= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
Relsqui comments on Defecting by Accident - A Flaw Common to Analytical People - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (420)
It isn't dishonest to say "this is a good idea, but it might be difficult for these reasons" rather than "your idea isn't feasible for these reasons" (unless of course you don't like the idea, in which case pick a different way of expressing politeness). The first one is stating the objection and also implying respect; the second one is stating the objection and also implying disrespect.
If you really wanted to state the objection without making any implication of respect at all, the nearest thing which comes to mind right now would be phrasing it as a question. "How would you deal with such and such obstacles?" This is a little dangerous, because if they don't have a good answer, they get stuck looking dumb and might blame you for it--but I think that's probably true regardless of how you raise the objection, so I don't think I'd worry about it.
Part of my criteria for determining goodness of ideas is feasibility. I would be being dishonest if the idea was not feasible.
Mm, okay, let's put it another way than "good" then. Perhaps: "That's a desireable outcome and your method would work if we had the resources, but we don't."
Well, okay, I think I see something. This post and this comment communicate that people often use arguments to support monolithic beliefs. People might be thinking that the first option you gave earlier is saying "I'm on your side, we need to work together to kill this 'unfeasible' enemy soldier" whereas the second is more like "Your idea is dumb and I will throw arguments at you until you retreat or surrender".
A kind of politeness, then, I could use, encourage, and appreciate when receiving would be an effort to communicate that we both want the outcome, your method has obstacles, can we fix these obstacles or find another route?
That's exactly it.