Open thread, Nov. 24 - Nov. 30, 2014

MrMind

If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

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If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

Notes for future OT posters:

1. Please add the 'open_thread' tag.

2. Check if there is an active Open Thread before posting a new one. (Immediately before; refresh the list-of-threads page before posting.)

3. Open Threads should be posted in Discussion, and not Main.

4. Open Threads should start on Monday, and end on Sunday.

An idea I've been toying with in my head, and discussed slightly at LW London yesterday: a sort of Snopes for "has person X professed opinion Y?"

Has Scott Alexander endorsed GamerGate? Did Eric Raymond say that hackers tend to be libertarian (or neoconservative, depending who you ask)? Did Eliezer say the singularity was too close to bother getting a degree?

I'll put further thoughts in replies to this comment.

I assume you're talking about internet figures in the greater LW-memeplex. If so, I think this is a bad idea.

Tidy reasons this may have low-to-moderate value:

It's already easy to find the public positions of an internet figure.
Reasons are more important than conclusions. Unless you think you can present the arguments better than the original source, you'll just end up simply linking to the original source, which is, again, easy to find.

Messy reasons this might have negative value:

As a rule, no online community has ever suffered from a lack of in

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0Artaxerxes11y

I like this idea a lot. I honestly think it would be a useful resource, should it be well researched and accurate.

5ChristianKl11y

As far as famous/notable people go, skeptics.stackexchange works perfectly well for those questions. In general however focusing on "he said, she said" is bad. I might argue I wide arrange of positions depending on the context. Sometimes I play devils advocate to make points. Focusing on actual content instead of focusing on what someone said in a single instance if often better.

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