Vladimir_Nesov comments on Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality discussion thread, part 4 - Less Wrong
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Downvoting mechanism is one way of making sure that obvious nonsense-posting gets visibly and quickly discouraged. Without it, there would be more nonsense.
I don't think that's actually true. There are very few nonsense posts (or at least, very few that get voted down); and when there are, downvoting doesn't always discourage the poster. When I see a post with a negative score, it's more often one that is controversial, or that disagrees with LessWrong dogma, or that was made by someone unpopular here, or that is in the middle of a flamewar between two users, or that is part of a longer conversation where one poster has triggered an "omega wolf" reaction from the rest of the pack by acting conciliatory.