so they are invalid).
    - wolverine876 4y ago
      > Funny you use the word "disrupt" in your ending paragraph, given the HN community is so full of aspirational start up founders and engineers who prided themselves on being "disrupters" at least that was the rallying call for a decade. I don't think it's coincidence. What was a tool has become a religious practice for which the original purpose has been forgotten, and which powerful people have twisted to their own desires - more power and wealth for them by shifting it away from democratic government, the public, by making themselves arbiters of truth who judge, in their monumental, blinding genius, all of the world's scholars - all they need to do is say something disparaging. Now they disrupt everything, including democracy, truth, and freedom. > a lot of people are scoring points online calling academic research bunk because a lot of it is bunk, published for professional gain instead of pushing human knowledge further Isn't that just repeating Thiel's and Andressen's claims (as you describe them)? You say it like it's assumed, but other than everyone repeating it, I don't see much evidence of it. Of course it's flawed, like every human endeavor is flawed, including Thiel's and Andressen's.