Posted by spoc on April 18, 2004, at 20:45:49
In reply to Re: please be civil, objective of....hmmmm Emmy » spoc, posted by shar on April 17, 2004, at 21:28:17
It may have sounded like I was being an idealist, but in looking for other angles on the recurrent “freedom of speech” issue and how it gets handled, I was actually trying to put on my detached scientist or philosophy student hat. You know, where you don’t assume that the point is how you feel about the concepts, but rather is just to be able to identify and grasp them. Just in case that would be different or refreshing. All the question marks in my post -- together with the statement below -- were meant to clarify that I wasn’t expressing an opinion or conclusion:
"... what I'm writing isn't from the perspective of however I feel about this whatsoever. It's just philosophizing. So from that angle....."
I started by asking if I had accurately grasped what the ideal principle coming out of all this is supposed to be. Then, I acknowledged the other extreme – the camp that says that is not at all what’s happening -- by tossing in “Stepford Message Board” (Shar, I couldn’t tell if my meaning there came across right, because if it had I’d think you would have liked that part!).
> well, I suppose if D. Bob got lazy, and didn't want to be much involved here, then, yeah, a better quality of give-and-take etc. would be a relief…
I could be mistaken, because I haven’t been here long, and hadn’t previously focused much on what the main purpose here might be. But I had the impression that the part about sustained accuracy and benefit despite minimal moderation is a key part of the mission statement. I think I read something to that effect, but it also seems clear that Dr. Bob *tries* not to be “much involved here.” I’m certain it has nothing to do with laziness, and it may not have anything to do with however busy he is elsewhere either. It's just part of the design. The purpose in the big picture might be akin to “automating” of this kind of thing, as is the trend in just about everything these days. Well, maybe “efficiency” is a better word.Ok, scientist hat still on. I was also thinking that the purpose here might be more about research at this stage of development than it is about someone having spontaneously decided to provide – *as an end in itself and an “as is” finished product* – a platform on which people could get help in "real time." Of course that effect is welcome no matter what, but it could even be incidental or gravy to the long range goal of identifying a formula or pattern.
Hey, even what happened with the Forest Troop didn't come about from totally natural means or constraints! So some here might say that this would make Dr. Bob's policies the poison meat! ;- ) .... ostensibly for the greater good; or the ideal of the greater good.
By now I have stumbled upon some of the classic PB debates on this conflict, and other “historic events,” in the archives. My twist is that it seems like people tend to discuss this matter from the perspective of feelings rather than from one of offering potentially crucial, unbiased feedback on the stability the experiment’s foundation. Maybe I was only spitting hairs (hey, this was an insomniac’s idea of fun at 2:00 a.m.), but somehow it seemed to me that there might be a difference in impact or effectiveness there. To conduct a controlled study, pains are probably taken to assess things scientifically and impersonally, and maybe it’s hard after awhile for the researcher to discern commitment to that from the possibility that certain “emotional reactions” from the very demographic being studied can indeed be valid.
Anyway, it’s said by some people who have been or were here for awhile that “justice” is not only defined too narrowly, but is randomly and unevenly applied. So if that is what’s happening yet nothing other than the effect of conservative but consistent civility rules on behavior was intended to be studied, I think that would mean that what actually got studied wasn’t what was intended to be studied. And that’s probably an important difference. Otherwise, I can only think of a couple other things that could be the case if that is not in fact what’s happening; but things are indeed random and uneven. On the dark end, there could be other co-existing hypotheses of a “classified” nature being examined, such as the role of randomness -- and the apprehension of it -- in getting things to police and run themselves!
Assuming that’s not it, on the benign end maybe Dr. Bob really just doesn’t agree that his decisions have been uneven. Or doesn’t see why it should upset people if things like equal or more serious transgressions are slipping under the wire; for reasons like the elapsed time before noticing them, or other technicalities. (Law enforcement can work like that in real life, can’t it!). In that case, if he chooses not to debate this kind of thing here, I’d hope he has other qualified source(s) that he does consult. Because he probably wouldn’t claim that things have tended to pan out well historically when one person’s opinion rules the masses without checks and balances! But then again, this isn’t a country, it’s a research project and a work in progress. So the bottom line rationale may simply be that we are all free to leave and take up citizenship elsewhere (although admittedly I’d also need help in seeing how that would prove the mission statement!).
So! Just posted to brainstorm possibilities and factors from the “PB as research” angle. But maybe I should have just gone to sleep instead! ;- )
poster:spoc
thread:336193
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20040307/msgs/337539.html