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First and foremost, I would like to have a friendly laugh at you deriding opinions, then following it up with a long post of your opinions. But I don't have an

by kolbe 12y ago

First and foremost, I would like to have a friendly laugh at you deriding opinions, then following it up with a long post of your opinions. But I don't have any criticism of what you said simply because it is your opinion. In fact, I (and many HNers) value the opinions of others (critical or otherwise), especially those of people who are especially intelligent or experienced. If opinions were worthless, the world would be stagnant. Great companies and great science has been done utilizing nothing more than opinions (one great scientist used his opinion that "God does not play dice with the universe" to drive his research). Secondly, the quote I took can very reasonably be taken as the most important statement Sam made, and a statement on which the rest of his article depends on. I didn't infer motivation, though I did use anecdotes from my life experience (i.e. the empirical evidence you accuse me of lacking) to inform the way in which I interpret statements that follow the "morally speaking, x is good, but excessive x is bad" logical structure (which, no shit "[bad adjective] x is bad" is virtually a tautology). And I'm sorry, but I have no clue what your last sentence has to do with anything. Sam presented zero examples of posts that are "gratuitously" negative, let alone numbers that support that this gratuitous negativity is rampant. Nevertheless, I do believe him that there is more ill-natured criticism than is ideal (mostly because every single community, online or otherwise, has this characteristic). Just his opinion that there is too much of the wrong type of criticism, and some information that he will be doing something about it. I offered another opinion that some others seem to share.

Meai 12y ago
He is right though, I also think your post was a perfect example of gratious negativity. However as this shows, it needs exceptional people with a high level of self reflection and lots of practice at discussions to even realize what is and isnt gratious negativity. For that reason I dont think this new rule will have any effect on this site because there are simply not enough people to vote according to this new rule and punish people who violate it. Even if we do explain to you how your comment was gratiously negative, you will simply not agree and that's that. There won't be any tangible consequences to your disagreement and therefore you won't change. I think this is the core problem of online discussions: Without consequences, people dont change. This is also why sites like Stackoverflow work well: It has (positive) consequences if you contribute well. (="internet points") but it's easier there because those are purely technical discussions with clear goals and non-goals. Life isn't so focussed in non-technical areas. So let's take your comment: You start with saying "statements like these are horrible" which is a personal opinion of yours without any backing evidence which you START with. So you start with something unsubstantiated and yet it's already very negative. In the real world this would more obviously be seen as poor social skills: Dont just start out a discussion by saying the other guy's opinion is horrible and then later on "maybe" add some points to underline that. Make your points FIRST and then at the end with a large disclaimer say your personal opinion if you really have to. Imagine every comment here to be a job interview. You wouldnt talk with adjectives like "horrible" at your interview. It's inprecise, it's pointless. You would instead say "statements like these are a little too inprecise because it's hard to qualify what is and isnt 'gratious' negativity." See how I completely omitted the word "horrible" yet the message was unchanged, no even better: the message has now more substance at the same wordcount. NOW I think you know what is meant by gratious negativity. Things that add wordcount without adding substance - yet being negative at the same time. As another poster has pointed out, there should and can be a similar rule about positivity.
- kolbe 12y ago
  I know it's just a minor mistake, but you have no idea how amusing it is to see a highly pedantic person try to insult me WRT to my ability to communicate correctly, while referring to my negativity as "gratious[1]." As far as the rest of your post goes, communication isn't just a series of code comments for everyone in this world. If every post were subjected to some Critical Thinking 101 interpretation of logic, we'd never get anywhere. If I wanted to be an ass, I could destroy your message citing dozens of logical fallacies, but that's pointless. You have your way of writing and speaking. And that's cool. I respect that. And I don't think it would be fair of me to subject you to some diatribe about what you could do to improve in my eyes, because we are obviously both literate enough to know the consequences of writing/speaking in the manner we do. I know what I said and how I said it, and a lot of people have agreed with it. If my caustic tone is too much of a hurdle to get over, then down vote me all you want. I'm saying what I'm saying directly to Sam Altman. I'm using my real name. There is a decent chance that at some point in my life, Sam could be a benefit to me, and I choose to communicate with him, negatively or positively, in the most effective manner that I know how, even if you think you know of more effective ways. [1] Gratious: An obsolete spelling of gracious
  - Meai 12y ago
    I think every discussion is a series of code and whether you want to "write clean code" with other people or not shows the value you have for other people. You call it pedantic in the same way that a disorganized person calls an organised person pedantic for making that extra effort. Ask yourself why I should spend my time reading your comments when you yourself have admitted that you dont think every post you write should be subjected to critical thinking 101. Why should anyone? Unless you think our time is not valuable. I am this direct with you because you seem to want to be effective, but I believe you are not.
  - kolbe 12y ago
    I know that's what you think. At some point, you picked up a very linear path in life, and you think any deviation from that line constitutes some form of imperfection. It's why you're probably great at coding or math, but suffer in some other areas of life. Why should you listen to someone who doesn't write like a robot? For one, it is boring to listen to people who communicate that way. Read some Gaddis or Pynchon. Read XKCD. Listen to music from all eras and cultures. Hell, listen to a joke, or watch a stupid cat video, or go skiing, or fuck a pretty girl, or a guy, or try some peyote. Life is filled with sensory perceptions that are worthwhile outside of the context of accumulation of knowledge or money or whatever you're optimizing for. I choose to speak the way I do because I would rather risk alienating people like you by being myself than to allow the world to mold me based on some ill-informed[1] perception of what I think the other people in this world are like. [1] Which, I guarantee, you and me and everyone we know are ill-informed on this topic.

by kolbe 12y ago

Meai 12y ago

He is right though, I also think your post was a perfect example of gratious negativity. However as this shows, it needs exceptional people with a high level of self reflection and lots of practice at discussions to even realize what is and isnt gratious negativity. For that reason I dont think this new rule will have any effect on this site because there are simply not enough people to vote according to this new rule and punish people who violate it. Even if we do explain to you how your comment was gratiously negative, you will simply not agree and that's that. There won't be any tangible consequences to your disagreement and therefore you won't change. I think this is the core problem of online discussions: Without consequences, people dont change. This is also why sites like Stackoverflow work well: It has (positive) consequences if you contribute well. (="internet points") but it's easier there because those are purely technical discussions with clear goals and non-goals. Life isn't so focussed in non-technical areas. So let's take your comment: You start with saying "statements like these are horrible" which is a personal opinion of yours without any backing evidence which you START with. So you start with something unsubstantiated and yet it's already very negative. In the real world this would more obviously be seen as poor social skills: Dont just start out a discussion by saying the other guy's opinion is horrible and then later on "maybe" add some points to underline that. Make your points FIRST and then at the end with a large disclaimer say your personal opinion if you really have to. Imagine every comment here to be a job interview. You wouldnt talk with adjectives like "horrible" at your interview. It's inprecise, it's pointless. You would instead say "statements like these are a little too inprecise because it's hard to qualify what is and isnt 'gratious' negativity." See how I completely omitted the word "horrible" yet the message was unchanged, no even better: the message has now more substance at the same wordcount. NOW I think you know what is meant by gratious negativity. Things that add wordcount without adding substance - yet being negative at the same time. As another poster has pointed out, there should and can be a similar rule about positivity.

kolbe 12y ago
I know it's just a minor mistake, but you have no idea how amusing it is to see a highly pedantic person try to insult me WRT to my ability to communicate correctly, while referring to my negativity as "gratious[1]." As far as the rest of your post goes, communication isn't just a series of code comments for everyone in this world. If every post were subjected to some Critical Thinking 101 interpretation of logic, we'd never get anywhere. If I wanted to be an ass, I could destroy your message citing dozens of logical fallacies, but that's pointless. You have your way of writing and speaking. And that's cool. I respect that. And I don't think it would be fair of me to subject you to some diatribe about what you could do to improve in my eyes, because we are obviously both literate enough to know the consequences of writing/speaking in the manner we do. I know what I said and how I said it, and a lot of people have agreed with it. If my caustic tone is too much of a hurdle to get over, then down vote me all you want. I'm saying what I'm saying directly to Sam Altman. I'm using my real name. There is a decent chance that at some point in my life, Sam could be a benefit to me, and I choose to communicate with him, negatively or positively, in the most effective manner that I know how, even if you think you know of more effective ways. [1] Gratious: An obsolete spelling of gracious
- Meai 12y ago
  I think every discussion is a series of code and whether you want to "write clean code" with other people or not shows the value you have for other people. You call it pedantic in the same way that a disorganized person calls an organised person pedantic for making that extra effort. Ask yourself why I should spend my time reading your comments when you yourself have admitted that you dont think every post you write should be subjected to critical thinking 101. Why should anyone? Unless you think our time is not valuable. I am this direct with you because you seem to want to be effective, but I believe you are not.
- kolbe 12y ago
  I know that's what you think. At some point, you picked up a very linear path in life, and you think any deviation from that line constitutes some form of imperfection. It's why you're probably great at coding or math, but suffer in some other areas of life. Why should you listen to someone who doesn't write like a robot? For one, it is boring to listen to people who communicate that way. Read some Gaddis or Pynchon. Read XKCD. Listen to music from all eras and cultures. Hell, listen to a joke, or watch a stupid cat video, or go skiing, or fuck a pretty girl, or a guy, or try some peyote. Life is filled with sensory perceptions that are worthwhile outside of the context of accumulation of knowledge or money or whatever you're optimizing for. I choose to speak the way I do because I would rather risk alienating people like you by being myself than to allow the world to mold me based on some ill-informed[1] perception of what I think the other people in this world are like. [1] Which, I guarantee, you and me and everyone we know are ill-informed on this topic.