> Online forums, whatever their subject, can be forbidding places for the newcomer; over time, most of them tend to become dominated by small groups of snotty know-it-alls
Human interaction is woven out of several different materials. One of these is social dominance. It's even more fundamental to our psychology than sex.
Unfortunately, while it's widely recognized in much of the civilized world that letting our sexual impulses run unfiltered in the professional context is detrimental to a relaxed workplace where people feel free to interact openly, most people seem to deny the existence of our need to seek and test social dominance. This often leads to the pollution of communication and debate.
There is nothing wrong with sexuality in the workplace, so long as it's discrete and consensual. Likewise, there is nothing wrong with dominance behavior in forums, so long as it serves substantive debate. When dominance takes a back-seat to the love of knowledge, things are okay. When it's the other way around: considered harmful. (I suppose Galileo had some experience with this.)
> The truth is, I became a skeptic for aesthetic reasons, and the truth is, its aesthetics now repel me. I increasingly find the core skeptical output monotonous and repetitive: there are only so many times you can debunk the same old junk, and I've had it up to here with science fanboyism. And when skeptics talk about subjects outside their domain of expertise, I'm struck by how irrelevant their comments are, and how ugly, shrill and trivial.
I've noticed that techies often create mini "crapsack worlds" in forums and in games. (And I'm not referring to colorful backstories for a game, but in the actual social dynamics between players or commenters.) Much of it can be characterized as "immaturity." However, that label alone isn't so helpful. It's better to ask: what makes a society or a place wonderful? What best encourages a high signal to noise ratio?
Human interaction is woven out of several different materials. One of these is social dominance. It's even more fundamental to our psychology than sex.
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/08/actors-see-status.html
Unfortunately, while it's widely recognized in much of the civilized world that letting our sexual impulses run unfiltered in the professional context is detrimental to a relaxed workplace where people feel free to interact openly, most people seem to deny the existence of our need to seek and test social dominance. This often leads to the pollution of communication and debate.
There is nothing wrong with sexuality in the workplace, so long as it's discrete and consensual. Likewise, there is nothing wrong with dominance behavior in forums, so long as it serves substantive debate. When dominance takes a back-seat to the love of knowledge, things are okay. When it's the other way around: considered harmful. (I suppose Galileo had some experience with this.)
> The truth is, I became a skeptic for aesthetic reasons, and the truth is, its aesthetics now repel me. I increasingly find the core skeptical output monotonous and repetitive: there are only so many times you can debunk the same old junk, and I've had it up to here with science fanboyism. And when skeptics talk about subjects outside their domain of expertise, I'm struck by how irrelevant their comments are, and how ugly, shrill and trivial.
I've noticed that techies often create mini "crapsack worlds" in forums and in games. (And I'm not referring to colorful backstories for a game, but in the actual social dynamics between players or commenters.) Much of it can be characterized as "immaturity." However, that label alone isn't so helpful. It's better to ask: what makes a society or a place wonderful? What best encourages a high signal to noise ratio?