4 ms·
> If you're going to say something on HN, please make it substantive. I believe calling out pseudoscience as such is substantive. To be perfectly clear, I thin
by epgui 3y ago
> If you're going to say something on HN, please make it substantive.
I believe calling out pseudoscience as such is substantive. To be perfectly clear, I think not doing it would even be irresponsible. Also, substantiveness does not always require great detail, under most common usages of the term that I know of.
> This applies to scientists the same as any other commenters.
That is not at issue.
- dang 3y agoSorry, (and I promise it's nothing personal!) but just using the putdown "pseudoscience" is not enough to make a comment substantive. This is just standard HN moderation, and it's not a borderline call. Generally speaking if what you're doing can be described as "calling out", it's probably better to just not post it to HN anyhow. That's not the curious conversation we're looking for. For the comment to count as substantive you have to explain something about why, and then you don't need the putdown part. People are slinging pejoratives and tropes like "pseudoscience" all over the internet. Adding "I'm a scientist" doesn't overcome this; besides which of course, anybody can say "I"m a" anything.
- epgui 3y agoIs a "putdown" essentially an insult? Because I used the word "pseudoscience" literally. Not as an insult, but as an academic word-label. > People are slinging pejoratives and tropes like "pseudoscience" all over the internet. Perhaps, but in this case, the most charitable reading is the literal one.
- dang 3y agoOk, but the problem is that the term is an internet cliché and people are going to interpret it in the way it's commonly used, even if you don't intend it as a putdown.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- dang 3y agoWe have to moderate by effects, not intent. No one can know your intent but effects are observable, they're what matter (because they're what affect the site), and you're responsible for them. (I don't mean you personally, of course; I mean all commenters.) Because of this, the burden is on the commenter to disambiguate. This is also standard HN moderation btw: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=burden%20disambiguate%20by%3Adang&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... I feel like we've drifted a bit, which is largely my fault, but the basic point is that when I look at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38841126 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38841126 - it's not a borderline case. That kind of comment isn't ok here.