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TheMajor comments on Guidelines for Upvoting and Downvoting? - Less Wrong Discussion

16 Post author: Sable 06 May 2015 11:51AM

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Tags: guidelines gardens well-kept downvoting upvoting

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Comment author: TheMajor 06 May 2015 11:56:58AM *  19 points [-]

If you want to read more posts like the one you just read, upvote. If you want to read less posts like the one you just read, downvote.

Comment author: TheAncientGeek 07 May 2015 08:21:45AM 6 points [-]

That's a bad criterion, since it's an open gateway to confirmation bias. Having your biases challenged feels bad.

Comment author: John_Maxwell_IV 07 May 2015 11:50:36AM *  7 points [-]

I've argued that counterfactually we should go a bit easy on unpopular views, even if the reasoning seems incorrect on further examination, since it's hard to predict in advance whether someone will find flaws in your reasoning, but they'll go especially hard on you if you present flawed reasoning for an unpopular position (relative to a popular one), discouraging arguing for unpopular positions.

Comment author: TheAncientGeek 07 May 2015 09:08:56AM 2 points [-]

Case in point

Comment author: FrameBenignly 08 May 2015 12:32:16AM 1 point [-]

To be fair, I think a more correct response would be that TheMajor's statement is correct, but implies a criterion which would likely lead to confirmation bias. Applied correctly, a better understanding of one's wants would support TheMajor's conclusion because one would not want to just have one's views confirmed.

Comment author: TheAncientGeek 11 May 2015 09:59:59AM 1 point [-]

In other words, it works just fine, so long as you are in an ideal world,

Comment author: Gunnar_Zarncke 07 May 2015 10:07:37PM 2 points [-]

This is an example where I - after some deliberation - decided to downvote. I believe this to be grossly overvoted. I agree that it is a simple and handy rule of thumb. But 22 upvotes? It isn't that insightful. It isn't a that much more correct choice than the approches mentioned in other comments.

Note that I wouldn't have downvoted if this comment would have stood in isolation. I see this post an example of a place where the votes order the comments in relation to how well they answer the question of the OP (which is facilitated by the default sort being 'best' voted). Actually a pattern not mentioned in the other comments.

Lets poll what you think of this:

If a post asks for advice (like in the OP) I vote depending on how well the comment answers the question.

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