How to have a debate on this platform?
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I think maybe don't go in with that goal. If you have an idea that you want to understand better yourself, and to update your own beliefs about whether and where it fits in an overall consistent worldview, then introducing it in a short form may be a good way to summarize and get initial reactions.
If you're trying to persuade or convince people to adopt it via "winning" a debate, this isn't the right forum.
Hello Dagon, I appreciate any answers to this question. However, unfortunately, I don't think introducing an idea via the shortform is likely to generate very much discussion, and if it does, it's likely to generate discussion about how to evaluate the ideas presented in the post, rather than debate. I think that trying to persuade people to adopt your viewpoint, or at least behaving as though you were, can be a good way to better explain your idea, especially in a debate format. The goal should be either to successfully persuade a rational opponent, or become persuaded of their beliefs instead, not to " win " the debate.
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I think generate good quality posts about things that are unlikely to be disagreed with to begin with, or else frame it in such a "LessWrong-style" that people see that it's clear you're really trying to be rationalist. It may be necessary to overdo that style if you expect it to be disagreed with in order to elicit more upvotes. Present counterarguments, frame it as a story, make it more interesting than just "I think X which everyone here disagrees with, tell me why I'm wrong."
Beyond people burying a post like that with downvotes because they disagree (which may happen, hard to say for sure), it's also just not that great of a post, in my opinion.
1Hello GenericModel, thanks for your response. Apologies in advance for the length of the comment that follows this sentence:
I have been thinking about how to implement some of your advice here. I have tried presenting counterarguments and my own counter-counterarguments alongside them, but my impression is that as long as the statement of my argument contradicts commonly held beliefs on LessWrong, and I don't address every single objection those who disagree with it are likely to have, they will view those exact points (the ones I miss) as being 'cruxes' of the debate, and decide that, as I avoided them, I must either be engaging in motivated reasoning or 'not even wrong' . On that point, it can be extremely difficult to be sure whether somebody actually is 'not even wrong', or whether they're in fact correct, whenever they are operating within a different worldmodel/ theory of reality/ framework from you. If your framework includes which things are and aren't important and salient to you, then any theory proposed in another one or outside it will appear 'not to even be wrong' , because it's not 'even framed' in a way which makes sense ( from within your framework) . &n...
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Would you be able to link me to an example?
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I was considering doing just this in my comment but decided against it, so now I will. This post: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/xHMEtKz68fXDjA9H3/third-order-cognition-as-a-model-of-superintelligence lays out a complex, potentially internally consistent model of superintelligence ( I wouldn't know as I haven't read it due to the 'cognitive labour' involved.) In another comment, someone explained that this, along with basically the other points I made in my comment above, was the reason why the post had all its upvotes cancelled out. It might be in the comment section here: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/8CJ5f2WT4M6BR64yh/visionary-arrogance-and-a-criticism-of-lesswrong-voting#g6iR4DNhAMphexhi8 Notice @Richard_Kennaway's comment.
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I mean it seems like the person who posted that managed to have interesting back-and-forths with people in the comments?
I agree there are some absolutely terrible commenters on LessWrong, and to be honest, I think they should be tolerated less than they currently are. But this post did have interesting debate, right? People just thought it was wrong.
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If you see their later posts on the same topic you'll notice more of this dynamic where fewer and fewer users engage with them, while the downvotes accumulate anyway. My position would be not to downvote anything to far below 0 until you understand it, unless you have something like a 'proof' that it's false(not necessarily as rigorous as a purely mathematical or logical one, but more than just believing it isn't even wrong).
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Ah okay I have just looked at your profile. Perhaps you are thinking of this post: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/SHryHTDXuoLuykgcu?commentId=cgT4ipPPQ6HcG6H8p. I just read it and unfortunately I do not think it was downvoted because of disagreements with LessWrong. I'm not much of a downvotey kinda guy myself, but I think it's pretty reasonable to downvote this. If you want my honest feedback:
* The metaphor seems kind of tortured to me.
* I don't find the analogy very insightful or revealing.
* There are a decent number of typos.
* The paragraphs and sentences are too long.
EDIT: To be more charitable, FWIW I do understand the impulse when something you really liked gets downvoted to criticize the readers and say that they just must not be smart enough to understand it. I have done this too, see here: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/ZRToRRSirgwNeLLuL/goedel-s-ontological-proof#gruZ5HzqnxneaKgTZ. But it is an impulse that as a writer one should try to fight against, as criticism (even self-criticism, if necessary) is the only way to improve.
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Reply to the edit: I absolutely did not say anyone 'just must not be smart enough to understand it', or imply that, or intend to. However, they may be operating from inside a different framework, which is not conducive to them understanding, which would be a more charitable interpretation.
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In response to this, I would ask what you mean by 'kinda tortured' ; do you mean it's been extended beyond where it applies? I realized people might assume this and made sure to point out areas where that was the case in the post itself, as well as to modify the metaphor where possible and appropriate. I have seen other, equally (non) applicable metaphors being upvoted on LessWrong, so this still confuses me.
If you don't mind, I would like to know why you don't find the analogy insightful; why doesn't the reasoning about the analogue transfer over to the thing itself?
Where are the typos? I wasn't aware of any.
Anyway, I appreciate getting any feedback at all on this ( but it's certainly not the only reason why I think the problem exists).
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I am sorry, I would like to engage on giving you detailed feedback but I am not really able to do that, because I have other things I need to do with my time. I hope that is understandable.
More generally, this is kind of "rules of engagement" you agree to when you put something out there. I'm not denigrating you by providing this criticism, in fact it is meant in a positive spirit (I promise <3). But I'm not able to provide detailed notes like a lecturer on every post that I don't like, and no-one else on LessWrong is obligated to do so either, right? They engaged with it enough to either up-or-downvote it, and that's something. But a karma system is designed to separate posts people think are good from posts people don't think are good.
If you're asking me, that post is not super good. A different reader, a different audience, may disagree. I think you show promising signs of someone who could be a good writer. I don't want to discourage you! This sort of analogical thinking, seeing X in Y, it's all great.
But for someone to want to read it you must also work on the craft of showing me why I should care. Showing that you respect me enough as a reader to spare me from typos, to explain why an analogy is useful (in a way that I will find satisfying), to make your sentences enjoyable to read. I know I can work on that, we all can. :)
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"I am sorry, I would like to engage on giving you detailed feedback but I am not really able to do that, because I have other things I need to do with my time. I hope that is understandable." It is; I think this encapsulates exactly why it's a good thing that you didn't downvote the post yourself; a cursory reading is not sufficient to tell you whether the analogy contains insights, etc. You have no obligation to downvote or read the post. The problem is when people make instinctive judgments for reasons they couldn't articulate at the time of making them, and then downvote on the basis of said judgments. Also, the same could be said of upvotes, though I think it matters less.
"But I'm not able to provide detailed notes like a lecturer on every post that I don't like, and no-one else on LessWrong is obligated to do so either, right?"
Not unless you cast a vote. If you do, then in my opinion you should at least have allowed the reasons why to coalesce into sufficiently sharp focus that you could explain why.
"They engaged with it enough to either up-or-downvote it, and that's something"
It's something negative from my perspective, because they effectively censored the idea which I still think is correct, without changing my mind. So to me, they drowned out a useful, true idea. A debate would be far more productive.
"Showing that you respect me enough as a reader to spare me from typos" I would like to know where these are, so I can fix them.
"to make your sentences enjoyable to read" If that becomes the objective function of writing, then Goodhart's law might make truth and logical coherence almost irrelevant.
(Clarification: I meant 'irrelevant as criteria which are actually employed when writing' , not irrelevant overall. )
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https://www.lesswrong.com/w/arguments-as-soldiers I think you should consider what would happen to this website if it functioned the way you desire, without judgment on quality of writing.
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I am completely against using arguments that way, however I think it should be possible to avoid that particular 'basin of attraction' without sacrificing the possibility of debate (or even of frequent debate).
Edit: upon reflection, there are probably exceptional situations in which I would endorse using arguments as soldiers, but I don't think they're at all likely to arise here very often.
Not a direct answer to your question, but it might be useful to know that this platform supports dialogs:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/kQuSZG8ibfW6fJYmo/announcing-dialogues-1
In my experience, what sometimes happens is that people start to discuss something in comments to some post and then decide (e.g. via exchanging some direct messages) to create a dialog.
For example, I had this dialog a couple of years ago:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/ZpbcvBtNMxG8v6mcB/digital-humans-vs-merge-with-ai-same-or-different
Hello mishka, thanks for this information. I think I was vaguely aware of this feature but had not differentiated it from conversations in my mind. It seems like it would work well for the purpose of having a debate, but only once the topic and participants are established; the problem I would still have is of how to generate debate on a particular topic or about a particular idea, with anyone who might disagree.
Your goal of starting a debate with an as-yet-undetermined rationalist is not aligned with the values of this community. If you wanted to have a discussion with a specific person about their ideas, that would make sense and you could do a dialogue. If you wanted to share an idea or ask a question, there are post types for that. However, it is becoming hard to avoid the conclusion that you basically want to start an argument. We’re not going to give you advice on how to provoke someone into disagreeing with you.
(Though ironically enough, this question is a decent method for that poor goal, though I don’t think you’ll get much sustained engagement over it)
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1I forgot to address this point: "Your goal of starting a debate with an as-yet-undetermined rationalist is not aligned with the values of this community " . Why is this? It seems to me like it would be in alignment with the community, because of the extraordinary epistemic effectiveness of debate. Obviously, it can be abused, but it doesn't necessarily have to be.
Because your priorities are in the wrong order. You’re treating what should be an instrumental goal as if it were terminal, and also starting from the general “I want to have a debate” rather than the specific “I want to have a debate about X.”
"You’re treating what should be an instrumental goal as if it were terminal" No I am not. I certainly didn't intend to give that impression. In fact, that's partly why I mentioned the effectiveness of debate when attempting to understand things.
"“I want to have a debate about X.” I want to have a debate about various topics, but it's necessary to be able to start debates in general in order to have a debate about any of them.
However, you would have an easier time starting with “I am curious about X. I think Y, but I want to know more about this. Does anyone want to discuss?”
It has been my experience that Questions are my best performing types of post, despite requiring relatively little effort, which certainly pushes me in the direction of agreeing with you here. But it does make me moderately sad (that/if) simply doing this outperforms making a concerted effort to argue for an idea and explain it in depth.
Hello Cole, I would ideally like to start a (or many) discussions or debates with multiple people involved.
"However, it is becoming hard to avoid the conclusion that you basically want to start an argument." I certainly want a debate, yes. I want arguments to be involved in that debate as well, but not as an end in itself.
"We’re not going to give you advice on how to provoke someone into disagreeing with you."
I want to induce people to voice their disagreements, not to express disagreement when they would otherwise agree (unless they get there through logical debate). So I don't think it's accurate to say I'm trying to 'provoke someone'; I want to provoke debate/ argument itself, which is different in an important way even if it leads to a similar result.
If you want people to engage with your ideas, have good ideas and present them clearly. As a distant third priority, they should have something to do with rationality, effective altruism, AI, etc.
That would (almost) ideally be the case, but there are of course many reasons which have little to do with the quality of the idea or the clarity of its presentation which determine how much attention is focused on it. Knowing whether an idea is good often(or always) requires engaging with it, so this can't be a key criterion for engagement! I try to present ideas as clearly as possible, but often the nature of the idea itself imposes an upper bound on the clarity with which it can be presented. Additionally, all of these things require significant development of the idea within the mind proposing/describing it, but sometimes that development and depth of understanding is extremely difficult or even impossible for a human to achieve on their own, hence why I'm keen to know how to generate debate.
It seems like you haven’t been here very long. If you want to discuss things but haven’t developed your ideas far enough to easily attract discussion, start by reading for awhile and then writing thoughtful comments.
The problem is, from my perspective, the evidence is consistent with both me not having developed my ideas to a point at which others correctly assess them as valuable, and my ideas being sufficiently far removed from the "LessWrongian belief centroid" that the dynamics I discussed with GenericModel come into play.
I doubt the problem is the belief centroid thing, lesswrong loves well thought out but unpopular takes.
Can you provide me with an argument or evidence that this remains true even when those unpopular beliefs stray far from the "centroid" in a way which wasn't predetermined by the general trajectory of the evolution of the body of ideas found here?
In that particular case, it happened because I wanted to respond to someone with views different from mine (I am a fairly strong proponent of the "merge", of non-invasive brain-computer interfaces, and so on), but at the same time I happened to do it in an open-ended fashion, inviting a dialog and not a confrontation, and so it ended up being quite fruitful, we learned a lot from it and generated plenty of food for thought. This was my comment which started it:
That should work for topics which are already discussed, at least occasionally.
If the particular views in question are sufficiently non-standard, so that they are not even discussed (or, at least, the angle in question is not even discussed), then it requires a more delicate treatment (and one might not be in a rush to generate a debate; novel, non-standard things need time to mature; moving the "Overton window" is tricky). For example, with my first post on LessWrong, I went through a bunch of drafts, was showing drafts to people around me, cut some things from a version I ended up publishing in order to make it considerably shorter and to improve readability.
It was not immediate big success and did not generate a debate, but it worked as a foundation for a number of my subsequent efforts, and was serving as an important reference point (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/WJuASYDnhZ8hs5CnD/exploring-non-anthropocentric-aspects-of-ai-existential).
Now, if I want to continue this line of exploration and discussion, I would need to ponder how to go about it (I have written a number of draft texts recently outside of LessWrong, as part of the October-December https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/7axYBeo7ai4YozbGa/halfhaven-virtual-blogger-camp, but the topic of AI existential safety is very delicate, so it's not obvious what is the "correct way" to proceed).
If what you have in mind is as non-standard as this, then how to proceed is fairly non-trivial...
Ah, I see that you are pointing to a specific post, https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/SHryHTDXuoLuykgcu/universities-as-rocket-engines-and-why-they-should-be-less.
OK, I've seen this post before, I skimmed it, I have not voted on it.
My thinking (relevant for pre-AI times, of course) was, "no, specialization is the answer; yes, they are rocket engines, at least in hard sciences, and they work the best when one cuts unnecessary 'mandatory courses' from unrelated disciplines, while leaving students with enough freedom to explore widely if they want to; but mostly, the researchers are often most productive in hardcore disciplines like math and physics while they are young, so help them focus, push higher, more specialized courses, more specialized efforts, diversity within math, within physics, but not by reaching out to humanities". So I seem to be a plausible debate counter-part in this sense.
So, why did not I respond? For several reasons, but, in part, because the turmoil around education is very strong already, with politics, with AI, with questions about relevance, and so on. The AI timelines are short (I think), and education-related timelines are long, so it does not look like we can affect this area too much. It's such a mess already, there are plenty of locally optimal actions available, but a restructuring effort as global as this?
Thank you for your in-depth reply. As I am currently involved in what could not inaccurately be referred to as a debate with Cole Wyeth, I will refrain from reading it and responding to it for now, but will do so at a later date. Sorry for this.
This seems like one of the most effective ways to understand things, but it is relatively rare on this website.
It’s not rare on this website.
I included the word 'relatively' because debate certainly happens on Lesswrong. However it's not nearly as common as it would be if the 'activation energy' required to start a debate was lower.
….so, relative to what?
If you’re saying that it would be possible for debates to happen more frequently, then I guess that’s true. However, they happen very frequently already.
Relative to other environments (perhaps academia?) where debate is more common, and used constructively.
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