Hacker News Guidelines

A shallow article written in bad faith only deserves a shallow dismissal.

Don't force me to fight an asymmetric warfare battle against malicious authors to participate.

Does a ‘shallow article’ even merit a dismissive comment? Wouldn’t it be better simply to ignore it and find another thread on which to engage?

That's what flagging is for. Or just ignore the post. Participation here is never "forced"

This makes sense to me since leaving a comment (even a negative one) would be a signal of engagement that would likely boost the likelihood of a given article being/remaining on the front page.

Ignoring/Flagging it is akin to shallow dismissal.

I make no distinction between the 2.

But the guidelines do.

> Please don't post shallow dismissals,

A shallow dismissal just makes your position look weak, and theirs stronger by comparison.

Ignoring those articles is quite nearly the definition of “easy”

“look” is the operative word here

I suppose it depends whether your goal is communicating your position or just winning a moral victory.

"Weak" is the operative word. Being right doesn't do you much favors if you can't communicate it. In this context, "looking" weak is being weak.

You're welcome to think so, but position strength is tied to facts, not posts.

> Being right doesn't do you much favors if you can't communicate it. In this context, "looking" weak is being weak.

No. Function over form.

IIRC, submissions are downranked as the commment to vote ration gets higher and higher.

https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented#flame-...

In that case, "strength" is the wrong metric. If you're posting a shallow response just because the facts align with your position, you're still just wasting people's time.

The people who already agree that the article is shallow learn nothing, and the people who don't know the article is shallow also learn nothing.

And I agree with you, position strength is tied to facts, which is why writing a shallow dismissal instead of listing some facts leads to a weak position.

Incidentally, why are you responding to me and not just saying "you're wrong, I'm done talking to you."

I agree, it's the same principal as spam. You don't reply calling them out as a spammer, as that only signals that they have access to your attention. You blackhole the spam or sender or submit to authorities of services that can help you block it in the future, but you do not engage with the originator.

The rule is not to force you to be a better person by making you consider all comments you see, it's to keep discussion useful and help the site continue to provide a high level of usefulness for all users, including yourself.

In that respect, ignoring, flagging, and shallow dismissals replies are three distinctly different outcomes with different utility to the users of this site.

The issue isn't justice, it's thread quality.

I'm coming to appreciate this view increasingly, why HN chooses to align itself this way, and the difficulty and precariousness with which that balance is attained.

I'll still say that the instances of HN moderation with which I have the greatest reservations tend to resemble what antisthenes describes above: poorly-conceived articles which would themselves be legitimately flagged and admonished if posted as HN comments to which the rather understandably heated or snippy response instead draws moderator action.

And yes, HN mods can't read everything or be everywhere,[1] so moderation is inconsistent, though I know what it strives toward.

And I can often identify how a response might have been improved or what elements run aground on HN's policies. I'm not convinced that the occasional exception or leniency would utterly wreck the ship (though having seen what, in dang's words things that strongly encourage that a "thread will lose its mind"[2] there's some reason for caution). But in a world where, to borrow from Tim Minchin, there's frequently a contingent which "keeps firing off clichés with startling precision like a sniper using bollocks for ammunition", diplomacy dikes do on occasion break.[3]

And tone-policing that, particularly unilaterally, strikes me as a greater wrong.

________________________________

Notes:

1. Which you've noted, 2 days ago <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37225175> and eight years ago: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9979719>. Another HN perennial...

2. <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22176686> and <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17689715>.

3. Tim Minchin, "Storm" (2009), <https://www.musixmatch.com/lyrics/Tim-Minchin/Storm>. Animated video: <https://yewtu.be/watch?v=HhGuXCuDb1U> and live performance: <https://yewtu.be/watch?v=KtYkyB35zkk>.

Perception is reality - Mother Nature is the arbiter, and you lose.

Both of the points of view have merit. We can move beyond anchoring to just one. How? Hegel has a "three step process": Thesis. Antithesis. Synthesis. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hegel-dialectics/

One synthesis is this: wise strategies depend on the audience composition and time scale.

More people should learn wise ways to quantify future rewards. Reinforcement learning, economics, and finance cover some simple ways. One way is a constant discount factor, but it is not the only nor best way.

> Perception is reality

Like most clichés, this is easy to say, but hard to apply. It is imprecise and does not capture its own limitations. These three words don't move us forward; we shouldn't fixate on them; we must move beyond them.

Reality exists without perception. It benefits us to clarify the difference. Here are some clearer statements that reflect current philosophical and scientific knowledge:

1. We only perceive a small, incomplete, distorted portion of reality.

2. Human perception is a flawed but useful error-corrected simulation designed to help us survive.

2. Perceptions and beliefs strongly influence individual behavior.

3. Behavior is constrained by reality (perceived or not, believed or not).

4. Over a sufficiently long time scale, individuals and groups who understand reality have a survival advantage.

5. Perceptions can deviate from reality for arbitrarily long time periods.

Spam is the extreme example. What about family or acquaintances who compulsively forward every garbage blog post they come across on whatever their political obsession is? What do you do when they don't respect multiple polite requests to take you off their CC: list? At some point you go, "the hell with seeming disengaged and just letting this trash pass without comment."

I'll happily forfeit my right to remain aloof and to give no signs of engagement if I get annoyed to the point where I'd prefer to go to war.

I've come around to the view that the randomness of enforcement (of any law or norm) can itself be a quite effective force multiplier at causing people to be on better behavior. It's the part that always seems unjust to someone; but then, if justice isn't the primary issue, it's a fair play. At least it's not selective enforcement.

There is that.

And though I suspect dang would respond that everyone sees bias against their own specific viewpoint, this particular pattern seems persistent, plays into well-established truth-to-power dynamics (where truth is disadvantaged), and specifically as concerns policy, has been repeatedly defended by dang.

Put another way, HN's alignment is to curiosity and discussion rather than truth or fairness. I've already touched on many of the considerations that factor into this above, and why I remain unconvinced by those arguments.

FWIW, the things I've been warned, banned, and hell-banned for on this site have never struck me as consistent enough in their application that I could discern a pattern other than the fact that I'm usually drunk and belligerent when I write them. The fact that they happen to be railing against powers that be isn't too unusual; I would have quit the site if I thought I couldn't speak my mind, as long as I speak it in ways that contribute to the conversation and aren't just throwing grenades. Don't get me wrong, I love intelligent flame wars. But on reflection, I actually more appreciate the components of a good flame war that fall into the discussion category rather than the truth paradigm. At least, y'know, there's a time and place, and there are well-defined rules. If a site says it's interested in X and you're interested in Y, at least they've made their preferences clear. In a free market they survive or they don't. I think that imagining that it's lesser to seek curiosity/discussion (which are fairly concrete, defined parameters) than to seek truth/fairness (and here we get into a kind of Romantic vs Enlightenment argument as to whether these words align with particular actions) is to try to stake a higher ground on vague claims of higher "morality" which some might agree with, others not so much, but which don't ultimately aid in the day-to-day function of moderation unless someone decides what "truth" is. Personally I'd rather take the beating of being banned for saying something rude or unhelpful than I would take a beating on a site where someone gets to decide what's true or fair.

As much as I disagree with the tone-policing of dissent and/or protest, there is an art to disagreement or countering ... um ... let's call it careless thought with style. And if nothing else, HN's policies have encouraged me to cultivate that.

One of my personal faves was responding to what struck me as a somewhat unthinking response to the true reality at the time of the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum by the 79 CE eruption of Mount Vesuvius, here: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22132283>.

Another addressed common tropes from Wealth of Nations: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17965681>.

I've increasingly taken to responding to highly disinformational or misinformed commentary by simply linking an authoritative rebutting item, occasionally quoting the specific element that addresses the point in question. E.g., <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33999668> and <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27284014>.

I'll also, when the argument seems to be circling rather than progressing, leave as my last response (if any) a link to a previous comment of mine in the thread, to make clear that I'd already addressed that point.

And much of that is not with the goal of convincing the person I'm responding to directly, but in addressing the wider audience. Though occasionally the former seems to occur: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36550938>.

The interesting part to me about this theory is this:

> Perceptions can deviate from reality for arbitrarily long time periods.

According to the theory, this is not [contained within] reality.

What if the "obviously" correct model you were raised on is not correct? Possible for Newton's theories, but impossible for something even more complex?