Iām confused about why this has (probably) multiple downvotes, and am interested to hear from downvoters.
The same thing happened on the longtermist flag thread, but in that case there was an original design people didnāt like. This is just a submission form.
I like the idea of people running contests on the Forum and didnāt see a problem with this post.
Did anyone downvote for any of the following reasons?
Utilitarianism is a different thing from EA and I donāt like conflating them
Design/āart posts donāt seem like good Forum content
Contests like this donāt seem like good Forum content
Making official symbols for philosophies seems too tribal /ā identity-driven
Iām confused about who Dan is and why heās taken charge of the official symbol of utilitarianism
I want to say that I didnāt downvote the post (I think its a relatively neat idea, and has garnered at least one good submission).
On the other hand, I find speculation on āwhy the downvotes?ā to be unproductive. Its reasonable to encourage people explain their opinions, but Iāve generally found that threads about downvotes are low quality with lots of guesses and trying to put words in other peopleās mouths. I donāt think youāre doing that here very much, but it isnāt the kind of thread Iād like to see often if at all.
It also seems odd that there are so rarely threads in the other direction, asking people to explain why they liked a particular post :)
I agree that threads like this shouldnāt be common. But Iād like to make a case for this one.
As the head of the Forum, I spend a lot of time thinking about what content I should be encouraging, promoting, etc. Over the last three years, I think Iāve developed a pretty good instinct for what kinds of posts people tend to like, which helps me do my job.
Thatās why posts like this (where the reactions surprise me and I donāt have even a ābest guessā as to what provoked them) are so interesting!
I see these rare scenarios as a chance to learn more about how Forum voters (our most engaged readers) think. And if someone ever asks me for feedback on a similar idea, Iād like to be able to advise them on how to present it so that readers will find it valuable.
Fair enough. I would personally find it less off-putting if you framed it in terms of collecting feedback instead of focusing on the downvotes. For example, suppose I saw a thread starting with:
āIām curious on feedback to this post. Please take this survey[link]ā
and then the survey itself has questions about the positions 1/ā2/ā3/ā4/ā5 mentioned, and a question on whether the respondent up/ādownvoted.
Then that seems like a fine thread. Youāre collecting genuine feedback, maybe it seems a little over the top, but it doesnāt come across as speculation on why someone disliked something. Thereās also an easy way for me to provide that feedback without making a public statement that people can then argue with. If I downvote something, there is a very good chance that I donāt want to spend time explaining my reasoning on a public thread where Iām in a social contract to reply to objections.
Very fair feedback! Iāll try to make that framing more explicit, though I donāt expect Iāll use a survey ā it adds an extra step, stops the author from getting notified when feedback happens (I have to share with them separately), and risks promoting a norm of ādonāt explain why you dislike things in publicā, which I think is very unhealthy for the Forum.
(For example, a comment like Peter Hartreeās, particularly the useful suggestion of hiring a professional for the same price, is one Iām very glad to have be public, for this author and for other authors who might try something similar.)
I didnāt downvote. For what itās worth, the main negative reaction I had was:
The use of the EA lightbulb as an example of a great symbol. Personally, Iāve always found it kind of amateurish and cringe. I think mainly because it combines two very tired cliches (a lightbulb to represent āideasā and a heart to represent āaltruismā? Really?!).
I suppose I could also complain that:
The claim that āsymbolism is importantā is not substantiated. Generically that seems true, but the claim that utilitarianism the philosophical idea needs a good/ābetter symbol and/āor a flag isnāt obvious.
Granting that symbolism is important, running a prize competition on the EA Forum is probably not the best way to get a brilliant symbol. My main concern is that the format disproportionately encourages submissions from amateurs. In logo design, professional designers often encounter clients who believe that a great logo can be whipped up by more or less anyone in a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon. But noāworld class logos usually take weeks or months of work, drawing on years of specialist training. If I had just $1K to spend, I might look for a talented young designer from a low-ish wage EU country (e.g. Portugal), and ask them to spend a couple days on it.
Re: (6) ā I was curious to see how many others felt the same way, so I ran a quick poll. Thereās obviously inherent bias to doing this on a group full of people interested in EA, but it does seem like the logo is pretty well-liked. (Not that this invalidates your view, of course.)
My main concern is that the format disproportionately encourages submissions from amateurs
We also crosspost on reddit to attract people who know how to design logos.
The claim that āsymbolism is importantā is not substantiated
I would need evidence against the claim that imagery basically worthless. Even in academic ML research, itās a fatal mistake not to spend at least a day thinking about how to visualize the paperās concepts. This mistake is nonetheless common.
i think you are moving the goalposts a bit when arguing against the view āthat imagery is worthlessā. peter (and you in the original post) wrote about symbolism specifically, and in this context symbolism in flags.
i also think there is probably a significant difference between the kind of plots, graphs and other visualisations you see in a research paper, which are aimed at explaining particular results and theories, and flags, which are more meant to associate with concepts, groups, movements and so on. itās like the difference between a paragraph of prose and a sloganāone of fidelity, i suppose.
Iām confused about why this has (probably) multiple downvotes, and am interested to hear from downvoters.
The same thing happened on the longtermist flag thread, but in that case there was an original design people didnāt like. This is just a submission form.
I like the idea of people running contests on the Forum and didnāt see a problem with this post.
Did anyone downvote for any of the following reasons?
Utilitarianism is a different thing from EA and I donāt like conflating them
Design/āart posts donāt seem like good Forum content
Contests like this donāt seem like good Forum content
Making official symbols for philosophies seems too tribal /ā identity-driven
Iām confused about who Dan is and why heās taken charge of the official symbol of utilitarianism
Or was it something else?
I want to say that I didnāt downvote the post (I think its a relatively neat idea, and has garnered at least one good submission).
On the other hand, I find speculation on āwhy the downvotes?ā to be unproductive. Its reasonable to encourage people explain their opinions, but Iāve generally found that threads about downvotes are low quality with lots of guesses and trying to put words in other peopleās mouths. I donāt think youāre doing that here very much, but it isnāt the kind of thread Iād like to see often if at all.
It also seems odd that there are so rarely threads in the other direction, asking people to explain why they liked a particular post :)
I agree that threads like this shouldnāt be common. But Iād like to make a case for this one.
As the head of the Forum, I spend a lot of time thinking about what content I should be encouraging, promoting, etc. Over the last three years, I think Iāve developed a pretty good instinct for what kinds of posts people tend to like, which helps me do my job.
Thatās why posts like this (where the reactions surprise me and I donāt have even a ābest guessā as to what provoked them) are so interesting!
I see these rare scenarios as a chance to learn more about how Forum voters (our most engaged readers) think. And if someone ever asks me for feedback on a similar idea, Iād like to be able to advise them on how to present it so that readers will find it valuable.
Fair enough. I would personally find it less off-putting if you framed it in terms of collecting feedback instead of focusing on the downvotes. For example, suppose I saw a thread starting with:
āIām curious on feedback to this post. Please take this survey[link]ā
and then the survey itself has questions about the positions 1/ā2/ā3/ā4/ā5 mentioned, and a question on whether the respondent up/ādownvoted.
Then that seems like a fine thread. Youāre collecting genuine feedback, maybe it seems a little over the top, but it doesnāt come across as speculation on why someone disliked something. Thereās also an easy way for me to provide that feedback without making a public statement that people can then argue with. If I downvote something, there is a very good chance that I donāt want to spend time explaining my reasoning on a public thread where Iām in a social contract to reply to objections.
Very fair feedback! Iāll try to make that framing more explicit, though I donāt expect Iāll use a survey ā it adds an extra step, stops the author from getting notified when feedback happens (I have to share with them separately), and risks promoting a norm of ādonāt explain why you dislike things in publicā, which I think is very unhealthy for the Forum.
(For example, a comment like Peter Hartreeās, particularly the useful suggestion of hiring a professional for the same price, is one Iām very glad to have be public, for this author and for other authors who might try something similar.)
I didnāt downvote. For what itās worth, the main negative reaction I had was:
The use of the EA lightbulb as an example of a great symbol. Personally, Iāve always found it kind of amateurish and cringe. I think mainly because it combines two very tired cliches (a lightbulb to represent āideasā and a heart to represent āaltruismā? Really?!).
I suppose I could also complain that:
The claim that āsymbolism is importantā is not substantiated. Generically that seems true, but the claim that utilitarianism the philosophical idea needs a good/ābetter symbol and/āor a flag isnāt obvious.
Granting that symbolism is important, running a prize competition on the EA Forum is probably not the best way to get a brilliant symbol. My main concern is that the format disproportionately encourages submissions from amateurs. In logo design, professional designers often encounter clients who believe that a great logo can be whipped up by more or less anyone in a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon. But noāworld class logos usually take weeks or months of work, drawing on years of specialist training. If I had just $1K to spend, I might look for a talented young designer from a low-ish wage EU country (e.g. Portugal), and ask them to spend a couple days on it.
Re: (6) ā I was curious to see how many others felt the same way, so I ran a quick poll. Thereās obviously inherent bias to doing this on a group full of people interested in EA, but it does seem like the logo is pretty well-liked. (Not that this invalidates your view, of course.)
Interesting, thanks Aaron. This result seems roughly in line with the fraction of EAG attendees who wear EA t-shirts.
We also crosspost on reddit to attract people who know how to design logos.
I would need evidence against the claim that imagery basically worthless. Even in academic ML research, itās a fatal mistake not to spend at least a day thinking about how to visualize the paperās concepts. This mistake is nonetheless common.
i think you are moving the goalposts a bit when arguing against the view āthat imagery is worthlessā. peter (and you in the original post) wrote about symbolism specifically, and in this context symbolism in flags.
i also think there is probably a significant difference between the kind of plots, graphs and other visualisations you see in a research paper, which are aimed at explaining particular results and theories, and flags, which are more meant to associate with concepts, groups, movements and so on. itās like the difference between a paragraph of prose and a sloganāone of fidelity, i suppose.