This thing seems to be more about enforcing a political PoV than about avoiding logical fallacies.
All my attempts to comment on the UBI article (and not supporting UBI) said my comment was a dogwhistle, and/or had an overly negative tone. This topic, of all things, is absolutely worthy to challenge and debate.
Using this would have the effect of creating an echo chamber, where people who stay never benefit from having their ideas challenged.
Thankyou — I’d love to hear what you wrote, if you wouldn’t mind sharing?
We’ve tried to aim it not to enforce any specific view — that’s a design goal — but focus on how it will feel to the other person.
Also things like logical fallacies or other non-emotional flaws in comments (there’s a toxicity metric for example, or dogwhistles).
An echo chamber is the exact opposite of what we want. There are too many already. What we hope for is guided communication so different views _can_ be expressed.
Can you give some examples of comments you made which you feel were reasonable but got flagged?
If that is happening, that is a huge problem. We'll look at that right away.
We specifically don't want that to be the case. We want to encourage healthy, productive debate.
We may have the "dog-whistle" stuff over tuned.
the dog whistle tuning is absolutely over the top in its default setting.
Just turned it way down. I hope you find it better now!
Thanks, I agree. We dialed it way down.
I wrote "Obama sucks" and got Dogwhistle, Low Score, Low Effort, Objectionable Phrases, and Negative Tone.
I wrote "Trump sucks" and got Low Score, Low Effort, Negative Tone.
Definitely a double standard baked in
Double standard, or legitimate difference? Maybe Trump empirically sucks more?
(This is the sort of debate I really don't think tooling can fix.)
Ignoring what is hopefully sarcasm on the empirical part, it's a double standard because it assumes that saying Obama sucks must be a dogwhistle and tied to undertones of racism.
"Dogwhistle
The phrase "Obama sucks" can be interpreted as more than just a simple critique of a political figure; it has been used to express racist sentiments by implying that a Black president is less capable or worthy of respect. This reinforces harmful stereotypes and can contribute to a broader culture of disrespect and division."
I don't know that I've ever seen a reasonable accusation of 'dogwhistling' on HN. They always just make the accuser seem paranoid or evasive.
I’m not wasting my time accusing. Downvote, flag, move on. Maybe that’s why you didn’t see any.
I would think/hope that both of those comments would be flagged with even a small amount of moderation set.
Avoiding that kind of comment is exactly what we are trying to do, actually.
Yes I agree, but the problem I'm pointing out is that in a phrase as simple as "X person sucks" your system flagged one as implicitly racist because the person being criticized was black.
Nothing in "Obama sucks" implied any kind of racism. If it's so baked in that with a simple phrase like that it reaches for dogwhistles, how can anyone trust the objectivity of this?
I totally agree -- just saying "Obama sucks" shouldn't have racism become part of the equation. Excellent point that we'll stew on and try to make better.
So when can I expect your update to the american population?
Yep, I agree -- it is a double standard... but......
Very sensitive topic. We'll think hard on how to handle things like that.
> Ignoring what is hopefully sarcasm on the empirical part…
I mean, in my opinion, Trump empirically sucks. Opinion polling backs me up! Should the model consider that more people consider one or the other to suck? Or should it ignore factual information to spare feelings? Which approach is more respectful to fellow commenters and the website owner?
(See also: X considering "cisgender" a slur. There's no shared reality on a lot of these things; trying to construct one gets deeply difficult.)
>Should the model consider that more people consider one or the other to suck?
If it's teaching how to avoid logical fallacies, which includes appeals to the majority, the answer is an obvious 'no'.
In other opinion polls they back up that he doesn't suck. Either way who cares? That's not what the app is supposed to be about if it's teaching/correcting you how to argue/debate better.
You completely ignored the whole point of what I said, which is that even in a simple statement like "This person sucks" it added its own implicit connotations, namely that disliking someone who happens to be black is implicit racism. Imagine trying to learn how to really argue with that kind of teacher.
I'm really expanding on your point - that two humans can't even agree here. The AI probably has even less chance of resolving the multi-factorial scenario we're in.
AFAICT, Respectify is trying to address improvements via leveraged grammar using minimal context. Dis/agreement is incidental.
eg
* Noun1 is great.
* Noun2 is great.
Ideally would result in equal outcomes.
Even for “ice cream” and “genocide” as the two nouns?