Fair enough Manfred, I respect your feeling of dislike on this position, but I disagree with its lack of rationality.

I did put in more than 60 seconds of effort trying to understand why it's a -1, and couldn't come up with something that didn't include my own bias. So I wanted to both understand what the -1 was for and test to see if my inclination is true or not. So far my bias is telling me it's an example of "have a go at the new guy on the block." - I hold only very lightly to this and will enjoy being proven incorrect by having the -1 explained.

It's commonly accepted that the most challenging time for a new group member is their beginning with the group and it's also known that constructive feedback helps with that challenge.

Does a member of rational group want to provide rational feedback? Observationally quite a few do not.

If I never (or rarely) question the -1, or never or rarely receive any more feedback that -1, then I will struggle, or may not ever understand what the -1 is for. I consider myself to be intellectually honest in asking "what's wrong with this?", because during the process of writing the post, I'm already asking "what's wrong with this?" and so perhaps someone with more knowledge gives me a -1 and I'd appreciate being informed "what's wrong with this.", for in being informed I can potentially implement better self editing procedures, that is I can improve my rationality.

Now if they don't have the time to answer that question, ok, I'll consider on my own what the -1 is for (again!) and then it's more likely I'll come up with an answer that has some amount of "reasoning" based upon my own biases. Now the sequences I've read so far imply that biases are something that people should attempt to perceive and challenge, so I believe that I am being consistent with the sites inclination towards rationality by asking the question, both to challenge and improve my own understanding and do the same for the person who has given me a -1, indeed also for those who witness the exchange also.

Thanks for giving time to somewhat reveal your thinking.

Would my thinking be correct if I decide you downvoted the Dan Gilbert TED talk post because the comment is annoying?

My thinking is...

It's not a joke, I wasn't losing an argument, I was attempting to provide new insight in that Dan Gilbert has something worthwhile to say on the topic, I'm not posting for the sake of karma - but how can you guess my intentions on that anyways? The premise (that synthetic happiness is on topic and Gilbert has something to say on this) is clearly open to interpretation and I reveal my un-sureness of that openly.

That leaves only "it's annoying".

I hope I helped, and I hope you, when downvoted in the future, think about why first before asking for an explanation. It happens to everyone, and there's a good reason it happens to everyone: nobody makes good comments every single time he says something. Nobody!

Do you think all downvotes are good downvotes?

a user is posting for the sake of karma

I'm curious, if you don't mind elaborating, what sort of posts do you have in mind? It's a little contradictory to me because to get karma, you need to post something people will find worth upvoting...