= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
gjm comments on White Lies - 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 (893)
I take a different view. That question is simply a good general question to ask, and one that people can easily forget to ask themselves. In this it resembles "How sure are you of that, and on what grounds?".
Of course if you ask either question you need to be prepared for the possibility that your interlocutor has a good answer, and if you find that happening too often then you should consider that maybe your questions are more posturing than genuine helping. But I've not seen any particular sign that that's happening a lot on LW. Maybe I haven't been watching closely enough?
Yeah, that's close to the impression I've been getting from instances of such.
And if you really think, if the conversation so far is really indicating, that someone is forgetting to ask themselves this question... then sure. But when someone says, in so many words: "I deliberately, by choice, do X" — how likely is it that they've just forgotten to consider what good it does them? It seems to me that if you break out the "but what good does tha really do you?" inquiry in such a case, then you are being condescending.