This is just a weird way to think about evidence, imo. I think the original post would’ve been more useful and persuasive (and generated better discourse) if it had been 1/5th as long. Throwing evidence—even high-quality evidence—at people does not always make them reason better, and often makes them reason worse. (I also don’t think it works here to say “just have better epistemics!” because (a) one important sense in which we’re all boundedly rational is that our ability to process information well decreases as the volume of information increases and (b) a writer acting in good faith—who wants you to reach the right conclusions—should account for this in how they present information.)
Critically, as previously stated, I think the photos constitute particularly poor evidence—they have a very low “provides useful information:how likely are they to sway people in ways that are irrational” ratio. This is why my comment wasn’t just “shorten your post so people can understand it better,” but rather “I think these photos will lead to vibes-based reasoning.” (This is also why prosecutors etc etc use this kind of evidence; it’s meant to make the jury think “aw they look so happy together! He couldn’t have possibly done that,” when in reality, the photo of the smiling couple on vacation has ~0 bearing on whether he murdered her.)
I agree in principle with the things you’re saying here. I disagree with these particulars because I disagree that the photos are poor evidence of anything relevant. The only issue at play here is NOT whether NL was abusive, or else I would agree with you.
To be more specific, the photos provide evidence of a unique kind for things like “was this job the kind of job that it’s reasonable to sell as ~$75k in compensation.”
Again, this can be true in addition to it ending up being an abusive environment. But when the discourse around this topic also includes things like “Jobs like this are just fundamentally bad and wrong and predatory etc, and we shouldn’t trust adults to be agentic enough to agree to them and not quit if they dislike them, etc”...
Or when people have takeaways from Alice and Chloe’s assertions that they were were treated basically like Cinderella while the NL leadership got to enjoy the tropical paradise themselves...
I think more evidence is better, yeah. NL is not just trying to counter some claims in some platonic ideal realm of simple facts, they’re fighting a number of narrative battles here, many of them vibes based.
I get that you’re saying this particular move backfired on that level for you, and I’m open to the idea that it was a “strategic” mistake.
But my take is that we are all imperfect reasoners whose epistemics have flaws in them and also that we can improve them, and I have yet to be in a situation where I feel like less information would have been better for me than more so long as that information is relevant, which may in fact be our main crux of disagreement here.
This is just a weird way to think about evidence, imo. I think the original post would’ve been more useful and persuasive (and generated better discourse) if it had been 1/5th as long. Throwing evidence—even high-quality evidence—at people does not always make them reason better, and often makes them reason worse. (I also don’t think it works here to say “just have better epistemics!” because (a) one important sense in which we’re all boundedly rational is that our ability to process information well decreases as the volume of information increases and (b) a writer acting in good faith—who wants you to reach the right conclusions—should account for this in how they present information.)
Critically, as previously stated, I think the photos constitute particularly poor evidence—they have a very low “provides useful information:how likely are they to sway people in ways that are irrational” ratio. This is why my comment wasn’t just “shorten your post so people can understand it better,” but rather “I think these photos will lead to vibes-based reasoning.” (This is also why prosecutors etc etc use this kind of evidence; it’s meant to make the jury think “aw they look so happy together! He couldn’t have possibly done that,” when in reality, the photo of the smiling couple on vacation has ~0 bearing on whether he murdered her.)
I agree in principle with the things you’re saying here. I disagree with these particulars because I disagree that the photos are poor evidence of anything relevant. The only issue at play here is NOT whether NL was abusive, or else I would agree with you.
To be more specific, the photos provide evidence of a unique kind for things like “was this job the kind of job that it’s reasonable to sell as ~$75k in compensation.”
Again, this can be true in addition to it ending up being an abusive environment. But when the discourse around this topic also includes things like “Jobs like this are just fundamentally bad and wrong and predatory etc, and we shouldn’t trust adults to be agentic enough to agree to them and not quit if they dislike them, etc”...
Or when people have takeaways from Alice and Chloe’s assertions that they were were treated basically like Cinderella while the NL leadership got to enjoy the tropical paradise themselves...
I think more evidence is better, yeah. NL is not just trying to counter some claims in some platonic ideal realm of simple facts, they’re fighting a number of narrative battles here, many of them vibes based.
I get that you’re saying this particular move backfired on that level for you, and I’m open to the idea that it was a “strategic” mistake.
But my take is that we are all imperfect reasoners whose epistemics have flaws in them and also that we can improve them, and I have yet to be in a situation where I feel like less information would have been better for me than more so long as that information is relevant, which may in fact be our main crux of disagreement here.