But either the identity of the author of a post is important, and we should all disclose it properly, or it’s totally secondary to the content, and it’s acceptable to hide it, if this is a hinderance.
It seems reasonable to say ‘the identity is not important, except people who have been specifically banned for abuse.’ Anonymity is desirable, but not to enable evasion of other rules.
I think this is muddying issues somewhat. The question of whether Torres’s involvement should have been disclosed is not about anonymity norms. (It’s not like Torres was trying to avoid Forum rules or anything in co-authoring the academic paper ‘Democratising Risk’.)
The question is whether the (alleged) involvement of Torres should have been disclosed as part of the recounting of the tale of the paper’s reception. Because Torres’s involvement was not disclosed, many people were trying to draw inferences about epistemics and community dynamics in EA while ignorant of a very important fact about why the project might have been getting negative feedback: i.e., that one of the co-authors was [harsh, but all demonstrably true via public evidence] a serial fabulist with a history of harassing and defaming those he disagrees with, and an obviously hostile agenda.
I should be clear: my understanding is that if Torres was indeed involved, then it was not as an anonymous author or anything, and that knowing Torres was involved would explain some of why people might have been negative about the project.
(As would the probable fact that, if Torres was involved, earlier versions of the paper were more hostile in tone).
If Torres was an anonymous collaborator the whole time, then I wouldn’t really care if Cremer and Kemp never disclosed that fact. Because it wouldn’t be relevant for drawing conclusions from the alleged pushback that the project got.
if anonymity is permissible—or, even stronger, desirable—then it seems to me that bans can be easily evaded. One can say “they shouldn’t be evaded!”, but for me it sounds self-defeating to support a norm and at the same time encourage an easy way to evade it. But yeah, legal systems are full of instances of that—but they are often recognized as “bugs”.
I do not think the issue here is that Kemp & Cremer intended to actually evade a ban imposed on Torres, but that their accusation might have been unfair—because it’d be proper to criticize their post given its origins.
It seems reasonable to say ‘the identity is not important, except people who have been specifically banned for abuse.’ Anonymity is desirable, but not to enable evasion of other rules.
I think this is muddying issues somewhat. The question of whether Torres’s involvement should have been disclosed is not about anonymity norms. (It’s not like Torres was trying to avoid Forum rules or anything in co-authoring the academic paper ‘Democratising Risk’.)
The question is whether the (alleged) involvement of Torres should have been disclosed as part of the recounting of the tale of the paper’s reception. Because Torres’s involvement was not disclosed, many people were trying to draw inferences about epistemics and community dynamics in EA while ignorant of a very important fact about why the project might have been getting negative feedback: i.e., that one of the co-authors was [harsh, but all demonstrably true via public evidence] a serial fabulist with a history of harassing and defaming those he disagrees with, and an obviously hostile agenda.
I should be clear: my understanding is that if Torres was indeed involved, then it was not as an anonymous author or anything, and that knowing Torres was involved would explain some of why people might have been negative about the project.
(As would the probable fact that, if Torres was involved, earlier versions of the paper were more hostile in tone).
If Torres was an anonymous collaborator the whole time, then I wouldn’t really care if Cremer and Kemp never disclosed that fact. Because it wouldn’t be relevant for drawing conclusions from the alleged pushback that the project got.
Exactly!
No one knew I was involved, though. Honestly. All that happened after I’d moved on. I was as surprised as everyone else to read Zoe’s EA Forum post.
That’s fair, I guess this objection applies to the post on the EA forum but not to the linked article.
Maybe I didn’t quite understande the point, but:
if anonymity is permissible—or, even stronger, desirable—then it seems to me that bans can be easily evaded. One can say “they shouldn’t be evaded!”, but for me it sounds self-defeating to support a norm and at the same time encourage an easy way to evade it. But yeah, legal systems are full of instances of that—but they are often recognized as “bugs”.
I do not think the issue here is that Kemp & Cremer intended to actually evade a ban imposed on Torres, but that their accusation might have been unfair—because it’d be proper to criticize their post given its origins.