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One of the most negative habits is in my opinion the failure to read a comment charitably (to make an effort to interpret it in the best possible light). Instea

by Udo 12y ago

One of the most negative habits is in my opinion the failure to read a comment charitably (to make an effort to interpret it in the best possible light). Instead, people often tend to misread or miserunderstand what's being said, only to use the opportunity to write a "correction" based on that false impression. A worse flavor of the same problem is a misunderstanding that is then used to justify outrage or personal annoyance. That's what I find worthy of being changed, and I will certainly make an effort to read comments more charitably as well. Overall though, and I realize this is quite anecdotal, rampant negativity - especially about things other members of the community have created - seems to have gotten less common recently.

webwanderings 12y ago
You are right. I read this somewhere, something along the lines ... that when you disagree with someone, you should first make sure to repeat and restate the arguments of the opponent you disagreeing with, in your own words, before making any of your own arguments.
- mwfunk 12y ago
  I've never heard that before, but it's excellent advice. Sometimes I like to come up with the best argument I possibly can against my own beliefs (basically playing devil's advocate with myself) to better understand opposing viewpoints, but this is even better.
- jessriedel 12y ago
  Here's one version, from Daniel Dennett: > How to compose a successful critical commentary: > 1. You should attempt to re-express your target’s position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, “Thanks, I wish I’d thought of putting it that way. > 2. You should list any points of agreement (especially if they are not matters of general or widespread agreement). > 3. You should mention anything you have learned from your target. > 4. Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism. http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/03/28/daniel-dennett-rapoport-rules-criticism/ http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/03/28/daniel-den... I add thoughts here: http://blog.jessriedel.com/2015/01/28/links-for-january-2015/ http://blog.jessriedel.com/2015/01/28/links-for-january-2015...
  - webwanderings 12y ago
    But, are you disagreeing or agreeing with me? LOL, j/k. Things are always so subtle with human communication. It is always fun to watch/see people put down rules to manage the psychology of communication (referring to original thread). But following rules, or have conscious awareness of the least minimum rules (etiquette is a better word) is always so important in having a reasonable environment.
  - tokenadult 12y ago
    Thanks for sharing that list.
  - JoshTriplett 12y ago
    I've seen it put as "steelmanning" an argument, as the opposite of a strawman. A strawman misrepresents the opposing argument to make it weaker; a steelman interprets an argument as strongly as possible before refuting it. At the very least, I try to phrase feedback as "this is awesome; I particularly like the ability to ... and the approach addressing .... I think it would help to also ...", or similar statements that make it clear what's good before commenting on what could be improved.
  - _deh 12y ago
    It's an excellent list. A little amusing as Dennett's own debating style is a touch more robust than this might suggest. Though in all fairness, if it's him vs. another philosopher of similar standing, both with subtle and complex positions built up over 40+ year careers, working through steps 1 - 3 might lengthen the discussion somewhat.
- ThrustVectoring 12y ago
  That reads like some of the mediation or non-violent communication advice I've heard. The point is that it lets people feel like they've been heard and understood.
- tptacek 12y ago
  I also like the (related) idea of an Ideological Turing Test: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_Turing_Test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_Turing_Test
  - JoshTriplett 12y ago
    That's a really good idea; you shouldn't just be able to restate the opposing argument as a devil's advocate, you should be able to understand all the arguments well enough to make them as effectively as any advocate. And you shouldn't sound like a caricature of that position unless all advocates of that position sound equally ridiculous.
    - protomyth 12y ago
      "you shouldn't sound like a caricature of that position unless all advocates of that position sound equally ridiculous" No, you owe it to yourself to make the best possible argument for the other side's position. It might still sound ridiculous in the end, but you really want to nail it and understand the argument. If for no other reason to expand your thinking on your side. Sadly, you probably should also understand the sound bites, but that is concession to how the world works and not your own education.
      - JoshTriplett 12y ago
        > No, you owe it to yourself to make the best possible argument for the other side's position. It might still sound ridiculous in the end, but you really want to nail it and understand the argument. If for no other reason to expand your thinking on your side. I think we're saying the same thing. I was suggesting that in some cases, the arguments really don't hold water at all, and there's no way to make them sound otherwise. In which case, if you're attempting to pass a Turing-like test for sounding like someone advocating that position, you're going to sound equally ridiculous.
        mkr-hn 12y ago
        Sometimes, the best thing to do is repeat someone's ridiculous view back to them. Most of the time, I get "yes, that's correct" back and can be sure there's no point in continuing. Saves time and energy.
ColinDabritz 12y ago
I think you're right! It's difficult to communicate tone and other 'out of band' stuff through text. This is what Wikipedia's "Assume good faith" guideline is to addresses. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Assume_good_faith http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Assume_good_faith
staunch 12y ago
I think you nailed the real problem, which is that people have become so quick to write off anyone who ruffles their feathers at all. Drew Houston describes the HN feedback he received for Dropbox as all the motivation he needed to keep going. He also explained that he knew it was a hit because of how many people were saying negative things. Today though, any truly critical comment means you're either a hater or a troll. Every person is either a friend or an enemy. Inside the club or outside the club. You can't sincerely like something, and also be very critical about aspects of it, without instantly transforming into a jealous hater. Assuming the worst about other people is probably the most negative thing you can do. Everyone is a mixed bag.
- kelukelugames 12y ago
  Sometimes I like to ask a lot of critical questions because I care and I really like it. Other times because I'm trying to rip it to shreds. It's probably impossible to tell for someone online which mode I am in.
- Udo 12y ago
  I would like to say though that as someone who occasionally makes things, I do appreciate proper critique and I do like to hear about different view points. Voicing legitimate and non-pedantic disagreement in a polite manner is to me one of the major features HN offers, simply because it's a collection of interesting people. Myself, I don't always agree with the majority opinion either. For example, I disagree with Sam's opinion about AGI, and even though that particular comment was received quite badly, I never meant it to be anything else but an invitation to see things from another perspective.
- mreiland 12y ago
  > I think you nailed the real problem, which is that people have become so quick to write off anyone who ruffles their feathers at all. I'm quick to write off people and I won't apologize for it. I have better things to do with my time than to give everyone the same amount of time and respect. If HN has decided to be touchy feely than this most certainly isn't the place for me. I prefer actual discourse where bullshit opinions are called out as such. edit: shit you guys, can't you go with the reading my comment charitably or will you hit that downvote button again, thereby showing your hypocrisy? I love the internet, I really do.
maxerickson 12y ago
The corrections I find the most frustrating are the ones that attempt to frame something that is reasonably a difference of opinion as a black/white, right/wrong issue. A made up example using something that is about as subjective as possible: No, that's wrong, strawberries are awful. (just changing that to "I disagree, ..." gets rid of a lot of the nonsense) There also ends up being a lot of what is essentially squabbling, comments going back and forth over what someone meant, or pedantically squishing some point that had done a good enough job of transmitting the idea (I'm all for being careful when it matters, I'm pretty sure it doesn't matter all the time).
- happyscrappy 12y ago
  The pedantic bickering is brutal because you cannot collapse threads.
  - danellis 12y ago
    The whole site needs rewriting and modernizing. Considering the audience, it's kind of shocking how stale it is.
    - krapp 12y ago
      I'm tempted to chalk that up to HN being, essentially, a pet project implemented in a toy language as a not entirely open source[0] forum maintained by volunteers. Of course, I don't know but that's my guess, that pg just didn't work very hard on polishing up the parts he didn't find personally interesting. For some reason, people seem to be weirdly elitist about HN's layout, and act as if any slight change to the UI is going to allow the barbarians of the internet to storm the gates, until Hacker News is aught but cat memes and ashes. [0] The language and original forum are, obviously, open source. But AFAIK you can't make pull requests against the code HN is actually running, which has had tons of modifications made to it, because that's special sauce. There used to be a repo for making bug and feature requests but that seems to no longer be active. Of course, you could roll your own minimalistic threaded forum, but getting people to move from HN anywhere other than lobste.rs[1] (if they want more moderation) or reddit (if they want less) might be difficult, unless you're serving some specific niche like DataTau[2]. [1]https://lobste.rs/ https://lobste.rs/ [2]http://www.datatau.com/ http://www.datatau.com/
300bps 12y ago
rampant negativity...seems to have gotten less common recently HN does do a good job of weeding out uselessly negative comments and other trolling behavior. If you want proof of that, go to your profile and turn on "Show Dead". It is amazing to see how many people are shadow banned yet continue to post on a daily basis. I've seen several accounts that have posted daily for years completely unaware nobody is seeing anything they post. They know nobody has ever upvoted or downvoted their comment or replied to it but just can't seem to make the connection that they're shadow banned.
- jsmthrowaway 12y ago
  > I've seen several accounts that have posted daily for years completely unaware nobody is seeing anything they post. I may be in the minority here, but I do not consider this a good result for anyone.
  - ZenoArrow 12y ago
    Agreed. Wish there was a way to upvote dead comments that I liked to contribute to their status being reconsidered.
    - dang 12y ago
      Soon there will be!
      - lancewiggs 12y ago
        That's a wonderful change to consider, thank-you.
- Karunamon 12y ago
  I've noticed the opposite. I browse with showdead on, and roughly half the time I'm left to wonder what on earth transgression the person committed to merit being silenced in that way after examining their comment history.
jseliger 12y ago
One of the most negative habits is in my opinion the failure to read a comment charitably (to make an effort to interpret it in the best possible light I don't even want charitable interpretation necessarily—I just want close reading and reasonably deep understanding of the topic! For example, the top reply to this comment of mine: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8941152 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8941152 totally misses the plot. Looking through my recent comment history, though, I'm impressed at the overall quality of the responses.
Torgo 12y ago
This goes both ways. If I think someone has misinterpreted me, I usually apologize for being unclear and clarify my statement. I would rather clear it up than start a flamewar, even if someone else might be itching for one.
ohnomrbill 12y ago
Why should I try to interpret comments in the best possible light? I could make an effort to interpret them in the worst possible light, too. I have no reason to believe that internet commenters mean well.
- ZenoArrow 12y ago
  The issue is really with speed of judgement. It's all too easy to become close minded after judging something, especially when judging something negatively. The key is remaining open minded as long as possible to take in more information, then you're in a better place to judge. Disagreement in a respectful manner is a reflection of how you've balanced the positive and negative, if you prejudge Internet commenters you'll have made it much harder on yourself to find that balance.
- dang 12y ago
  > Why should I try to interpret comments in the best possible light? Because doing so contributes to the community and not doing so harms it. When you respond to the strongest interpretation of a comment, you're responding to what's most substantive in it. That raises the signal/noise ratio for everybody, and curiosity is what we're trying to optimize for.
  - angersock 12y ago
    There is a different between the "strongest" interpretation of a comment and the "best possible light". For example, if somebody tells me "Angersock, you can go happily fuck yourself", I'm not going to expect them to be wishing me a rousing and cheerful round of masturbation--that is the "best possible light", but not the "strongest interpretation". Properly handled, assuming the worst of a comment, articulating the argument you think is being made, and then rebutting it, is far better than just assuming the best--provided it's done civilly, of course.
    - dang 12y ago
      You're responding to a pretty weak interpretation of what we're talking about here. :) The point is to address the strongest plausible interpretation of what another is saying. It's pretty well-established what the Principle of Charity means [1]. (By the way, you can see from [2] that there's an ongoing discussion about formalizing it for HN.) I don't think it's a stretch, mutatis mutandis, to take even a comment like "go fuck yourself" charitably. It could, indeed probably mostly does, mean "I'm angry about something unrelated." 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity 2. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=author:dang%20principle%20of%20charity&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?query=author:dang%20principle%20of%2...
olalonde 12y ago
Agreed. This really got on my nerves a few weeks ago and I couldn't resist going meta (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9013259 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9013259). There's even a Wikipedia article on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity
- glaugh 12y ago
  Your posting of this a little while back has caused me to think to myself "Geez, 'Principle of charity' would be useful here" over and over and over since you originally posted that. Really useful name to put to a concept like that. So. Thanks!
cpncrunch 12y ago
A related issue is people downvoting comments that they haven't properly comprehended. Instead of asking "why do you think x" or "do you mean x" they just downvote the comment. Sometimes it happens with controversial comments, even when the controversial comment is based on facts. Sometimes going against HN groupthink (e.g. saying something bad about libertarianism) results in downvotes. EDIT: I'm surprised that I got a downvote on this comment. I think that illustrates the problem.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > EDIT: I'm surprised that I got a downvote on this comment. I think that illustrates the problem. I think it illustrates the problem with "sometimes UI elements get clicked without intent" and "HN has no way to undo up/downvotes". In fact, I can say that with authority, since I was the one who made the accidental click.
  - reitanqild 12y ago
    This seems not to be the only reason: There seems to be a consistent tendency that some people downvote comments not because the comments are wrong but because accepting the comment would undermine their position/opinion. See anything that touches into google/apple/feminism
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- acheron 12y ago
  Off topic, but the idea that the HN "groupthink" is libertarian seems ridiculous to me... Other than the NSA stuff which is superficially libertarian, I don't see it at all. The prevailing attitude here is sort of vague lefty-"liberal", basically what you'd expect from, well, a bunch of college students and recent graduates who don't take politics too seriously and live in places like SF and NYC.
  - cpncrunch 12y ago
    I'm talking about things like not wanting to be searched at the airport, not wanting any NSA surveillance or spying, not wanting copyright theft to be illegal, etc. Libertarian seems a more correct word to describe these positions than liberal, as the common theme is distrust of authority. I find it a little ironic that your comment was downvoted, even though your comment was a very reasonably presented and valid opinion. I just upvoted you. Another example of the problem with the downvote button. IMO there is no need at all for a downvote button -- it just causes more problems than it ever solves. Much better to just have a 'flag' button for abusive/inappropriate comments, and an upvote button.
weinzierl 12y ago
> Instead, people often tend to misread or miserunderstand > what's being said, only to use the opportunity to write a > "correction" based on that false impression. Part of this issue is what at Stackoverflow was called the "Fastest Gun in the West Problem" [1]. I think a successful strategy on HN is: Write many comments really quickly and take the risk that some of them are bad or even wrong. The incentive for being an early commenter outbalances the penalty for being wrong sometimes. [1] http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/10/solving-the-fastest-gun-in-the-west-problem/ http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/10/solving-the-fastest-gu...
reitanqild 12y ago
> One of the most negative habits is in my opinion the failure to read a comment charitably More generally - the failure to r e a d the article/parent comment etc. (People who disagree with me seems particularly prone to this :-P )
detcader 12y ago
Such a problem could always be solved by phrasing your response as a question. "No, it's actually this way" vs "Have you considered the possibility that it's this way?" carries the same information with drastically different results.
micampe 12y ago
Yup. Not just comments, always trying to find the alleged negative aspects of everything and clinging only onto that, without so much as acknowledging other possibilities. This is the reason I stopped reading HN as much, just as I stopped reading comments everywhere else on the internet. I don't want to tiptoe through arguments trying to preventively push aside all possible misinterpretations or people trying to put words in my mouth. This is not critical thinking, this is just cynic criticism.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 12y ago
  I don't mind the negativity on HN and sometimes it's even helpful if I can avoid getting upset, but the negative comments on Amazon really make it hard to decide what to buy.
ademarre 12y ago
> people often tend to misread or miserunderstand what's being said This is like the phenomenon examined in this 2005 paper: Egocentrism Over E-Mail: Can We Communicate as Well as We Think?[1] From the abstract: > Without the benefit of paralinguistic cues such as gesture, emphasis, and intonation, it can be difficult to convey emotion and tone over electronic mail. [...] this limitation is often underappreciated, such that people tend to believe that they can communicate over e-mail more effectively than they actually can. When we read a HN comment negatively, we should second guess our interpretation of it before we reply. We may not have perceived it the way the author intended. Likewise when writing comments, we should ask ourselves if our wording might be received more negatively than we realize. [1] http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/nicholas.epley/krugeretal05.pdf http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/nicholas.epley/krugeretal05....
- aptwebapps 12y ago
  Another factor, although probably less prominent, is responsiveness. Back when I used to code on a MUD I noticed that conversations on one of the messages boards were much more likely to heat up than chat sessions. Just being able to react and clarify things from one sentence to the next makes a big difference. I suppose it's possible there's also some sort of face-to-face feel with chat that encourages sympathetic responses.
  - XorNot 12y ago
    I'd say social cues are important. When you write in text you're really speaking in the tone and voice of someone's mind - which means their current emotional state, perception of the writer etc. The only reliable way I've found to make text only social interaction work is basically to be what feels like overly nice. Which manages to average out to a casual conversation in the real world - I think. I mean who knows?
wamatt 12y ago
This comment brings to mind the concept of the the steel man [1][2]. Steelmanning an argument means to go one step further. In addition to selecting the most charitable parts of another person's argument, one seeks to improve on it, by making it the best possible representation of the other persons position. From there, one can offer their own counterpoint, to this improved version. [1] https://themerelyreal.wordpress.com/2012/12/07/steelmanning/ https://themerelyreal.wordpress.com/2012/12/07/steelmanning/ [2] http://lesswrong.com/lw/85h/better_disagreement/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/85h/better_disagreement/
- hyperpallium 12y ago
  Theatre Sports (competitive collaborative dramatic improvisation) has the concepts of offer, accept, and block. Accepting an offer means to build on it in some way, as a real part of the scene - in the way you mean. A block is when you ignore or undermine the offer, denying it instead of building on it. There's temptation to do so for a cheap laugh. The uncharitable negativity of HN seems similar.
  - jlees 12y ago
    One thing that took me a while to understand as a player - accepting doesn't always mean ignoring conflict. If you offer me something, I accept that your version of reality is true; I don't have to agree with specific parts of it. For example, if someone starts a scene with "Isn't it lovely to be here in Paris?", I accept that we are in Paris, but I don't have to think it's lovely. The takeaway from this to non-improv discussions is that I'm more aware of the fact that although I might disagree with the comment someone makes, I accept that the writer has that opinion and that they believe it to be true, and if I want to challenge any part of it then I'm going to have a much better time of it if I start from their version of reality.
    - pain 12y ago
      Accepting means logging|auditing?
    - andrea_sdl 12y ago
archemike_ 12y ago
Sadly it's spawned by the rampant ignorance most intellectual people face on a daily basis. This creates a cynicism and impulsive reaction to "check off" that perspective without vetting it further. This will be a good case study in guidelines that defy human behavior. It is tendency for many to go against this policy, which is why it was begat. Interesting how Y Combinator is wanting to thwart group think I welcome the spike.
xythian 12y ago
There's a well established social phenomena for what you describe as uncharitable reading the words / actions of other people. It's called the fundamental attribution error. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error It has been studied in detail with respect to computer mediated communications as far back as the dawn of email and the tendency of readers to assign a lot more negativity to the emails they receive then their senders ever intended.
ndesaulniers 12y ago
Another issue is that text is quite poor at conveying tone, both on HN and elsewhere. Saw something recently about adding emoji's for tone.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
sebastianconcpt 12y ago
Yes I can count with one hand the people that consistently uses the Principle of Charity. And the saddest part is not seeing the interlocutor full of himself and completely ignoring the fact that, by not using this principle, he makes his own argument weaker (showing that his intelligence didn't reached those heights). The saddest part is the public false victory because depending on the peers (audience), he will likely be perceived as in a stronger position when the opposite is true. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity
stcredzero 12y ago
Always interpreting what was said to him in the most intelligent light is the distinguishing behavior of my favorite professor from grad school. If people are constantly correcting you on jumping to the wrong conclusion, and telling you they actually meant something else, then you are not as smart as you think you are in that context. (Yes, this is indeed related to Dunning-Kruger!) On the other hand, my favorite professor would often come out with an interpretation of what someone said that was levels more intelligent than what was said. Then the reaction would be surprise or even delight on the part of the other. (Sometimes, I think this was a deliberate tactic to keep the conversation on a higher level.) One of the smartest men I've ever met.
abandonliberty 12y ago
Yes, there are parts of this community very uncomfortable with things they do not understand or agree with, and are very quick to argue or dismiss rather than try and see the value of the contribution or different point of view. Reddit went through the same shift as it became more popular. There is hope: one of my best received comments was a gentle chiding of someone who had belittled someone's comment.
abandonliberty 12y ago
Yes, there are parts of this community very uncomfortable with things they do not understand or agree with, and are very quick to argue or dismiss rather than try and see the value of the contribution. Reddit went through the same shift as it became more popular. There is hope: one of my best received comments was a gentle chiding of someone who had belittled someone's comment.

by Udo 12y ago

webwanderings 12y ago

You are right. I read this somewhere, something along the lines ... that when you disagree with someone, you should first make sure to repeat and restate the arguments of the opponent you disagreeing with, in your own words, before making any of your own arguments.

mwfunk 12y ago
I've never heard that before, but it's excellent advice. Sometimes I like to come up with the best argument I possibly can against my own beliefs (basically playing devil's advocate with myself) to better understand opposing viewpoints, but this is even better.
jessriedel 12y ago
Here's one version, from Daniel Dennett: > How to compose a successful critical commentary: > 1. You should attempt to re-express your target’s position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, “Thanks, I wish I’d thought of putting it that way. > 2. You should list any points of agreement (especially if they are not matters of general or widespread agreement). > 3. You should mention anything you have learned from your target. > 4. Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism. http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/03/28/daniel-dennett-rapoport-rules-criticism/ http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/03/28/daniel-den... I add thoughts here: http://blog.jessriedel.com/2015/01/28/links-for-january-2015/ http://blog.jessriedel.com/2015/01/28/links-for-january-2015...
- webwanderings 12y ago
  But, are you disagreeing or agreeing with me? LOL, j/k. Things are always so subtle with human communication. It is always fun to watch/see people put down rules to manage the psychology of communication (referring to original thread). But following rules, or have conscious awareness of the least minimum rules (etiquette is a better word) is always so important in having a reasonable environment.
- tokenadult 12y ago
  Thanks for sharing that list.
- JoshTriplett 12y ago
  I've seen it put as "steelmanning" an argument, as the opposite of a strawman. A strawman misrepresents the opposing argument to make it weaker; a steelman interprets an argument as strongly as possible before refuting it. At the very least, I try to phrase feedback as "this is awesome; I particularly like the ability to ... and the approach addressing .... I think it would help to also ...", or similar statements that make it clear what's good before commenting on what could be improved.
- _deh 12y ago
  It's an excellent list. A little amusing as Dennett's own debating style is a touch more robust than this might suggest. Though in all fairness, if it's him vs. another philosopher of similar standing, both with subtle and complex positions built up over 40+ year careers, working through steps 1 - 3 might lengthen the discussion somewhat.
ThrustVectoring 12y ago
That reads like some of the mediation or non-violent communication advice I've heard. The point is that it lets people feel like they've been heard and understood.
tptacek 12y ago
I also like the (related) idea of an Ideological Turing Test: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_Turing_Test http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideological_Turing_Test
- JoshTriplett 12y ago
  That's a really good idea; you shouldn't just be able to restate the opposing argument as a devil's advocate, you should be able to understand all the arguments well enough to make them as effectively as any advocate. And you shouldn't sound like a caricature of that position unless all advocates of that position sound equally ridiculous.
  - protomyth 12y ago
    "you shouldn't sound like a caricature of that position unless all advocates of that position sound equally ridiculous" No, you owe it to yourself to make the best possible argument for the other side's position. It might still sound ridiculous in the end, but you really want to nail it and understand the argument. If for no other reason to expand your thinking on your side. Sadly, you probably should also understand the sound bites, but that is concession to how the world works and not your own education.
    - JoshTriplett 12y ago
      > No, you owe it to yourself to make the best possible argument for the other side's position. It might still sound ridiculous in the end, but you really want to nail it and understand the argument. If for no other reason to expand your thinking on your side. I think we're saying the same thing. I was suggesting that in some cases, the arguments really don't hold water at all, and there's no way to make them sound otherwise. In which case, if you're attempting to pass a Turing-like test for sounding like someone advocating that position, you're going to sound equally ridiculous.
      - mkr-hn 12y ago
        Sometimes, the best thing to do is repeat someone's ridiculous view back to them. Most of the time, I get "yes, that's correct" back and can be sure there's no point in continuing. Saves time and energy.

ColinDabritz 12y ago

I think you're right! It's difficult to communicate tone and other 'out of band' stuff through text. This is what Wikipedia's "Assume good faith" guideline is to addresses. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Assume_good_faith http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Assume_good_faith

staunch 12y ago

I think you nailed the real problem, which is that people have become so quick to write off anyone who ruffles their feathers at all. Drew Houston describes the HN feedback he received for Dropbox as all the motivation he needed to keep going. He also explained that he knew it was a hit because of how many people were saying negative things. Today though, any truly critical comment means you're either a hater or a troll. Every person is either a friend or an enemy. Inside the club or outside the club. You can't sincerely like something, and also be very critical about aspects of it, without instantly transforming into a jealous hater. Assuming the worst about other people is probably the most negative thing you can do. Everyone is a mixed bag.

kelukelugames 12y ago
Sometimes I like to ask a lot of critical questions because I care and I really like it. Other times because I'm trying to rip it to shreds. It's probably impossible to tell for someone online which mode I am in.
Udo 12y ago
I would like to say though that as someone who occasionally makes things, I do appreciate proper critique and I do like to hear about different view points. Voicing legitimate and non-pedantic disagreement in a polite manner is to me one of the major features HN offers, simply because it's a collection of interesting people. Myself, I don't always agree with the majority opinion either. For example, I disagree with Sam's opinion about AGI, and even though that particular comment was received quite badly, I never meant it to be anything else but an invitation to see things from another perspective.
mreiland 12y ago
> I think you nailed the real problem, which is that people have become so quick to write off anyone who ruffles their feathers at all. I'm quick to write off people and I won't apologize for it. I have better things to do with my time than to give everyone the same amount of time and respect. If HN has decided to be touchy feely than this most certainly isn't the place for me. I prefer actual discourse where bullshit opinions are called out as such. edit: shit you guys, can't you go with the reading my comment charitably or will you hit that downvote button again, thereby showing your hypocrisy? I love the internet, I really do.

maxerickson 12y ago

The corrections I find the most frustrating are the ones that attempt to frame something that is reasonably a difference of opinion as a black/white, right/wrong issue. A made up example using something that is about as subjective as possible: No, that's wrong, strawberries are awful. (just changing that to "I disagree, ..." gets rid of a lot of the nonsense) There also ends up being a lot of what is essentially squabbling, comments going back and forth over what someone meant, or pedantically squishing some point that had done a good enough job of transmitting the idea (I'm all for being careful when it matters, I'm pretty sure it doesn't matter all the time).

happyscrappy 12y ago
The pedantic bickering is brutal because you cannot collapse threads.
- danellis 12y ago
  The whole site needs rewriting and modernizing. Considering the audience, it's kind of shocking how stale it is.
  - krapp 12y ago
    I'm tempted to chalk that up to HN being, essentially, a pet project implemented in a toy language as a not entirely open source[0] forum maintained by volunteers. Of course, I don't know but that's my guess, that pg just didn't work very hard on polishing up the parts he didn't find personally interesting. For some reason, people seem to be weirdly elitist about HN's layout, and act as if any slight change to the UI is going to allow the barbarians of the internet to storm the gates, until Hacker News is aught but cat memes and ashes. [0] The language and original forum are, obviously, open source. But AFAIK you can't make pull requests against the code HN is actually running, which has had tons of modifications made to it, because that's special sauce. There used to be a repo for making bug and feature requests but that seems to no longer be active. Of course, you could roll your own minimalistic threaded forum, but getting people to move from HN anywhere other than lobste.rs[1] (if they want more moderation) or reddit (if they want less) might be difficult, unless you're serving some specific niche like DataTau[2]. [1]https://lobste.rs/ https://lobste.rs/ [2]http://www.datatau.com/ http://www.datatau.com/

300bps 12y ago

rampant negativity...seems to have gotten less common recently HN does do a good job of weeding out uselessly negative comments and other trolling behavior. If you want proof of that, go to your profile and turn on "Show Dead". It is amazing to see how many people are shadow banned yet continue to post on a daily basis. I've seen several accounts that have posted daily for years completely unaware nobody is seeing anything they post. They know nobody has ever upvoted or downvoted their comment or replied to it but just can't seem to make the connection that they're shadow banned.

jsmthrowaway 12y ago
> I've seen several accounts that have posted daily for years completely unaware nobody is seeing anything they post. I may be in the minority here, but I do not consider this a good result for anyone.
- ZenoArrow 12y ago
  Agreed. Wish there was a way to upvote dead comments that I liked to contribute to their status being reconsidered.
  - dang 12y ago
    Soon there will be!
    - lancewiggs 12y ago
      That's a wonderful change to consider, thank-you.
Karunamon 12y ago
I've noticed the opposite. I browse with showdead on, and roughly half the time I'm left to wonder what on earth transgression the person committed to merit being silenced in that way after examining their comment history.

jseliger 12y ago

One of the most negative habits is in my opinion the failure to read a comment charitably (to make an effort to interpret it in the best possible light I don't even want charitable interpretation necessarily—I just want close reading and reasonably deep understanding of the topic! For example, the top reply to this comment of mine: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8941152 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8941152 totally misses the plot. Looking through my recent comment history, though, I'm impressed at the overall quality of the responses.

Torgo 12y ago

This goes both ways. If I think someone has misinterpreted me, I usually apologize for being unclear and clarify my statement. I would rather clear it up than start a flamewar, even if someone else might be itching for one.

ohnomrbill 12y ago

Why should I try to interpret comments in the best possible light? I could make an effort to interpret them in the worst possible light, too. I have no reason to believe that internet commenters mean well.

ZenoArrow 12y ago
The issue is really with speed of judgement. It's all too easy to become close minded after judging something, especially when judging something negatively. The key is remaining open minded as long as possible to take in more information, then you're in a better place to judge. Disagreement in a respectful manner is a reflection of how you've balanced the positive and negative, if you prejudge Internet commenters you'll have made it much harder on yourself to find that balance.
dang 12y ago
> Why should I try to interpret comments in the best possible light? Because doing so contributes to the community and not doing so harms it. When you respond to the strongest interpretation of a comment, you're responding to what's most substantive in it. That raises the signal/noise ratio for everybody, and curiosity is what we're trying to optimize for.
- angersock 12y ago
  There is a different between the "strongest" interpretation of a comment and the "best possible light". For example, if somebody tells me "Angersock, you can go happily fuck yourself", I'm not going to expect them to be wishing me a rousing and cheerful round of masturbation--that is the "best possible light", but not the "strongest interpretation". Properly handled, assuming the worst of a comment, articulating the argument you think is being made, and then rebutting it, is far better than just assuming the best--provided it's done civilly, of course.
  - dang 12y ago
    You're responding to a pretty weak interpretation of what we're talking about here. :) The point is to address the strongest plausible interpretation of what another is saying. It's pretty well-established what the Principle of Charity means [1]. (By the way, you can see from [2] that there's an ongoing discussion about formalizing it for HN.) I don't think it's a stretch, mutatis mutandis, to take even a comment like "go fuck yourself" charitably. It could, indeed probably mostly does, mean "I'm angry about something unrelated." 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity 2. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=author:dang%20principle%20of%20charity&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?query=author:dang%20principle%20of%2...

olalonde 12y ago

Agreed. This really got on my nerves a few weeks ago and I couldn't resist going meta (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9013259 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9013259). There's even a Wikipedia article on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity

glaugh 12y ago
Your posting of this a little while back has caused me to think to myself "Geez, 'Principle of charity' would be useful here" over and over and over since you originally posted that. Really useful name to put to a concept like that. So. Thanks!

cpncrunch 12y ago

A related issue is people downvoting comments that they haven't properly comprehended. Instead of asking "why do you think x" or "do you mean x" they just downvote the comment. Sometimes it happens with controversial comments, even when the controversial comment is based on facts. Sometimes going against HN groupthink (e.g. saying something bad about libertarianism) results in downvotes. EDIT: I'm surprised that I got a downvote on this comment. I think that illustrates the problem.

dragonwriter 12y ago
> EDIT: I'm surprised that I got a downvote on this comment. I think that illustrates the problem. I think it illustrates the problem with "sometimes UI elements get clicked without intent" and "HN has no way to undo up/downvotes". In fact, I can say that with authority, since I was the one who made the accidental click.
- reitanqild 12y ago
  This seems not to be the only reason: There seems to be a consistent tendency that some people downvote comments not because the comments are wrong but because accepting the comment would undermine their position/opinion. See anything that touches into google/apple/feminism
deleted 12y ago
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acheron 12y ago
Off topic, but the idea that the HN "groupthink" is libertarian seems ridiculous to me... Other than the NSA stuff which is superficially libertarian, I don't see it at all. The prevailing attitude here is sort of vague lefty-"liberal", basically what you'd expect from, well, a bunch of college students and recent graduates who don't take politics too seriously and live in places like SF and NYC.
- cpncrunch 12y ago
  I'm talking about things like not wanting to be searched at the airport, not wanting any NSA surveillance or spying, not wanting copyright theft to be illegal, etc. Libertarian seems a more correct word to describe these positions than liberal, as the common theme is distrust of authority. I find it a little ironic that your comment was downvoted, even though your comment was a very reasonably presented and valid opinion. I just upvoted you. Another example of the problem with the downvote button. IMO there is no need at all for a downvote button -- it just causes more problems than it ever solves. Much better to just have a 'flag' button for abusive/inappropriate comments, and an upvote button.

weinzierl 12y ago

> Instead, people often tend to misread or miserunderstand > what's being said, only to use the opportunity to write a > "correction" based on that false impression. Part of this issue is what at Stackoverflow was called the "Fastest Gun in the West Problem" [1]. I think a successful strategy on HN is: Write many comments really quickly and take the risk that some of them are bad or even wrong. The incentive for being an early commenter outbalances the penalty for being wrong sometimes. [1] http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/10/solving-the-fastest-gun-in-the-west-problem/ http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/10/solving-the-fastest-gu...

reitanqild 12y ago

> One of the most negative habits is in my opinion the failure to read a comment charitably More generally - the failure to r e a d the article/parent comment etc. (People who disagree with me seems particularly prone to this :-P )

detcader 12y ago

Such a problem could always be solved by phrasing your response as a question. "No, it's actually this way" vs "Have you considered the possibility that it's this way?" carries the same information with drastically different results.

micampe 12y ago

Yup. Not just comments, always trying to find the alleged negative aspects of everything and clinging only onto that, without so much as acknowledging other possibilities. This is the reason I stopped reading HN as much, just as I stopped reading comments everywhere else on the internet. I don't want to tiptoe through arguments trying to preventively push aside all possible misinterpretations or people trying to put words in my mouth. This is not critical thinking, this is just cynic criticism.

0xdeadbeefbabe 12y ago
I don't mind the negativity on HN and sometimes it's even helpful if I can avoid getting upset, but the negative comments on Amazon really make it hard to decide what to buy.

ademarre 12y ago

> people often tend to misread or miserunderstand what's being said This is like the phenomenon examined in this 2005 paper: Egocentrism Over E-Mail: Can We Communicate as Well as We Think?[1] From the abstract: > Without the benefit of paralinguistic cues such as gesture, emphasis, and intonation, it can be difficult to convey emotion and tone over electronic mail. [...] this limitation is often underappreciated, such that people tend to believe that they can communicate over e-mail more effectively than they actually can. When we read a HN comment negatively, we should second guess our interpretation of it before we reply. We may not have perceived it the way the author intended. Likewise when writing comments, we should ask ourselves if our wording might be received more negatively than we realize. [1] http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/nicholas.epley/krugeretal05.pdf http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/nicholas.epley/krugeretal05....

aptwebapps 12y ago
Another factor, although probably less prominent, is responsiveness. Back when I used to code on a MUD I noticed that conversations on one of the messages boards were much more likely to heat up than chat sessions. Just being able to react and clarify things from one sentence to the next makes a big difference. I suppose it's possible there's also some sort of face-to-face feel with chat that encourages sympathetic responses.
- XorNot 12y ago
  I'd say social cues are important. When you write in text you're really speaking in the tone and voice of someone's mind - which means their current emotional state, perception of the writer etc. The only reliable way I've found to make text only social interaction work is basically to be what feels like overly nice. Which manages to average out to a casual conversation in the real world - I think. I mean who knows?

wamatt 12y ago

This comment brings to mind the concept of the the steel man [1][2]. Steelmanning an argument means to go one step further. In addition to selecting the most charitable parts of another person's argument, one seeks to improve on it, by making it the best possible representation of the other persons position. From there, one can offer their own counterpoint, to this improved version. [1] https://themerelyreal.wordpress.com/2012/12/07/steelmanning/ https://themerelyreal.wordpress.com/2012/12/07/steelmanning/ [2] http://lesswrong.com/lw/85h/better_disagreement/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/85h/better_disagreement/

hyperpallium 12y ago
Theatre Sports (competitive collaborative dramatic improvisation) has the concepts of offer, accept, and block. Accepting an offer means to build on it in some way, as a real part of the scene - in the way you mean. A block is when you ignore or undermine the offer, denying it instead of building on it. There's temptation to do so for a cheap laugh. The uncharitable negativity of HN seems similar.
- jlees 12y ago
  One thing that took me a while to understand as a player - accepting doesn't always mean ignoring conflict. If you offer me something, I accept that your version of reality is true; I don't have to agree with specific parts of it. For example, if someone starts a scene with "Isn't it lovely to be here in Paris?", I accept that we are in Paris, but I don't have to think it's lovely. The takeaway from this to non-improv discussions is that I'm more aware of the fact that although I might disagree with the comment someone makes, I accept that the writer has that opinion and that they believe it to be true, and if I want to challenge any part of it then I'm going to have a much better time of it if I start from their version of reality.
  - pain 12y ago
    Accepting means logging|auditing?
  - andrea_sdl 12y ago

archemike_ 12y ago

Sadly it's spawned by the rampant ignorance most intellectual people face on a daily basis. This creates a cynicism and impulsive reaction to "check off" that perspective without vetting it further. This will be a good case study in guidelines that defy human behavior. It is tendency for many to go against this policy, which is why it was begat. Interesting how Y Combinator is wanting to thwart group think I welcome the spike.

xythian 12y ago

There's a well established social phenomena for what you describe as uncharitable reading the words / actions of other people. It's called the fundamental attribution error. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error It has been studied in detail with respect to computer mediated communications as far back as the dawn of email and the tendency of readers to assign a lot more negativity to the emails they receive then their senders ever intended.

ndesaulniers 12y ago

Another issue is that text is quite poor at conveying tone, both on HN and elsewhere. Saw something recently about adding emoji's for tone.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

sebastianconcpt 12y ago

Yes I can count with one hand the people that consistently uses the Principle of Charity. And the saddest part is not seeing the interlocutor full of himself and completely ignoring the fact that, by not using this principle, he makes his own argument weaker (showing that his intelligence didn't reached those heights). The saddest part is the public false victory because depending on the peers (audience), he will likely be perceived as in a stronger position when the opposite is true. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity

stcredzero 12y ago

Always interpreting what was said to him in the most intelligent light is the distinguishing behavior of my favorite professor from grad school. If people are constantly correcting you on jumping to the wrong conclusion, and telling you they actually meant something else, then you are not as smart as you think you are in that context. (Yes, this is indeed related to Dunning-Kruger!) On the other hand, my favorite professor would often come out with an interpretation of what someone said that was levels more intelligent than what was said. Then the reaction would be surprise or even delight on the part of the other. (Sometimes, I think this was a deliberate tactic to keep the conversation on a higher level.) One of the smartest men I've ever met.

abandonliberty 12y ago

Yes, there are parts of this community very uncomfortable with things they do not understand or agree with, and are very quick to argue or dismiss rather than try and see the value of the contribution or different point of view. Reddit went through the same shift as it became more popular. There is hope: one of my best received comments was a gentle chiding of someone who had belittled someone's comment.

abandonliberty 12y ago

Yes, there are parts of this community very uncomfortable with things they do not understand or agree with, and are very quick to argue or dismiss rather than try and see the value of the contribution. Reddit went through the same shift as it became more popular. There is hope: one of my best received comments was a gentle chiding of someone who had belittled someone's comment.