[Jensson]

When someone says "A is B" you should hear "I think A is B", that makes everything much simpler since there are very few things people are certain about.

When making a stronger statement people say "I'm certain A is B".

Edit: Take your post as an example, it is about twice as long as it has to be since you add so much padding to mark uncertainty. Humans are uncertain about most things, if you say something I'll assume that is what you think and it isn't the whole truth, that is what everyone does, just learn to not be afraid of being wrong and just do the simple thing that is easy to read.

[MrJohz]

I find that tends not to be true, although this may be a cultural thing. When people say "A is B", what I find they usually mean is "I think that A is B, but I have not questioned this opinion particularly strongly and do not have a confidence level attached to this belief". And very often the default confidence level people attach to their unquestioned opinions is relatively high, which means for them it typically lies relatively close to the "I am certain" mark.

This is why I find it's really helpful to purposefully indicate when I'm saying things that are merely my opinions, when I'm saying things that I'm certain about, and when I'm somewhere in-between. Partly, it indicates to the to the other person the degree to which I hold a given opinion, but it mainly just helps me hold myself accountable about the assumptions I'm making: is this something I have sincerely thought about and formulated a belief about, or is this just an intuition that I've not tested yet?

[Jensson]

> When people say "A is B", what I find they usually mean is

The important part is what confidence levels people are used that you have when you say "A is B", not what the person who said it is thinking. As you said here, you know people are wrong a lot when they say it, so that is what "A is B" means, it means "I think A is B".

The exception is if you are saying it from a place of authority like being a teacher or writing a manual. If you are an authority then you should hedge what you say if you aren't confident, but HN comments aren't an authority, there is no need to hedge what you say here, everyone knows you are just saying what you think. If someone was an authority they would start the comment with it.

[MrJohz]

Well the important part for me is what confidence levels I have, which is why I wrote the rest of the comment about why I try to distinguish between my opinions and my facts.

But yeah, when I'm reading things, I take them with a grain of salt (or depending on the topic, rather more than a grain). But I always trust people who are capable of expressing their own confidence levels more, because I can see that they've considered the topic more fully. For example, I don't like microservices, but I trust the comment that talks about microservices with qualified positivity far more than the one that just says "microservices are bad because XYZ" without giving any indication of the nuances involved in such a decision.

[Jensson]

> But I always trust people who are capable of expressing their own confidence levels more, because I can see that they've considered the topic more fully

You shouldn't since it makes you vulnerable to social manipulation and bullshitters. People know you think like this, so those who wants to manipulate will talk like an authority, which is why you see ChatGPT use a lot of hedging and fluff language like this, because it makes people trust what it says more. Don't fall for that, it is so easy to fake.

But sure, if you want to manipulate people you should speak like that since it makes them trust you more. But that has nothing to do with being wrong or not, since people don't view you as an authority if you don't speak like that and therefore don't trust you then that means it is the correct way to speak if you aren't sure.

You don't get tricked since I don't hedge my language, that is exactly what I want.

[em-bee]

i don't know if understand you right, especially i don't get how hedging is manipulative, but here is my take:

this applies in particular to pseudonymous written discussions like hacker news. i don't know who you are, and i don't know your character, but if i read you hedging your statements instead of speaking with authority then that gives me the feeling that i can have a constructive conversation with you even if i disagree with what you say. it doesn't mean you have to hedge everything, but that you indicate about which things you are more sure about and about which you aren't.

whereas if you write in an authoritative tone then i can either try to find out who you are and verify that you are indeed an authority on this subject, or i can blindly believe you (which i would only do if what you say confirms what i want to believe as true for myself) or reject you as someone who is unlikely to be able to reason with and give up responding. neither of which is a good choice. at best i can give a hedged response that explains why i believe i am right to disagree and hope that you are able to explain to me why you should be right after all. this is where not being afraid to be wrong comes in for me.

and once we enter a state where we both have opinions that we are not certain about we can then continue to explore the subject matter together until we can find a consensus that we both can agree with.

and it may just be that one or both of us changed their opinion on a subject completely because in the course of our exploration we both learned something new. but that is only possible if neither of us act like an authority on the subject refusing to accept new input.

[roenxi]

The necessity of the verbal construct "I think X" logically suggests that all the other times someone is lying. Which isn't the case, I just find the implication funny.

People have a weird relationship with confidence. Because most people can't assess facts for themselves (reality is horrible, complex and it is good strategy to let someone else figure it out) they rely on the speaker's confidence to gauge how true something is. I guess is there is some sort of follow-up social system to punish people when their expressed confidence is out of line with what the expert consensus is, treating them as though they were exposed liars.

So on the one hand I personally prefer your approach - it is easier just to add a mental "I think" in front of everything everyone says because that is the real situation. And on the other don't expect the flowery language to go away because there is a social game playing out.