= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
gwern comments on Free research help, editing and article downloads for LessWrong - 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 (439)
Request for comments from others who frequent this page:
I have been feeling that the academic literature is severely underused outside academia, including here on LW. Every now and then, I see a discussion that I think of interrupting to say, "Why don't you guys go on Google Scholar to learn more about this from people who have already thought about this? [As opposed to trying to come up with the same ideas by yourselves.]" (Access isn't a problem: abstracts often provide the information that one is looking for, and besides, free access to the vast majority of cited articles is available within hours from, e.g., here and Reddit's r/scholar.)
I'm hesitant about making this sort of comment because there is a clear potential for signaling: "I read journal articles that smart people read; I'm so smart. [You don't read these articles; you're not smart.]" From an outside view, I can imagine people making this sort of comment to signal intelligence (related), so I'm worried that my belief that the academic literature is underused is coming from a rationalization of a desire to use this signal.
If the literature is indeed underused, one possible explanation is that online journal access and search is a very recent innovation. If I'm not mistaken, it was very difficult for the general public to access any journal article ten years ago (and searching for specific information would have been a daunting task even for specialists).
Any thoughts?
'Discussion is not about Information'? If I saw people using Google routinely, I would wonder if maybe there's some sort of recentness issue; but I see even sophisticated young techies who literally grew up using Google failing to do so. I can't count how many times on LessWrong, Reddit, Wikipedia, or IRC I have spent 5 seconds in Google and refuted or confirmed someone's speculation. There's a reason LMGIFY is an acronym.
Huh, this was actually the first explanation that came to mind. I wanted to check if I was being too cynical (or too caught up in my own signaling), so I avoided mentioning it.
This is certainly true, I often do this myself and notice I could Google something and still don't do it. It's usually when I'm hanging out with friends and we're speculating about something because it's fun to speculate rather than because we want to figure something out.