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cousin_it comments on Open Thread, Jul. 27 - Aug 02, 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion

5 Post author: MrMind 27 July 2015 07:16AM

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Comment author: Elo 27 July 2015 05:48:45PM 2 points [-]

I am having a crisis in my life of trying to ask people a particular question and have them try to answer a different question. Its painful. I just want to yell at people; "answer the question I asked! not the one you felt like answering that was similar to the one I asked because you thought that was what I wanted to hear about or ask about!".

This has happened recently for multiple questions in my life that I have tried to ask people about. Do you have suggestions for either: a. dealing with it b. getting people to answer the right question

Assuming there isn't something wrong with the question I originally ask and how I present it.

Comment author: cousin_it 27 July 2015 07:02:13PM 2 points [-]

Yeah, I get that a lot. Some random suggestions:

  • Ask in a more friendly and open-ended way
  • Tailor your question to the crowd's interests and biases
  • Accept the tangents and try to spin them into other interesting conversations
  • Find a different crowd to ask
Comment author: Elo 28 July 2015 12:03:54AM 0 points [-]

Thanks!

I think I will have to expand my asky-circles (4 above)

I am concerned for 2 (above) because part of me has already done that ad infinitum. Most things I ask have gone around my head for days and then gone over in circles multiple times before completing them. I am no longer sure how to best do that.

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