The Majority Illusion in Social Networks(arxiv.org)
arxiv.org
The Majority Illusion in Social Networks
http://arxiv.org/abs/1506.03022
126 comments
I've always wondered why social networks like Reddit make no attempt to throttle their loudest members. If you have a small minority who upvote/downvote an extremely high number of posts, they will easily drown out any votes cast by people who are more measured in their voting behavior.
It seems like there are so many fundamental ways in which the most popular social networks and discussion forums are flawed.
http://www.thecaucus.net/#/content/caucus/community_blog/103
It seems like there are so many fundamental ways in which the most popular social networks and discussion forums are flawed.
http://www.thecaucus.net/#/content/caucus/community_blog/103
Because Reddit was written by young undergrads in their college dorm who haven't had the decade of experience with vote manipulation that Slashdot had by that time, let alone experienced the rise and decline of Usenet.
Indeed by 2006 the mature Slashdot moderation system - after a deluge of invasions by trolls and agenda-pushers - already had a lot of the tools that Reddit is still missing or eventually reinvented badly - limited number of upvote points, meta-moderation etc.
Indeed by 2006 the mature Slashdot moderation system - after a deluge of invasions by trolls and agenda-pushers - already had a lot of the tools that Reddit is still missing or eventually reinvented badly - limited number of upvote points, meta-moderation etc.
We need a social network designed from the ground up to be a public square for civic discussion between people who disagree. We need mechanisms to agree on facts, and tools to create arguments supported by those facts.
A nice ideal, but likely to be very difficult in practice, because in reality almost nobody disagrees on actual provable, scientific facts. The toughest disagreements usually arise around things which are not facts, but are presented as if they were.
All human subcultures carry with them a large baggage of "facts" which the group accepts in order to promote social cohesion, avoid conflict or sometimes simply to advertise membership of the group. Try convincing a highly religious person that their religion is entirely fact-free, or that God doesn't exist using logic, and you will get nowhere: they prefer to believe things that other people don't because believing these things grants membership to a group and the benefits of that membership are perceived to outweigh the benefits of being a person of pure rationality.
Indeed, a genuine belief that you are entirely rational is simply another form of group membership signalling: probably that you want to be seen as a member of the group "intellectuals" or "scientists" or possibly "educated people". Being unable to recognise the difficulty people have in being entirely rational is itself a form of irrationality.
So to get back to your proposed social network, here's what would happen: it would very quickly become dominated by a particular pre-existing social subculture, probably "male internet geeks who believe themselves to be supremely rational" and their baggage of pseudo-facts would come along for the ride.
This is NOT an argument against doing what you want to do. Even if the goal is unattainable, creating better discussion forums with better tools for raising the level of discussion is never a bad thing. Just don't think it'd solve the 'friendship paradox' discussed in the paper.
All human subcultures carry with them a large baggage of "facts" which the group accepts in order to promote social cohesion, avoid conflict or sometimes simply to advertise membership of the group. Try convincing a highly religious person that their religion is entirely fact-free, or that God doesn't exist using logic, and you will get nowhere: they prefer to believe things that other people don't because believing these things grants membership to a group and the benefits of that membership are perceived to outweigh the benefits of being a person of pure rationality.
Indeed, a genuine belief that you are entirely rational is simply another form of group membership signalling: probably that you want to be seen as a member of the group "intellectuals" or "scientists" or possibly "educated people". Being unable to recognise the difficulty people have in being entirely rational is itself a form of irrationality.
So to get back to your proposed social network, here's what would happen: it would very quickly become dominated by a particular pre-existing social subculture, probably "male internet geeks who believe themselves to be supremely rational" and their baggage of pseudo-facts would come along for the ride.
This is NOT an argument against doing what you want to do. Even if the goal is unattainable, creating better discussion forums with better tools for raising the level of discussion is never a bad thing. Just don't think it'd solve the 'friendship paradox' discussed in the paper.
It sounds like you agree that religious people are not rational, which is clearly not true. They just start from different axioms (not only physicalist ones) when they reason.
Charitably, it could be confusion over what the word 'rational' means.
At any rate, your points about group membership signalling are well taken. I'd like to point out other forms of social signalling, outgrouping for instance, can be just as powerful and even more counterproductive.
I'm not sure how to let people have honest, helpful, and enjoyable conversations while still policing for things like extraneous signaling. Historically, creating 'safe spaces' for frank and productive dialog hasn't been very successful.
Charitably, it could be confusion over what the word 'rational' means.
At any rate, your points about group membership signalling are well taken. I'd like to point out other forms of social signalling, outgrouping for instance, can be just as powerful and even more counterproductive.
I'm not sure how to let people have honest, helpful, and enjoyable conversations while still policing for things like extraneous signaling. Historically, creating 'safe spaces' for frank and productive dialog hasn't been very successful.
Isn't it the other way around? I just argued that belief in what I call pseudo-facts can be seen as an odd form of rationality, if by announcing your belief in them you get useful and positive things in return. For organised religion that might be a community of friends and people who will help you in times of need, a feeling of being part of something, a collection of interesting stories and shared cultural artifacts, acceptance by family, less anxiety about death, a moral code to live by or all of them together.
In that sense, the belief in (say) biblical literalism would not itself be a rational belief, but the overall behaviour that surrounds it can be a rational choice.
Now, you seem to be arguing that I don't understand the meaning of rational, and then go on to claim that literally anything can be considered rational because you can just pick your own axioms. That's not how rationality works! You can go ahead and create an argument that seems perfectly reasonable in your own frame of reference but nobody else will care if your axioms aren't shared or are clearly nonsense!
In that sense, the belief in (say) biblical literalism would not itself be a rational belief, but the overall behaviour that surrounds it can be a rational choice.
Now, you seem to be arguing that I don't understand the meaning of rational, and then go on to claim that literally anything can be considered rational because you can just pick your own axioms. That's not how rationality works! You can go ahead and create an argument that seems perfectly reasonable in your own frame of reference but nobody else will care if your axioms aren't shared or are clearly nonsense!
> In that sense, the belief in (say) biblical literalism would not itself be a rational belief
I find it optimistic, to say the least, that each individual can reasonably start from first principles, discover whether there is a Creator, discover if God wants anything from us, and then comply with the requirements of God before the afterlife (if there is one). Atheism is a much more defensible position than a personal deism of any specificity.
Regarding group membership, some organizations are absolutely about that, but the Jesus of the Bible was clearly opposed to people using religion for personal ends. So there are religions that are open to hanging around for the friendship, but biblical Christianity isn't one of them.
> Now, you seem to be arguing that I don't understand the meaning of rational...
I didn't mean any offense. It seemed likely that we didn't have the same definition of 'rational' and it seems even more likely now.
> ...nobody else will care if your axioms aren't shared...
Except people clearly do care. And their response is to establish ingroups, outgroups, promote ignorance, and that's not a good road to go down. I would rather people come to an understanding that everyone is mostly rational, mostly logical, and mostly trying to live a good life. They're normal people that made other choices, in other words.
Regarding nonsensical axioms, axioms can be nonsense if they are inherently contradictory. The axioms we're talking about here pass that hurdle.
I find it optimistic, to say the least, that each individual can reasonably start from first principles, discover whether there is a Creator, discover if God wants anything from us, and then comply with the requirements of God before the afterlife (if there is one). Atheism is a much more defensible position than a personal deism of any specificity.
Regarding group membership, some organizations are absolutely about that, but the Jesus of the Bible was clearly opposed to people using religion for personal ends. So there are religions that are open to hanging around for the friendship, but biblical Christianity isn't one of them.
> Now, you seem to be arguing that I don't understand the meaning of rational...
I didn't mean any offense. It seemed likely that we didn't have the same definition of 'rational' and it seems even more likely now.
> ...nobody else will care if your axioms aren't shared...
Except people clearly do care. And their response is to establish ingroups, outgroups, promote ignorance, and that's not a good road to go down. I would rather people come to an understanding that everyone is mostly rational, mostly logical, and mostly trying to live a good life. They're normal people that made other choices, in other words.
Regarding nonsensical axioms, axioms can be nonsense if they are inherently contradictory. The axioms we're talking about here pass that hurdle.
> I find it optimistic, to say the least, that each individual can reasonably start from first principles, discover whether there is a Creator, discover if God wants anything from us, and then comply with the requirements of God before the afterlife (if there is one).
I am willing to bet that there is less people in this world who do this "search on their own and discover god" than there are atheists. In fact, if you hang around atheist circles (The Atheist Experience for example), you'll hear enough people say they lost friends/family after deconverting or even that they still fear Hell even after they stopped believing.
> but the Jesus of the Bible was clearly opposed to people using religion for personal ends
How would you know? You realize that, assuming that Jesus did exist as a single person and all, we only have accounts compiled by a single authority that had interest in not having any negative portrayal of the guy?
It's like saying that Steve Jobs was not a bad person because his authorized biography didn't mention any terrible things (and even then, Jobs' probably mentions his daughter in passing at least).
> Regarding nonsensical axioms, axioms can be nonsense if they are inherently contradictory.
If you believe in truth-coherence, which seems to be a belief that religiosity-inclined people have.
Monists/materialists seem to tend more towards the truth-correspondence view. Under the latter, axioms don't need to be contradictory to be nonsense. They just need to be contradictory with reality.
I am willing to bet that there is less people in this world who do this "search on their own and discover god" than there are atheists. In fact, if you hang around atheist circles (The Atheist Experience for example), you'll hear enough people say they lost friends/family after deconverting or even that they still fear Hell even after they stopped believing.
> but the Jesus of the Bible was clearly opposed to people using religion for personal ends
How would you know? You realize that, assuming that Jesus did exist as a single person and all, we only have accounts compiled by a single authority that had interest in not having any negative portrayal of the guy?
It's like saying that Steve Jobs was not a bad person because his authorized biography didn't mention any terrible things (and even then, Jobs' probably mentions his daughter in passing at least).
> Regarding nonsensical axioms, axioms can be nonsense if they are inherently contradictory.
If you believe in truth-coherence, which seems to be a belief that religiosity-inclined people have.
Monists/materialists seem to tend more towards the truth-correspondence view. Under the latter, axioms don't need to be contradictory to be nonsense. They just need to be contradictory with reality.
> How would you know?
I said "Jesus of the Bible" to avoid getting into that here.
> [Nonsensical axioms] just need to be contradictory with reality.
Sure, but there's no objective observation that can prove God does or does not exist. If He is omniscient and omnipotent, He cannot be a dependent variable in any experiment.
> I am willing to bet that there is less people in this world who do this "search on their own and discover god" than there are atheists.
Any self-professed Christian who deviates from the teachings of the Bible either intentionally or out of disinterest is doing this to some degree. And everyone who considers themselves theist without affirming some more established canon is doing this.
I would wager there are more of those than atheist or orthodox (in the broad sense) Christians.
I said "Jesus of the Bible" to avoid getting into that here.
> [Nonsensical axioms] just need to be contradictory with reality.
Sure, but there's no objective observation that can prove God does or does not exist. If He is omniscient and omnipotent, He cannot be a dependent variable in any experiment.
> I am willing to bet that there is less people in this world who do this "search on their own and discover god" than there are atheists.
Any self-professed Christian who deviates from the teachings of the Bible either intentionally or out of disinterest is doing this to some degree. And everyone who considers themselves theist without affirming some more established canon is doing this.
I would wager there are more of those than atheist or orthodox (in the broad sense) Christians.
> Sure, but there's no objective observation that can prove God does or does not exist. If He is omniscient and omnipotent, He cannot be a dependent variable in any experiment.
If she's omniscient, then free will doesn't exist. If she's omnipotent, then she can create a rock so heavy she can't lift it… but probably can lift it.
I also notice that you didn't mention omnibenevolent.
> Any self-professed Christian who deviates from the teachings of the Bible either intentionally or out of disinterest is doing this to some degree.
Really? Any Christian who works on Sunday is "reasonably start[ing] from first principles [and] discover[ing] whether there is a Creator"?
I agree with you: we don't use the same definition of "rational".
If she's omniscient, then free will doesn't exist. If she's omnipotent, then she can create a rock so heavy she can't lift it… but probably can lift it.
I also notice that you didn't mention omnibenevolent.
> Any self-professed Christian who deviates from the teachings of the Bible either intentionally or out of disinterest is doing this to some degree.
Really? Any Christian who works on Sunday is "reasonably start[ing] from first principles [and] discover[ing] whether there is a Creator"?
I agree with you: we don't use the same definition of "rational".
> If she's omnipotent, then she can create a rock so heavy she can't lift it… but probably can lift it.
God can't create a rock too heavy for God to lift because that's nonsense, not because deist philosophy contradicts itself. The question of predestination vs. free will is interesting, and there is plenty of literature on the subject. If nothing else, the Lutheran position might be dissatisfying to some, but it's hard to refute.
I didn't mention omnibenevolence, no, though we have no way of proving whether individual people are 'good', so I don't know why we think we can judge God fairly.
> Any Christian who works on Sunday is "reasonably start[ing] from first principles [and] discover[ing] whether there is a Creator"?
Allowing for exceptions, Christians who work seven days a week or do not belong to a local church (broadly defined) are ignoring clear instructions in scripture. When this happens, it's typically for one of two reasons. One, people know they should be doing things and are simply bad at doing them. Christian theology actually makes amazing amounts of room for people who genuinely struggle with obedience.
The second category is who I was mainly referring to earlier. These people don't obey the scripture because they believe the scriptures are not really authoritative in all cases. That opens up a whole can of worms about which scriptures count, why, and who decides. Regarding the issues addressed by those scriptures, what is really true, why, and who decides? The whole thing becomes very open-ended very fast. I'm not necessarily opposed to that exercise on an intellectual level, but it seems like a lot of work to expect each individual person to take that faith journey alone. When groups of people do it together, well, you end up with a new belief systems like Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses, or even Christian Universalism.
Circling back to the particulars of observing the Sabbath, the Jesus of the Bible clearly said that the Sabbath was is for people, not God, and that the spirit of the law was much more important than the rule. In the epistles, it's specifically pointed out as an example of a rule that can be observed in different ways in good faith.
So Christians don't generally beat each other up about Sabbath issues, but it's widely (and casually) accepted that many Americans overwork, which causes personal and family issues, and that there's a lot of wisdom about being disciplined in observing a day of rest.
God can't create a rock too heavy for God to lift because that's nonsense, not because deist philosophy contradicts itself. The question of predestination vs. free will is interesting, and there is plenty of literature on the subject. If nothing else, the Lutheran position might be dissatisfying to some, but it's hard to refute.
I didn't mention omnibenevolence, no, though we have no way of proving whether individual people are 'good', so I don't know why we think we can judge God fairly.
> Any Christian who works on Sunday is "reasonably start[ing] from first principles [and] discover[ing] whether there is a Creator"?
Allowing for exceptions, Christians who work seven days a week or do not belong to a local church (broadly defined) are ignoring clear instructions in scripture. When this happens, it's typically for one of two reasons. One, people know they should be doing things and are simply bad at doing them. Christian theology actually makes amazing amounts of room for people who genuinely struggle with obedience.
The second category is who I was mainly referring to earlier. These people don't obey the scripture because they believe the scriptures are not really authoritative in all cases. That opens up a whole can of worms about which scriptures count, why, and who decides. Regarding the issues addressed by those scriptures, what is really true, why, and who decides? The whole thing becomes very open-ended very fast. I'm not necessarily opposed to that exercise on an intellectual level, but it seems like a lot of work to expect each individual person to take that faith journey alone. When groups of people do it together, well, you end up with a new belief systems like Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses, or even Christian Universalism.
Circling back to the particulars of observing the Sabbath, the Jesus of the Bible clearly said that the Sabbath was is for people, not God, and that the spirit of the law was much more important than the rule. In the epistles, it's specifically pointed out as an example of a rule that can be observed in different ways in good faith.
So Christians don't generally beat each other up about Sabbath issues, but it's widely (and casually) accepted that many Americans overwork, which causes personal and family issues, and that there's a lot of wisdom about being disciplined in observing a day of rest.
> God can't create a rock too heavy for God to lift because that's nonsense
Yes. Just like the omni concepts to begin with.
> These people don't obey the scripture because they believe the scriptures are not really authoritative in all cases.
If I tell you that I believe you don't really exist and yet I'm still talking to you, does that make me a fine rationalist? No. It makes me a total idiot.
People do stuff that makes no sense all the time. The fact that they do, does not suddenly make their actions exquisitely well intellectually justified or what not.
Actually, I think you are confusing 'rationalization' and 'rationalism' together.
Yes. Just like the omni concepts to begin with.
> These people don't obey the scripture because they believe the scriptures are not really authoritative in all cases.
If I tell you that I believe you don't really exist and yet I'm still talking to you, does that make me a fine rationalist? No. It makes me a total idiot.
People do stuff that makes no sense all the time. The fact that they do, does not suddenly make their actions exquisitely well intellectually justified or what not.
Actually, I think you are confusing 'rationalization' and 'rationalism' together.
> they just start from different axioms
I think they're also more likely to turn a blind eye to cases where the buildout of their model doesn't hold true. They could, for example, start out with the belief that the bible is the literal word of God, but hand wave away the fundamental contradictions you can find between different parts of it. (How many angels visited Jesus, exactly who did Cain think would kill him for being a vagabond, etc.) That's not just doing math from different first principles, it's changing the arithmetic rules as you go to fit the answer you want to produce.
I think they're also more likely to turn a blind eye to cases where the buildout of their model doesn't hold true. They could, for example, start out with the belief that the bible is the literal word of God, but hand wave away the fundamental contradictions you can find between different parts of it. (How many angels visited Jesus, exactly who did Cain think would kill him for being a vagabond, etc.) That's not just doing math from different first principles, it's changing the arithmetic rules as you go to fit the answer you want to produce.
Indeed.
I am an athiest, but if sievebrain tried to convince me "that God doesn't exist using logic"; then he would get nowhere. Logic alone is too impartial such debates.
I am an athiest, but if sievebrain tried to convince me "that God doesn't exist using logic"; then he would get nowhere. Logic alone is too impartial such debates.
My point was a little different. There is actually lots of reason and logic on both sides. But both in general and at specific times, people need to pick the underlying axioms (do only matter and energy exist?) they are going to assume. You probably agree, but I want it to be crystal clear that we don't have to throw out logic or reason (or accuse others of doing so) to discuss philosophy, theology, and their intersection with current events.
If you mean there's no proof for whether physicalism is true or false, then I completely agree.
If you mean there's no proof for whether physicalism is true or false, then I completely agree.
I think you'll see formerly religious atheists make the most claims about the illogic of (their former) religion, because they are most familiar with it. They can provide logical arguments against their particular former belief, but none that would ever convince the true believers (e.g. those who say things like, "Even if the Pope said tomorrow it was all a sham I would still believe in Catholicism", or similarly for other hierarchical religions).
Your mention of axioms is very similar to how I used to reason about my own former belief. When empirical reality contradicted those axioms and I spent some time away from the continuous reindoctrination to examine what I believed was real, I found it far more reasonable to disbelieve than to replace one belief with another.
Ultimately empirical reality has to be the arbiter; no amount of soul searching alone, without evidence, can reveal facts about reality. So maybe there is no concrete logical "proof" that physicalism is real, but empiricism isn't about absolutes, and empirically, physicalism has a much, much better track record of supplying new, true knowledge about reality than any other supposed way of knowing.
Your mention of axioms is very similar to how I used to reason about my own former belief. When empirical reality contradicted those axioms and I spent some time away from the continuous reindoctrination to examine what I believed was real, I found it far more reasonable to disbelieve than to replace one belief with another.
Ultimately empirical reality has to be the arbiter; no amount of soul searching alone, without evidence, can reveal facts about reality. So maybe there is no concrete logical "proof" that physicalism is real, but empiricism isn't about absolutes, and empirically, physicalism has a much, much better track record of supplying new, true knowledge about reality than any other supposed way of knowing.
> Ultimately empirical reality has to be the arbiter; no amount of soul searching alone, without evidence, can reveal facts about reality.
To reiterate, I believe strongly in empirical evidence. I'm mostly arguing against it being the sole source of knowledge.
And thanks for sharing the rest of your thoughts. I would call what you believe about physicalism a form of faith since you are aligning your expectations to a system that has a good track record in your experience. And I think that's understandable.
At any rate, if we can have a little humility in admitting the limitations to our own certainty, I believe we'll have more charity when dealing with people from other perspectives.
To reiterate, I believe strongly in empirical evidence. I'm mostly arguing against it being the sole source of knowledge.
And thanks for sharing the rest of your thoughts. I would call what you believe about physicalism a form of faith since you are aligning your expectations to a system that has a good track record in your experience. And I think that's understandable.
At any rate, if we can have a little humility in admitting the limitations to our own certainty, I believe we'll have more charity when dealing with people from other perspectives.
> Try convincing a highly religious person that their religion is entirely fact-free, or that God doesn't exist using logic, and you will get nowhere
Lets keep religion out of HN, shall we?
A lot of us actually seems to believe in some kind of deity/ies, we just dont mention it because we value HN as a common ground for technical and business discussions.
If not I could tell you some stories about stupid, stubborn evil ateists as well :-P
Lets keep religion out of HN, shall we?
A lot of us actually seems to believe in some kind of deity/ies, we just dont mention it because we value HN as a common ground for technical and business discussions.
If not I could tell you some stories about stupid, stubborn evil ateists as well :-P
> Lets keep religion out of HN, shall we?
As a religious person, I find keeping religion out of normal discourse has been very counterproductive for both religious and non-religious people. I understand that the discussions are more prone to conflict and uncomfortable feelings, but they're nonetheless key to understanding other people and diversity of thought.
Keeping religion (and agnosticism and atheism) out of things produces the same problems we see with the 'Majority Illusion'.
As a religious person, I find keeping religion out of normal discourse has been very counterproductive for both religious and non-religious people. I understand that the discussions are more prone to conflict and uncomfortable feelings, but they're nonetheless key to understanding other people and diversity of thought.
Keeping religion (and agnosticism and atheism) out of things produces the same problems we see with the 'Majority Illusion'.
Point is <edit>I felt</edit> GP used his post as a platform to launch a covert attack on religion in an otherwise unrelated thread.
I have nothing against discussing religion online but I think it is mostly offtopic on HN.
Edit: see also my reply to GPs answer to me
I have nothing against discussing religion online but I think it is mostly offtopic on HN.
Edit: see also my reply to GPs answer to me
For what it's worth, I got the same impression. But I would consider it a problem if HN, which generally welcomes broad topics including philosophy and politics, considered religion off topic. Religion is the defining trait to many minority groups in the U.S. and the rest of the English speaking world. Asking people to keep religion out of things is asking people to stay in the closet in some contexts.
I understand that's surely not intended, but it's nonetheless the consequence of making religion off topic.
I understand that's surely not intended, but it's nonetheless the consequence of making religion off topic.
I actually personally agree but I thought there was a rule, written or unwritten, to keep religion out of HN.
Would it be better if I said something like "keep attacks on religion out of HN"?
Would it be better if I said something like "keep attacks on religion out of HN"?
One problem with rules like this is that they inadvertently create a bias in what is considered an "attack", which leads to religious claims standing uncontested because any disagreement is viewed as an attack. Eventually it becomes okay to preach belief, but not okay to advocate for reasoned disbelief.
This is related to a current problem in the US left, where tolerance of belief has to compete with intolerance of abuse, and sadly, belief often wins at the expense of the abused.
This is related to a current problem in the US left, where tolerance of belief has to compete with intolerance of abuse, and sadly, belief often wins at the expense of the abused.
Then again, this is a general problem, not only when discussing religion but also when discussing racism, feminism etc: everything is an attack according to someone.
For context: did you read the comment that started this thread? I and others originally read it as a fairly broad patronising attack against all religions before the author came back and explained the intention. (and I still think it could have been written a lot clearer to begin with. )
For context: did you read the comment that started this thread? I and others originally read it as a fairly broad patronising attack against all religions before the author came back and explained the intention. (and I still think it could have been written a lot clearer to begin with. )
I have read all of the thread, though not in order, and while from a religious perspective (as a former extremely devout believer) I can see how describing religion as irrational would feel like an attack, from a conversational perspective it can be incredibly frustrating to have to couch every example in softening language to avoid offending someone, and can thus see why the original comment was not so couched.
So back to the point of creating tools for productive discussion, is there some solution to the problem that will allow us to communicate ideas without the offense and without the verbosity?
So back to the point of creating tools for productive discussion, is there some solution to the problem that will allow us to communicate ideas without the offense and without the verbosity?
> is there some solution to the problem that will allow us to communicate ideas without the offense and without the verbosity?
I'm not sure we can get there in one HN thread, but consciously addressing linguistic gaps would be worthwhile. When particular words have enough overloaded meaning to cause confusion and conflict, we need to find new words.
For the record, I'm for healthy (respectful) dissent. A lack of dissent is poisonous for all parties. But outgrouping is also poisonous.
I'm not sure we can get there in one HN thread, but consciously addressing linguistic gaps would be worthwhile. When particular words have enough overloaded meaning to cause confusion and conflict, we need to find new words.
For the record, I'm for healthy (respectful) dissent. A lack of dissent is poisonous for all parties. But outgrouping is also poisonous.
Something along those lines, sure. I'm actually fine with people civilly criticizing religion, though.
It's the stereotyping that really sticks out to me. It would be flagged or downvoted (justifiably!) if someone called women irrational or told homosexuals that their lifestyles should be kept private.
I'm convinced that the double standard here just doesn't register for most of the HN community, and almost all the English speaking world besides. I said something to raise awareness of the problem.
It's the stereotyping that really sticks out to me. It would be flagged or downvoted (justifiably!) if someone called women irrational or told homosexuals that their lifestyles should be kept private.
I'm convinced that the double standard here just doesn't register for most of the HN community, and almost all the English speaking world besides. I said something to raise awareness of the problem.
It's the stereotyping that really sticks out to me. It would be flagged or downvoted (justifiably!) if someone called women irrational or told homosexuals that their lifestyles should be kept private.
I think the difference here is that in one case one would be inferring a belief system from membership in a non-belief-related group, while the other would be inferring a belief system from membership in a belief system.
I don't think it's a double standard to treat those things differently (though there are corners of HN that get wildly out of control in either of the aforementioned cases).
I think the difference here is that in one case one would be inferring a belief system from membership in a non-belief-related group, while the other would be inferring a belief system from membership in a belief system.
I don't think it's a double standard to treat those things differently (though there are corners of HN that get wildly out of control in either of the aforementioned cases).
I don't follow you. Neither calling people groups irrational nor encouraging them to live closeted lifestyles is 'inferring a belief system'.
I meant that calling a gender irrational is different from calling a belief system irrational, regardless of whether either claim is true.
Agreed. I think we need more meta* courses. Courses on how we think, agree, disagree, discuss, learn, unlearn. If we understand ourselves more maybe then it wouldn't be so difficult to bring people who are in diametric opposition together for fruitful conversation.
The arguments get very tiresome quickly. There are a million other places online to beat the same dead horse of 'what is evidence, etc'. Keep it out of HN.
And yet this entire subthread is about a proposal to create a social network "designed from the ground up to be a public square for civic discussion between people who disagree" that has "mechanisms to agree on facts, and tools to create arguments supported by those facts".
Isn't HN supposed to be a place for civil discussion between people who disagree?
If you write off arguments you disagree with as "tiresome" and "beating a dead horse", especially on something as basic as "what is evidence", then you're providing a strong negative counterpoint to the original proposal - do people even want a place where people can agree on facts and then disagree on the results of interpretations of those facts? Or do they want, as you seem to want, to retreat into their comfortable social network of people who all agree on the same unwritten body of pseudo-facts?
Isn't HN supposed to be a place for civil discussion between people who disagree?
If you write off arguments you disagree with as "tiresome" and "beating a dead horse", especially on something as basic as "what is evidence", then you're providing a strong negative counterpoint to the original proposal - do people even want a place where people can agree on facts and then disagree on the results of interpretations of those facts? Or do they want, as you seem to want, to retreat into their comfortable social network of people who all agree on the same unwritten body of pseudo-facts?
Equally tiresome political issues are on here all the time. There are also fairly regular (and equally redundant) back-and-forths about programming languages.
At the very least, the political issues and programming language fads have changed in the last few centuries.
As have particular religious movements, but most people don't know about that because they are considered off topic in the news, at work, and in polite company.
> Lets keep religion out of HN, shall we?
As a semi-religious person [0], I would purely love to see religious tenets discussed dispassionately on HN, for a couple of reasons:
1. I've long thought that a corollary of the Summary of the Law [1] is "face the facts," that is, base your beliefs on evidence to the extent possible; as a group, the HN crowd is quite good at examining evidence from various perspectives.
2. Much and even most of the HN crowd is quite interested in knowing "what's going on," which ultimately extends to why is there something rather than nothing? [2]. I would greatly value the insights of others in that area.
--------------
[0] I describe myself as semi-religious because I do try to base my beliefs on evidence; this is reflected in the title of my religion blog (largely inactive in recent years), "The Questioning Christian," at http://www.QuestioningChristian.org . The right-hand column there lists some of my favorite essays.
[1] See http://www.questioningchristian.com/2004/11/facing_facts.htm...
[2] For my "naïve conjecture" about what's going on (to borrow a phrase from the Rev. Dr. John Polkinghorne FRS, an English particle physicist turned Anglican priest), see http://www.questioningchristian.com/2007/02/another_way_to_....
As a semi-religious person [0], I would purely love to see religious tenets discussed dispassionately on HN, for a couple of reasons:
1. I've long thought that a corollary of the Summary of the Law [1] is "face the facts," that is, base your beliefs on evidence to the extent possible; as a group, the HN crowd is quite good at examining evidence from various perspectives.
2. Much and even most of the HN crowd is quite interested in knowing "what's going on," which ultimately extends to why is there something rather than nothing? [2]. I would greatly value the insights of others in that area.
--------------
[0] I describe myself as semi-religious because I do try to base my beliefs on evidence; this is reflected in the title of my religion blog (largely inactive in recent years), "The Questioning Christian," at http://www.QuestioningChristian.org . The right-hand column there lists some of my favorite essays.
[1] See http://www.questioningchristian.com/2004/11/facing_facts.htm...
[2] For my "naïve conjecture" about what's going on (to borrow a phrase from the Rev. Dr. John Polkinghorne FRS, an English particle physicist turned Anglican priest), see http://www.questioningchristian.com/2007/02/another_way_to_....
'Religion' is etymologically related to connotations of joining and binding. This implies some sort of separation, and a process of joining.
Similarly, 'yoga' (by which I do not mean physical exercise) is etymologically related to connotations of union (from 'yuj'). Again, the implication is separation and a process of union.
If you take a serious look at your own experience (the evidence), you will arrive at a similar conclusion to Descartes; roughly, that the evidence of one's senses cannot be taken at face value because they provide similar evidences in a dream which is understood to be entirely illusory upon waking up.
Alas, most of 'Western' (I do apologise in advance to anyone who thinks I'm being too liberal with that word) thought takes the waking state to be absolute, and dream and deep sleep to be subsets of this state. This is an assumption but it runs so deep that it will be difficult for most to see what I'm trying to point out.
First consider that the three states of consciousness experienced (waking, dream and deep sleep) are completely different modes; that is, the dreamer can neither conceive the existence of a waking world which is more 'real' than his current experience, nor will he readily admit that his experience is illusory...until he wakes up and becomes the waker. At this point the illusory nature of the dream cannot be doubted. The money in the dream cannot service debts of the waking state.
Consider, then, that questions as to the origin of the world, the purpose of existence and the nature of God may arise only during dream and waking, because in these states there exists thought and thus by implication a mind -- the conclusion is then drawn that in the absence of a mind, there is also absence of a world (as in deep sleep).
Thus one may conclude that the 3 states of waking, dream and deep sleep have relative and not absolute reality. It will, however, be noticed that there is a substratum integrating these varying experiences and arrogating them.
These are all evidences available to any human being and perhaps could lead one to believe that there might be something to religion after all, beyond the paraphernalia of clothing, places of worship and specific texts.
"The kingdom of heaven is within you; he that findeth his Self shall know it"
Similarly, 'yoga' (by which I do not mean physical exercise) is etymologically related to connotations of union (from 'yuj'). Again, the implication is separation and a process of union.
If you take a serious look at your own experience (the evidence), you will arrive at a similar conclusion to Descartes; roughly, that the evidence of one's senses cannot be taken at face value because they provide similar evidences in a dream which is understood to be entirely illusory upon waking up.
Alas, most of 'Western' (I do apologise in advance to anyone who thinks I'm being too liberal with that word) thought takes the waking state to be absolute, and dream and deep sleep to be subsets of this state. This is an assumption but it runs so deep that it will be difficult for most to see what I'm trying to point out.
First consider that the three states of consciousness experienced (waking, dream and deep sleep) are completely different modes; that is, the dreamer can neither conceive the existence of a waking world which is more 'real' than his current experience, nor will he readily admit that his experience is illusory...until he wakes up and becomes the waker. At this point the illusory nature of the dream cannot be doubted. The money in the dream cannot service debts of the waking state.
Consider, then, that questions as to the origin of the world, the purpose of existence and the nature of God may arise only during dream and waking, because in these states there exists thought and thus by implication a mind -- the conclusion is then drawn that in the absence of a mind, there is also absence of a world (as in deep sleep).
Thus one may conclude that the 3 states of waking, dream and deep sleep have relative and not absolute reality. It will, however, be noticed that there is a substratum integrating these varying experiences and arrogating them.
These are all evidences available to any human being and perhaps could lead one to believe that there might be something to religion after all, beyond the paraphernalia of clothing, places of worship and specific texts.
"The kingdom of heaven is within you; he that findeth his Self shall know it"
As counterevidence I would submit lucid dreaming, various half-awake/half-asleep states, and, the strongest evidence of all that sleep is a behavior of a physical brain and not an entrance to another world, the study of neuroscience.
Your views are valid if you're considering the other states of consciousness as subsets of the waking state. It's hard to extricate oneself from this thought pattern.
On the contrary, it is possible to dream that one is engaging in neuroscience, even hook up (dream) friends and family to some kind of brain monitor and prove that they are themselves asleep/dreaming. That doesn't change the fact that the entire dream is illusory. One can never see one's own brain while dreaming or sleeping, it is upon waking that we rely on the testimony of others and thus, again, on the existence of a mind. In this way, thought precedes the brain, whose very appearance occurs in the medium of thought. This is inverted as compared to the Western view that brains produce thoughts. Thoughts produce brains!
I'm not sure (and happy to be corrected) if lucid dreaming is well defined enough that we can say it is awareness of the illusory nature of the dream, while dreaming. Dream money, earned lucidly or not, cannot service debts of the waking state. And vice versa! Hence different modes of experience.
On the contrary, it is possible to dream that one is engaging in neuroscience, even hook up (dream) friends and family to some kind of brain monitor and prove that they are themselves asleep/dreaming. That doesn't change the fact that the entire dream is illusory. One can never see one's own brain while dreaming or sleeping, it is upon waking that we rely on the testimony of others and thus, again, on the existence of a mind. In this way, thought precedes the brain, whose very appearance occurs in the medium of thought. This is inverted as compared to the Western view that brains produce thoughts. Thoughts produce brains!
I'm not sure (and happy to be corrected) if lucid dreaming is well defined enough that we can say it is awareness of the illusory nature of the dream, while dreaming. Dream money, earned lucidly or not, cannot service debts of the waking state. And vice versa! Hence different modes of experience.
1) There is still always the question of where to start when looking at evidence. In terms of the question that started this thread, different people find it worthwhile (or not) to spend time considering particular questions based on past experience and assumptions. For people wanting a good place to discuss various topics, is that really what you want or do you want people who don't value that discussion to value it? What prevents people who want to discuss the topic from actually doing so? Possibly that many more people are willing to offer a piece of their perspective than spend much (or any) time considering alternatives? That is basically what I have to offer on religion.
I looked at your site and a few things I didn't see are a discussion about how identifying as Christian affects your daily life, how you came to consider Christianity as an option, how "cosmic coincidences" are evidence of any god, or even if so how those cosmic coincidences translate into your particular religious actions such as quoting the bible.
My perspective is that most religions have been spread primarily by violence and these violent interactions explain the overall picture of religion in the world today independent of the truth of the deistic claims of any particular religion (but potentially related to effectiveness of particular religions as a psychological hack to enable optimal violence for spreading that religion).
2) Why do you consider "a creator" as helping with that question? I am not particularly interested in "why something rather than nothing?" because I can't even imagine what a satisfying answer could possibly be.
I looked at your site and a few things I didn't see are a discussion about how identifying as Christian affects your daily life, how you came to consider Christianity as an option, how "cosmic coincidences" are evidence of any god, or even if so how those cosmic coincidences translate into your particular religious actions such as quoting the bible.
My perspective is that most religions have been spread primarily by violence and these violent interactions explain the overall picture of religion in the world today independent of the truth of the deistic claims of any particular religion (but potentially related to effectiveness of particular religions as a psychological hack to enable optimal violence for spreading that religion).
2) Why do you consider "a creator" as helping with that question? I am not particularly interested in "why something rather than nothing?" because I can't even imagine what a satisfying answer could possibly be.
> My perspective is that most religions have been spread primarily by violence and these violent interactions explain the overall picture of religion in the world today
Please note that originally Christianity spread in a peer-to-peer way until the Roman empire picked it up.
Even after then a lot of people have spread Christianity not by forcing people but by presenting it as a better option.
Personally I try to avoid forcing my views unto people ("many people who try to become fishers of men end up like scarecrows"). Instead I try to make an example and if anyone like what they see they are free to ask.
Please note that originally Christianity spread in a peer-to-peer way until the Roman empire picked it up.
Even after then a lot of people have spread Christianity not by forcing people but by presenting it as a better option.
Personally I try to avoid forcing my views unto people ("many people who try to become fishers of men end up like scarecrows"). Instead I try to make an example and if anyone like what they see they are free to ask.
I did not mean my comments as an attack on religious people. I'm sorry you interpreted it that way. Quite the opposite: I tried to argue that despite the lack of factual evidence for the existence of gods, strongly believing in them anyway can make sense if membership of organised religion is attractive enough.
I don't expect anyone who is religious to see it that way though, even though I've met many devout Christians who happily admit there is no factual proof of God and that is why they place their energies in faith instead.
I don't expect anyone who is religious to see it that way though, even though I've met many devout Christians who happily admit there is no factual proof of God and that is why they place their energies in faith instead.
> I've met many devout Christians who happily admit there is no factual proof of God
There are factual cases for God, some attempting to be proofs even. For example, many consider objective morality (race based slavery is bad, say) to be a case for absolute good, which is hard to explain by pure randomness.
Faith, to a Christian, is making choices in the face of this problem. A Christian knows that everyone has to decide whether to follow God or not, and in that way, everyone has faith in some set of axioms. Many people (intelligent, kind, smart ones!) have immense faith that only matter and energy exist despite basically no proof in that metaphysical axiom.
Despite how hard it is to explain this, it's actually a clear thought to a reasonably educated Christian. It's just hard to communicate since words like 'rational', 'proof', and 'facts' are overloaded and cause confusion in these sorts of conversations. In this way, the balkanization of our culture is a negative feedback loop as misunderstanding promotes division which promotes more misunderstanding.
> strongly believing in them anyway can make sense if membership of organised religion is attractive enough
The point of Christianity isn't being part of an organization. People who go to worship services because it's their favorite social club are actually criticized pretty heavily by Jesus in the Bible. To be fair, I think most churchgoers don't understand the implications of this.
There are factual cases for God, some attempting to be proofs even. For example, many consider objective morality (race based slavery is bad, say) to be a case for absolute good, which is hard to explain by pure randomness.
Faith, to a Christian, is making choices in the face of this problem. A Christian knows that everyone has to decide whether to follow God or not, and in that way, everyone has faith in some set of axioms. Many people (intelligent, kind, smart ones!) have immense faith that only matter and energy exist despite basically no proof in that metaphysical axiom.
Despite how hard it is to explain this, it's actually a clear thought to a reasonably educated Christian. It's just hard to communicate since words like 'rational', 'proof', and 'facts' are overloaded and cause confusion in these sorts of conversations. In this way, the balkanization of our culture is a negative feedback loop as misunderstanding promotes division which promotes more misunderstanding.
> strongly believing in them anyway can make sense if membership of organised religion is attractive enough
The point of Christianity isn't being part of an organization. People who go to worship services because it's their favorite social club are actually criticized pretty heavily by Jesus in the Bible. To be fair, I think most churchgoers don't understand the implications of this.
I think you are all proving my point for me; as a reminder, my point was that trying to create a social network oriented around debating of facts would rapidly run into problems due to people who present things which are actually beliefs as if they were facts.
The existence of God is not a fact, not even remotely close to being one. If it was then basically everyone would believe in God because any unbeliever would be seen as crazy as someone who doesn't believe in gravity. But lots of people don't believe in God. The existence of God is an article of faith, and that is simply not something you can blow off as "words like 'fact' are overloaded".
Really, this whole sub-thread is strong evidence for why edraferi's proposal would be very difficult. Such a website or tool could not even handle a debating-101 discussion on religion because people would have no way to agree on what the facts were.
The existence of God is not a fact, not even remotely close to being one. If it was then basically everyone would believe in God because any unbeliever would be seen as crazy as someone who doesn't believe in gravity. But lots of people don't believe in God. The existence of God is an article of faith, and that is simply not something you can blow off as "words like 'fact' are overloaded".
Really, this whole sub-thread is strong evidence for why edraferi's proposal would be very difficult. Such a website or tool could not even handle a debating-101 discussion on religion because people would have no way to agree on what the facts were.
The inexistence of God is an article of faith as well. It's typically faith in the truth of the physicalist position.
But I agree with you on the tool. Even if we can assume a healthy community (a huge assumption) the tool would have to pick some first principles and scientific standards that would inevitably be controversial. We could maybe have different sections based on different first principles, but then we're back to a fragmented, insular culture.
But I agree with you on the tool. Even if we can assume a healthy community (a huge assumption) the tool would have to pick some first principles and scientific standards that would inevitably be controversial. We could maybe have different sections based on different first principles, but then we're back to a fragmented, insular culture.
Maybe machine learning could help identify differences in accepted definitions of words and different assumptions. This came up in another thread recently, but I'll restate the idea here: maybe an n-dimensional vector can be assigned to each assumption or each individual's understanding of a word, and then nearby vectors compared to see where different groups have similar ideas but use different words to describe them (or vice versa).
The word "faith", for example, probably means something completely different to a scientist who has "faith" (confidence) in a particular experimental method, versus a religious person who has "faith" (belief/hope) in God, versus a parent who has "faith" (trust) in a child.
A tool for discussion could help elucidate these differences in usage and bridge the linguistic gap that can form between groups.
The word "faith", for example, probably means something completely different to a scientist who has "faith" (confidence) in a particular experimental method, versus a religious person who has "faith" (belief/hope) in God, versus a parent who has "faith" (trust) in a child.
A tool for discussion could help elucidate these differences in usage and bridge the linguistic gap that can form between groups.
Great thoughts. I have had similar ones from a theological perspective.
Probably the most famous words of Jesus, from John 3, say that "whoever believes in [Jesus] will not perish". The word 'belief' here is from the Koine Greek root 'pistis' (1), which is also translated as 'faith' in its noun form. It absolutely carries connotations of trust, relationship, and fidelity. To the point where it is nonsense to have faith without personal consequences such as changed behavior (see James 1). So I believe your last definition fits the ideas of the Bible better.
Anyway, both Christians and non-Christians in the English speaking world tend to use the word 'faith' to fit your second definition, something more like wish/hope/belief/feeling. So I can understand atheist's offense when Christians say atheism and science are each expressions of faith, but I think a lot of it comes from the sort of 'linguistic gap' you talk about.
Anyway, it's a shame we don't more words to distinguish between these overloaded ideas: faith, facts, love, etc.
(1) https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?str...
Probably the most famous words of Jesus, from John 3, say that "whoever believes in [Jesus] will not perish". The word 'belief' here is from the Koine Greek root 'pistis' (1), which is also translated as 'faith' in its noun form. It absolutely carries connotations of trust, relationship, and fidelity. To the point where it is nonsense to have faith without personal consequences such as changed behavior (see James 1). So I believe your last definition fits the ideas of the Bible better.
Anyway, both Christians and non-Christians in the English speaking world tend to use the word 'faith' to fit your second definition, something more like wish/hope/belief/feeling. So I can understand atheist's offense when Christians say atheism and science are each expressions of faith, but I think a lot of it comes from the sort of 'linguistic gap' you talk about.
Anyway, it's a shame we don't more words to distinguish between these overloaded ideas: faith, facts, love, etc.
(1) https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?str...
>The inexistence of God is an article of faith as well. It's typically faith in the truth of the physicalist position
Is it? I really hope you're merely lying in order to socially signal religiousness, because the general form of this argument allows that technically, you don't know that this SMBC is false [0]. I believe that densely-packed Hitlers exist all around you. The inexistence of the densely packed Hitlers crowding just outside the cone of your vision is an article of faith. It's typically faith in the truth of a universe whose boundary conditions are subject to Popperian falsifiability.
[0] http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=3307
Is it? I really hope you're merely lying in order to socially signal religiousness, because the general form of this argument allows that technically, you don't know that this SMBC is false [0]. I believe that densely-packed Hitlers exist all around you. The inexistence of the densely packed Hitlers crowding just outside the cone of your vision is an article of faith. It's typically faith in the truth of a universe whose boundary conditions are subject to Popperian falsifiability.
[0] http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=3307
For example, many consider objective morality (race based slavery is bad, say) to be a case for absolute good, which is hard to explain by pure randomness.
I just want to clarify some incredibly common misconceptions here. There are lots of claims on these issues, so it can be difficult to get a clear picture of which claims are actually supported by evidence.
First, from an empirical perspective, all signs point to morality being an evolved phenomenon. This is studied scientifically by surveying different cultures, conducting game-like experiments, and testing for moral behavior in other species. You can find videos of monkeys who appear to have a sense of fairness, for example, and lots of other species (dogs, crows, other primates, etc.) all display varying levels of behaviors we call moral. This is what we would expect to find if these behaviors evolved as adaptations.
Second, "randomness" is not an accurate word to use to describe evolution by natural selection. Mutations are mostly random, but those rare mutations that survive DNA repair mechanisms and produce a reproductive and survival advantage persist and spread. Something similar occurs with cultural memes, including those layers of morality which do not come from instinct.
Finally, though you didn't mention this specifically, it's important to point out that scientists did not decide there was no God and then set out to prove it (a common misconception with some people I know). Most historical scientists were religious, but over time as more and more evidence was collected, scientists in aggregate found that what they had been taught about God was unnecessary for and often contradictory to their scientific discoveries. Thus, despite some scientists remaining religious, science itself is an atheistic process, as that is what has been proven to work.
It's this track record of epistemological success that leads people to accept metaphysical materialism, not an a priori assumption.
If you want more detailed summaries of the empirical support for these arguments, I recommend the book Why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne.
I just want to clarify some incredibly common misconceptions here. There are lots of claims on these issues, so it can be difficult to get a clear picture of which claims are actually supported by evidence.
First, from an empirical perspective, all signs point to morality being an evolved phenomenon. This is studied scientifically by surveying different cultures, conducting game-like experiments, and testing for moral behavior in other species. You can find videos of monkeys who appear to have a sense of fairness, for example, and lots of other species (dogs, crows, other primates, etc.) all display varying levels of behaviors we call moral. This is what we would expect to find if these behaviors evolved as adaptations.
Second, "randomness" is not an accurate word to use to describe evolution by natural selection. Mutations are mostly random, but those rare mutations that survive DNA repair mechanisms and produce a reproductive and survival advantage persist and spread. Something similar occurs with cultural memes, including those layers of morality which do not come from instinct.
Finally, though you didn't mention this specifically, it's important to point out that scientists did not decide there was no God and then set out to prove it (a common misconception with some people I know). Most historical scientists were religious, but over time as more and more evidence was collected, scientists in aggregate found that what they had been taught about God was unnecessary for and often contradictory to their scientific discoveries. Thus, despite some scientists remaining religious, science itself is an atheistic process, as that is what has been proven to work.
It's this track record of epistemological success that leads people to accept metaphysical materialism, not an a priori assumption.
If you want more detailed summaries of the empirical support for these arguments, I recommend the book Why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne.
> science itself is an atheistic process
Should this be non-religious instead of atheistic? When we say atheistic we mist often assume someone who is opposed to the idea of all religions, not just somebody who doesn't let it interfere with his work.
Should this be non-religious instead of atheistic? When we say atheistic we mist often assume someone who is opposed to the idea of all religions, not just somebody who doesn't let it interfere with his work.
I also prefer to consider science as agnostic since it chooses to focus its efforts on physical things like matter and energy. And I believe that was done in the effort to find common ground to reason from. It's a broader form of "assume all cows are spherical" so we can understand the world better.
I don't think it's so much to find common ground. I think it's because it works. AIUI scientists have studied the metaphysical (miracles, remote viewing, psychics, ESP, telekinesis, out of body experiences, etc.) and found no evidence any of them exist beyond the obvious physical explanations.
It's quite simple. Some people demand testable theories to accept a religions' god as existing.
There is no evidence of the Christian god, the Hindu god's, or the Greek gods doing what their holy texts claimed, so I'm of in the camp where I assume none of them are correct. It's senseless to be sure one is because it happened to be the one you were raised with.
There is no evidence of the Christian god, the Hindu god's, or the Greek gods doing what their holy texts claimed, so I'm of in the camp where I assume none of them are correct. It's senseless to be sure one is because it happened to be the one you were raised with.
> It's senseless to be sure one is because it happened to be the one you were raised with.
And you wouldn't think that if you were born in other circumstances.
> I'm of in the camp where I assume none of them are correct
Fair enough. My point was that everyone assumes some things and that there will be more peace and understanding when we acknowledge that instead of establishing outgroups.
And you wouldn't think that if you were born in other circumstances.
> I'm of in the camp where I assume none of them are correct
Fair enough. My point was that everyone assumes some things and that there will be more peace and understanding when we acknowledge that instead of establishing outgroups.
But my assumptions are based on the presence of evidence. I can't condone systems based on anything else because there is nothing that prevents it from escalating into 'kill the others'.
One way to avoid 'kill the others' is to avoid creating 'others'. Understanding others' beliefs doesn't require condoning them, but it does require mutual respect.
On a side note, physicalist assumptions can and do lead to harsh utilitarianism and eventually the devaluing and ending of human life.
Finally, the "don't kill" part of the Bible is very clear. You don't have to be a theologian to know that people killing in the name of Christ aren't Christians. Just like you don't have to be a mathematician to know that 2+2=4.
On a side note, physicalist assumptions can and do lead to harsh utilitarianism and eventually the devaluing and ending of human life.
Finally, the "don't kill" part of the Bible is very clear. You don't have to be a theologian to know that people killing in the name of Christ aren't Christians. Just like you don't have to be a mathematician to know that 2+2=4.
Ok, thanks, I see.
For me it was very easy to interpret as a general attack.
For me it was very easy to interpret as a general attack.
>Lets keep religion out of HN, shall we?
I think youre being a bit defensive. That statement might not apply to your religion, especially if it's one based on facts.
I think youre being a bit defensive. That statement might not apply to your religion, especially if it's one based on facts.
"...in reality almost nobody disagrees on actual provable, scientific facts."
Facts have the nasty habit of changing.
Much of my activism devolved down to persuading people that their assumptions need to be updated based on the latest, best available science.
Facts have the nasty habit of changing.
Much of my activism devolved down to persuading people that their assumptions need to be updated based on the latest, best available science.
I think the first hurdle to clear will be to convince people to use their spare time to willingly have arguments on the internet with people who they think essentially hate them.
It sounds like a non-starter.
It sounds like a non-starter.
You say:
almost nobody disagrees on actual provable,
scientific facts. The toughest disagreements
usually arise around things which are not facts,
but are presented as if they were.
> civic discussion between people who disagree
Unfortunately, you will find only a small minority of the population would be interested this, and therefore the network would have a strong self selection bias.
You might find that people who are interested skew heavily liberal, for example, which would strongly reduce the diversity of political opinion.
There's plenty of recent psychological research that suggests that people in general, and conservatives in particular, find uncertainty and disagreement to be actually threatening:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/calling-truce-poli...
"Psychologists have found that conservatives are fundamentally more anxious than liberals, which may be why they typically desire stability, structure and clear answers even to complicated questions. "
Unfortunately, you will find only a small minority of the population would be interested this, and therefore the network would have a strong self selection bias.
You might find that people who are interested skew heavily liberal, for example, which would strongly reduce the diversity of political opinion.
There's plenty of recent psychological research that suggests that people in general, and conservatives in particular, find uncertainty and disagreement to be actually threatening:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/calling-truce-poli...
"Psychologists have found that conservatives are fundamentally more anxious than liberals, which may be why they typically desire stability, structure and clear answers even to complicated questions. "
> You might find that people who are interested skew heavily liberal, for example, which would strongly reduce the diversity of political opinion.
Let me guess you identify as a liberal? :-)
Let me guess you identify as a liberal? :-)
Sure, but I'm not dumb enough to believe that liberals know the answer to everything.
Ask yourself this though -- do you consider openness to new ideas and willingness to challenge orthodoxy a more stereotypically conservative or liberal trait, given that those traits have both upsides and downsides.
Ask yourself this though -- do you consider openness to new ideas and willingness to challenge orthodoxy a more stereotypically conservative or liberal trait, given that those traits have both upsides and downsides.
The "liberal" identity in US is a lossy projection of many different ideology axes to a single one, and is much more closely to just mean "the left" than the definition you meant. I do not believe that they are any more open to new ideas than the right. Both sides stick to the first fancy idea they knew about, and it just happens that those idea are different.
"Liberal" as defined with characteristics in your question is orthogonal to whatever "liberal" is in US politics. And if you ignore children, I think it would be a rather small percentage of human.
"Liberal" as defined with characteristics in your question is orthogonal to whatever "liberal" is in US politics. And if you ignore children, I think it would be a rather small percentage of human.
I don't identify with the left, but I suspect something like that will happen.
People who will be interested in a scholarly sort of social net will be university educated, richer than most, and use computers a lot. So we will have a skew there.
People who will be interested in a scholarly sort of social net will be university educated, richer than most, and use computers a lot. So we will have a skew there.
I find my conservative acquaintances want to argue about politics than my liberal ones.
Psychology as a field is effectively garbage. Until they fix their reproducibility problems I wouldnt draw any conclusions from what could very easily be cherry picked data.
Psychology as a field is effectively garbage. Until they fix their reproducibility problems I wouldnt draw any conclusions from what could very easily be cherry picked data.
Agreed. There was a study that was published assigning some traits to conservatives and others to liberals. Then someone found a math error. They had actually flipped which trait was associated with which group. Pretty egregious. At a minimum, it underscores the need for plenty of reproduction, especially in complex fields like psychology and sociology.
http://retractionwatch.com/2016/06/07/conservative-political...
http://retractionwatch.com/2016/06/07/conservative-political...
> argue about politics
Is their motivation to prove that they're right, or to have a discussion and risk being swayed?
Is their motivation to prove that they're right, or to have a discussion and risk being swayed?
Some of both, just like anyone with firmly held beliefs in the liberal camp. Someone extremely anti-religion will frequently engage in religious arguments to prove that they are right, not to risk being turned religious.
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Hilarious that so many here find the voices of others so intolerable to their careful cultivation of certainty that we sit about dreaming of mediums where we set the rules and all must comply to participate.
The best example of such a network is Wikipedia. Draw from that any conclusions you want.
The problem with Wikipedia is that is that it creates a huge barrier to seeing things that a regularly edited out as well as no means to verify whether things that were removed may have been verifiable.
That data is available. If some would find it valuable, perhaps another interface could be created to make the stream of edits more accessible? One can understand why that isn't the default focus of Wikipedia.
I like science fiction author Dr. David Brin's idea of "Disputational Arenas," where issues are exhaustively and respectfully discussed in all their complex glory.
http://www.davidbrin.com/disputation.html
The Economist will host something like this, where an issue is presented in an online forum and thoroughly debated until a consensus is established.
http://www.davidbrin.com/disputation.html
The Economist will host something like this, where an issue is presented in an online forum and thoroughly debated until a consensus is established.
Logical discussions are hard online. We, as a species, are prone to emotional irrationality that can impair intelligent discourse w/ non-like minded viewpoints. Also, a lack of prosody[1] in text/type communications is problematic; w/o cadence, inflection & body language a simple statement can be construed a myriad of differing ways. Lastly, and I'm sure there's more, the noise on the line allows anyone to find supportive evidence to bolster their learned attachment to their personal bias. All are a helluva a hindrance to meaningful discussions that could be overcome w/ mutual diligence... until you factor the presence of paid actors assigned to sway opinions w/ more noise added to exploit their special interests. Frankly, the internet as some of us geezers knew it is already FUBAR, the rest is walled-gardens, service contracted entrapment & mouth-service to obfuscated, spurious ends.
edit: [1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosody_(linguistics)
edit: [1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosody_(linguistics)
One model that I've thought of in the past would be centered around moderators instead of direct voting like reddit/hn. Instead of a discussion being by-everyone-for-everyone, a discussion would be led by a moderator, who would be in charge of voting or banning within that conversation. People would then vote on the _moderator_ rather than on the conversation directly.
Eventually I imagine we might see popular moderators who are seen as fair, and they would take their "job" quite seriously, and we would see some good discussions. Maybe. Or maybe it would be a total shit-show. :)
Eventually I imagine we might see popular moderators who are seen as fair, and they would take their "job" quite seriously, and we would see some good discussions. Maybe. Or maybe it would be a total shit-show. :)
If this helps any, Facebook's machine learning stuff seems to focus on showing you posts that you'll comment on. The effect is that it either shows you me-too type posts that agree with your already stated position, or it shows you polar opposite posts that it knows will get you to respond. Better yet, it'll sort the replies to the post it shows you by its estimation of how likely you are to respond to them (agree or disagree), which means, if you're not a me-too-er, that it deliberately shit-stirs by showing you posts that it knows you'll have to rebuke. :P
I'd like to make a crowd-sourced Bayes net of all evidence, hypotheses, and policy proposals. Let people vote on the connections between nodes and their influence, but then let the Bayes net decide what is consequentially true. Most people are able and willing to follow local arguments about individual things, but discard the whole thing when the argument expands to have actual consequences for policy. The goal would be to let people keep making those local judgement calls on evidence and truth, but let the machine handle the consequent implications.
LessWrong, perhaps? If you can tolerate the smugness of course, but that's usually a side effect of most people who tend to be too logical, not just members of LessWrong.
LessWrong is a self-selected community. It won't scale.
> self-selected community
as would be this one.
as would be this one.
It's essentially what https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview is. It relies heavily on moderation to maintain quality, so I'm not sure how well it scales.
Sometimes I think a restricted medium forces people to communicate dense and honest. It imposes more upfront thinking and reflective reading instead of shallow arguing.
Political discourse is based as much on feeling as it is on facts. You might wish that weren't the case but ignoring that fact doesn't make it less true.
It's not a social network design issue. It's a social issue of actual humans. Our society, currently, rewards outrage amd sensitivity as opposed to reason and the free exchange of ideas. We are essentially in a post enlightenment phase moving towards new forms of regressive authoritarianism.
Often though, the people who disagree are themselves the biggest hinderance to a useful conversation... right?
It's interesting to note that the same principles discussed in the paper might also apply to the social networks necessary for the development a new social network "for civic discussion between people who disagree".
Social networks are by default designed to circumvent reasoning.
True reason based system would require claims based on science - and nothing more.
There would be no discussion.
True reason based system would require claims based on science - and nothing more.
There would be no discussion.
A lot of the topics being discussed don't lend themselves to repeatable testable science. So lots of opinion and preconceived notions, or even just principles are involved in decision making.
If these issues could be resolved by the scientific method, they likely would have already.
If these issues could be resolved by the scientific method, they likely would have already.
I think you're describing a dialectic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectic
The problem with such a project (which I think could succeed without solving it) is that it is not merely the case that people disagree on the facts.
They also disagree on the frame of reference. That may not be solvable.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectic
The problem with such a project (which I think could succeed without solving it) is that it is not merely the case that people disagree on the facts.
They also disagree on the frame of reference. That may not be solvable.
Consensus agreement would probably not be the goal of such a project, and there's no reason to expect or desire that (aside from the old idea that public reason leads to truth in political questions which by now seems rather silly).
If we were devising a government (or any other system) it would be productive to have consensus on some issues (who is the enemy) and not so on others (quantity of net redistribution).
Just as there exists P space and NP space it ought to be possible to categorize questions for which there exist right and wrong answers (universal absolutes), and then a separate space for 'spectrum' questions whose answers are a matter of degree contingent on the feedback from the environment.
Confusing these two types of questions when the answers are unknown is easy and can make you very wrong. I'll give a practical example that may be biased. Personally I believe moderate climatic change to be in the 2nd category* while biodiversity in the 1st category because a temperature can be ratcheted up or down (even if it took centuries or was expensive) whereas once a species is extinguished it is gone forever while the side affects are permanent. They are both serious problems but getting a category 1 question wrong makes the error baked in for the future.
You'll remember numerous occasions when the government tried to defy the laws of biology or physics and this never ends well. Something I believe most politicians do not comprehend is that not every 'policy question' belongs to category 2. Something I believe most scientists do not comprehend is that not every political question belongs to category 1.
> aside from the old idea that public reason leads to truth in political questions which by now seems rather silly).
A public debate could be seen as a method to factor in information from the world and limit the framing of the question so something can objectively be done.
Not so much leading to truth as increasing the likelihood of survival for the participants.
* Yes I'm aware temp change can cause extinction events, this is a toy example to illustrate the point.
Just as there exists P space and NP space it ought to be possible to categorize questions for which there exist right and wrong answers (universal absolutes), and then a separate space for 'spectrum' questions whose answers are a matter of degree contingent on the feedback from the environment.
Confusing these two types of questions when the answers are unknown is easy and can make you very wrong. I'll give a practical example that may be biased. Personally I believe moderate climatic change to be in the 2nd category* while biodiversity in the 1st category because a temperature can be ratcheted up or down (even if it took centuries or was expensive) whereas once a species is extinguished it is gone forever while the side affects are permanent. They are both serious problems but getting a category 1 question wrong makes the error baked in for the future.
You'll remember numerous occasions when the government tried to defy the laws of biology or physics and this never ends well. Something I believe most politicians do not comprehend is that not every 'policy question' belongs to category 2. Something I believe most scientists do not comprehend is that not every political question belongs to category 1.
> aside from the old idea that public reason leads to truth in political questions which by now seems rather silly).
A public debate could be seen as a method to factor in information from the world and limit the framing of the question so something can objectively be done.
Not so much leading to truth as increasing the likelihood of survival for the participants.
* Yes I'm aware temp change can cause extinction events, this is a toy example to illustrate the point.
My biggest fear about FB isn't regarding privacy, but its enormous ability to spread misinformation.
Why single FB? Internet in general gives anyone an enormous ability (well, potential, really) to spread misinformation.
FB has definitely made it easier; it's just a matter of a button click. (Share button)
I was thinking about this the other day. In the pre-social network days, it was obnoxious to blast your political opinions out to your friends and family. You had to create or forward an email, and very few people did. Mostly grandparents. Now it seems that everyone can and will share their political views through a social network. Is it just that it's easier, or is there something else about the platform that invites that type of sharing?
Well, it's not only easier, but it's easy to find others that share your (obnoxious or not) opinions in various groups. So now you're in an echo chamber where your opinions will gather likes and reposts, while your friends and family might try to ignore you as best they can.
And of course, the more you associate and interact with groups that fit your opinions and interests, the more Facebook and other ad-supported services will try to prioritize showing you those posts, so the echo chamber effect is amplified.
And when you step out into the real world, you'll be inclined to think of others that don't share your "informed" opinion as uninformed or naive, after all you have seen all this evidence to back you your opinions and theories. [Edit:spelling]
And of course, the more you associate and interact with groups that fit your opinions and interests, the more Facebook and other ad-supported services will try to prioritize showing you those posts, so the echo chamber effect is amplified.
And when you step out into the real world, you'll be inclined to think of others that don't share your "informed" opinion as uninformed or naive, after all you have seen all this evidence to back you your opinions and theories. [Edit:spelling]
I mean, it's still obnoxious, everyone bitches about _that person_ on their Facebook. Or don't they?
Everyone has _that_ person, but a lot more people share a couple posts per week, or some similar lower volume but nonetheless obnoxious posts.
Consider reddit, where anyone can create - and curate - a discussion board on any topic; or wikipedia, where topics are often heavily trolled by the self-appointed "guardians of the holy page."
In general, in these situations, it seems that the greater tyrant always seems to win, to the detriment of the community.
In general, in these situations, it seems that the greater tyrant always seems to win, to the detriment of the community.
Pamphlet, newspaper, telegram, radio, telephone, television..
Indeed, I think the problem with Facebook, is that like Television it is not anarchic enough.
A society with free speech is supposed to tolerate the expression of really bad ideas partly because nothing other than the consent of human minds lets society distnguish good ideas from bad.
But no particular organisation has a duty to be a forum for all ideas. And that's why it's OK to kick a racist out of your dinner party, and OK for reddit to try and censor its worst users. But when such organisations are main forum for conversion, then the censorship starts to look total.
A society with free speech is supposed to tolerate the expression of really bad ideas partly because nothing other than the consent of human minds lets society distnguish good ideas from bad.
But no particular organisation has a duty to be a forum for all ideas. And that's why it's OK to kick a racist out of your dinner party, and OK for reddit to try and censor its worst users. But when such organisations are main forum for conversion, then the censorship starts to look total.
Voice, body, mind...
>but its enormous ability to spread misinformations
I think there are worse sources of missinformation, like Redit.
I think there are worse sources of missinformation, like Redit.
TL;DR: if highly connected nodes tend to have a given attribute, most nodes have the illusion that the majority has that attribute.
It's an interesting statement, but not terribly insightful. I hope more research follows.
It's an interesting statement, but not terribly insightful. I hope more research follows.
arxiv postings should feature warning sign iconography. On one hand, it offers open access to research -- awesome. On the other hand, it offers us a chance to waste our time and energy studying material that may never survive peer review.
I get excited whenever I see what appears to be a really interesting, valuable piece of information gleamed through rigorous research. My immediate first emotion is excitement. However, that excitement casts a long shadow of doubt as my system 2 mode of reason kicks in and alerts me that the content of interest is the result of an arxiv posting that may fail to survive peer review. Of course, death-through-peer-review may not imply bunk science but I assume that it more often is the case (experts, please chime in).
This leads me to ask whether the HN community would be better without knowing of bleeding edge research on arxiv until it's graduated peer review --What do you think: Is it better to front page bleeding edge, unverified research?
I think the world would benefit by a service that indexes arxiv postings that have survived peer review. Is this feasible?
I get excited whenever I see what appears to be a really interesting, valuable piece of information gleamed through rigorous research. My immediate first emotion is excitement. However, that excitement casts a long shadow of doubt as my system 2 mode of reason kicks in and alerts me that the content of interest is the result of an arxiv posting that may fail to survive peer review. Of course, death-through-peer-review may not imply bunk science but I assume that it more often is the case (experts, please chime in).
This leads me to ask whether the HN community would be better without knowing of bleeding edge research on arxiv until it's graduated peer review --What do you think: Is it better to front page bleeding edge, unverified research?
I think the world would benefit by a service that indexes arxiv postings that have survived peer review. Is this feasible?
Surely the act of people reading it is peer review? Unless you assume that nobody on Hacker News is qualified to read scientific papers, which seems like a stretch.
No. Peer review is more than that. It's a vetting process. 90% if everything is crap, and so if you don't vet it, you'll get 90% crap.
Also, by conflating a forum full of lay people with experts in a specific field is a bit absurd. Simply put, not everyone's opinion should be given equal weight.
Also, by conflating a forum full of lay people with experts in a specific field is a bit absurd. Simply put, not everyone's opinion should be given equal weight.
For any given arxiv article, I'd wager 98% of people on HN are unqualified to critically review the article. They're not aware of prior work that might contradict the article. They're not aware of the limitations of prior work that the article cites. They've never tried the experimental or theoretical methods the article uses, and so on. Yet these are the people upvoting and commenting on implications.
98% sounds like a made up stat, so if you grant me the same privilege then let's say HN has 1 million readers. So 2% of that would be 20,000 people qualified to judge the article, which is plenty of people.
1) HN has 300k daily uniques (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9219581). Of those readers, nearly all do not comment (we don't have 300k comments, do we?). Of those commentors, only a fraction comment on a given article.
2) Of those commenters, most are not actual researchers, who are, IMO, much, much busier with real work (you know... research) than your average HN commenter.
2) Of those commenters, most are not actual researchers, who are, IMO, much, much busier with real work (you know... research) than your average HN commenter.
Of course most don't comment, but commenting is not required for a paper to be peer reviewed, only reviewing it is. If someone were to see the paper here, and review it, and find an error, presumably they would contact the author.
300k * 0.02 = 6000 people who may be qualified. How many people are typically asked to peer review a paper? A handful? The odds are still good.
300k * 0.02 = 6000 people who may be qualified. How many people are typically asked to peer review a paper? A handful? The odds are still good.
The original poster was talking about what would be better for the HN community. The HN community is a discussion forum, not a system of people privately emailing.
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My rule of thumb is to always have a healthy dose of skepticism regardless of how a study was published, whether in a peer-reviewed journal, preprints, or even a blog post. About bleeding edge research, publishing machine learning methods immediately on arXiv seem to be hot among academics nowadays.
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In online scenarios, the result is that many can say, well, I am dedicated to X, but I'm not as extremely dedicated as Y... where Y may be literally one of the most X-dedicated people in the entire world.
When you have this majority illusion, some high-engagement obsessives, and throw in some producers of writings (news, documents, popular literature and orientation literature such as FAQs), you have an engine for converting dedication into social goods such as a sense of belonging, friendship, and most of all, self-identification.
The ability to create and sustain these communities in many forms, for any topic, worldwide, is the miracle of the internet.