Louie comments on Something's Wrong - Less Wrong

82 [deleted] 05 September 2010 06:08PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Article Navigation

Comments (161)

Comments (161)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: simplicio 07 September 2010 05:13:07AM 9 points [-]

...criticism without suggestion is useless and deserving of dismissal.

  • I find a flaw in Andrew Wiles' proof of FLT. Should I mention it if I don't have any ideas for my own proof? After all, FLT is definitely true anyway.
  • Eliezer is finally coding his FAI, and I notice that there is a way the code might fail to maintain its goal system during self-modification. Should I tell him this if I don't personally know how to fix the problem?
  • My uncle, a crown attorney, is prosecuting a rapist based solely on eyewitness identification across racial lines, something I know to be problematic. I have no idea who the rapist is, and there are no other leads. Should I bring it up?
  • Professor Peach, after much pondering of what to do about the severely mentally handicapped, decides that since "nature is about survival of the fittest," euthanasia would be the best option. I argue he has made a mistake in ethical reasoning (the naturalistic fallacy), but I have no idea what should be done about the institutionalized mentally handicapped either. Should I shut up?

There is no such thing, really, as criticism without suggestion. Sometimes the suggestion is just "Woah, something's very wrong here!" That's usually OK.

Comment author: Louie 09 September 2010 01:06:59AM 2 points [-]

These are great suggestions. Thank you. I think I just changed my mind.

My model didn't account for someone actually pointing out flaws using their own reasoning in novel situations. I don't think I've ever seen someone actually do this.

In my experience, criticism in the wild is the art of finding and repeating another thinker's reasoning to re-attack a clearly wrong idea again without adding anything new to human thought or attempting to do something tangible to improve things.

The reason that I dismiss critics like this is because they are engaging in an enjoyable, negative-sum activity by sitting around and sniping at people for "being wrong" while not engaging in the less enjoyable, positive-sum activity of actually trying to do something better. People who actually do things understand this which I think is what Roosevelt was getting at in pointing out that it is unhelpful to mindlessly repeat inadequacies of the best functioning plans without attempting to invent and/or implement alternatives.

Comment author: simplicio 09 September 2010 01:21:39AM 0 points [-]

In my experience, criticism in the wild is the art of finding and repeating another thinker's reasoning to re-attack a clearly wrong idea again without adding anything new to human thought or attempting to do something tangible to improve things.

Yup, there is definitely that aspect to things, alas.

Though I would submit that even such unoriginal criticism may be justified, given an important rhetorical objective.

Powered by Reddit Powered by Reddit