Should we consider a mechanism to reduce conformity bias? For example, we could allow users to blind themselves to (the nature of) existing reactions until they choose to reveal them or react themselves.
Such a mechanism may come with its own drawbacks, of course. And it's possible I'm just overthinking this. But I hadn't seen the idea discussed yet, so I thought I'd bring it up.
I think it's unintentional. I don't see how to parse that as a valid English sentence. (Even though it starts out so promising: "And still, it is not 'a', given that ...")
And there are some other errors too:
I'm not aware of any such guide, but it's a good idea. Here are some thoughts on how we might break this down if we ever want to start such a guide:
Oh, I don't think there's a disagreement here. I strong-upvoted the comment I responded to. "We can ban a Nazi because they're a Nazi." is a bad rule.
What I'm trying to add to the conversation (apart from an attempted steel-man of that footnote) is that the actual reason we ban people from communities is not because of what they've done in the past, but what they're likely to do in the future if they stay.
Usually we need to observe someone's actions before we can make such a determination, so it almost always ma...
My most charitable interpretation of footnote 1 is this: It's possible to imagine a profile picture, bio or first post so beyond the pale that the best course of action is to ban that person outright. And if you cannot imagine such a profile picture, bio or first post, then you have a poor imagination.
That would be quite a high bar for me, though. There would have to be overwhelming evidence that this person is going to be a net-negative influence. "They are a self-professed Nazi" would not clear that bar.
But would this account for a cumulative 8 pairs per person per year? Socks that end up in a sibling's drawer, fall on the floor, are carelessly paired up or lost in the dryer would eventually find their way back to where they belong, so they wouldn't make a difference in the long term.
I can think of several explanations for that number being a bit too high. It seems possible, for example, that Samsung is counting socks that were lost but then found soon after. Why else would their innovative AddWash™ system (a small door to add extra items to an ongoing wash cycle) be proposed as a solution?
But I think I prefer to believe that the average is being upset by a small number of pet ferrets.
I realize this article is not really about socks. Socks are merely the running example in a discussion about psychology, data mining and yak shaving.
But I have to ask: Do socks really mysteriously disappear? More so than other possessions and enough to cause shortages for a significant number of people? Sure I've thrown socks away when they got worn down, but I don't remember any ever being unaccounted for. It must have happened once or twice, but an average of 8 pairs per person per year? That's baffling.
If those statistics are reliable (an...
I want to like this idea, but I'm not sure yet. The process of writing down your own reasoning and assumptions seems incredibly valuable to me. But I wonder how much the framing of this exercise would actually help someone who is already introspective enough to attempt it.
Do you think it could mitigate certain cognitive biases? I can easily imagine different people writing contradictory children's picture books, just as they write contradictory blog-posts. Not because they're lying, but because of confirmation bias.
Also, if you take the framing too literally, there may be the temptation to oversimplify. Your global warming example has a lot of complexity for a children's picture book. :-)