[qlm]

Perhaps a controversial view on this particular forum but I find the tendency of a certain type of person* to write about everything in this overly-technical way regardless of whether it is appropriate to the subject matter to be very tiresome ("executing cached heuristics", "constrained the search space").

*I associate it with the asinine contemporary "rationalist" movement (LessWrong et al.) but I'm not making any claims the author is associated with this.

[nilirl]

What diction is "appropriate to the subject matter" is a negotiation between author and reader.

I think the author is ok with it being inappropriate for many; it's clearly written for those who enjoy math or CS.

[davrosthedalek]

I think it's a trick. It seems to be the article is just a series of ad-hoc assumptions and hypotheses without any support. The language aims to hide this, and makes you think about the language instead of its contents. Which is logically unsound: In a sharp peak, micro optimizations would give you a clearer signal where the optimum lies since the gradient is steeper.

[qlm]

> In a sharp peak, micro optimizations would give you a clearer signal where the optimum lies since the gradient is steeper.

I would refuse to even engage with the piece on this level, since it lends credibility to the idea that the creative process is even remotely related to or analogous to gradient descent.

[nilirl]

I wouldn't jump to call it a trick, but I agree, the author sacrificed too much clarity in a try for efficiency.

The author set up an interesting analogy but failed to explore where it breaks down or how all the relationships work in the model.

My inference about the author's meaning was such: In a sharp peak, searching for useful moves is harder because you have fewer acceptable options as you approach the peak.

[davrosthedalek]

Fewer absolute or relative? If you scale down your search space... This only makes some kind of sense if your step size is fixed. While I agree with another poster that a reduction of a creative process to gradient descent is not wise, the article also misses the point what makes such a gradient descent hard -- it's not sharp peaks, it's the flat area around them -- and the presence of local minima.

[nilirl]

I see your point. I'd meant relatively fewer progressive options compared to an absolute and unchanging number of total options.

But that's not what the author's analogy would imply.

Still, I think you're saying the author is deducing the creative process as a kind of gradient descent, whereas my reading was the author was trying to abductively explore an analogy.

[davrosthedalek]

True, but my point is that not only does the analogy not work, the author also doesn't understand the thing he makes the analogy with, or at least explores the thought so shoddily that it makes no sense.

It's somewhat like saying cars are faster than motorbikes because they have more wheels-- it's like with horses and humans, horses have four legs and because of that are faster than humans with two legs. It's wrong on both sides of the analogy.

[danparsonson]

I enjoy maths and CS and I could barely understand a word of it. It seems to me rather to have been written to give the impression of being inappropriate for many, as a stand-in for actually expressing anything with any intellectual weight.

[gilleain]

A bit harsh, but I see what you mean. It is tempting to try and fit every description of the world into a rigorous technical straightjacket, perhaps because it feels like you have understood it better?

Maybe it is similar to how scientist get flack for writing in technical jargon instead of 'plain language'. Partly it is a necessity - to be unambiguous - however it is also partly a choice, a way to signal that you are doing Science, not just describing messing about with chemicals or whatever.

[jbreckmckye]

I have observed it too, it is heavily inspired by economics and mathematics.

Saying "it's better to complete something imperfect than spend forever polishing" - dull, trite, anyone knows that. Saying "effort is a utility curve function that must be clamped to achieve meta-optimisation" - now that sounds clever

If I was going to be uncharitable, I think there is are corners of the internet where people write straightforward things dressed it up in technical language to launder it as somehow academic and data driven.

And you're right, it does show up in the worse parts of the EA / rationalist community.

(This writing style, at its worst, allows people to say things like "I don't want my tax spent on teaching poor kids to read" but without looking like complete psychopaths - "aggregate outcomes in standardised literacy programmes lag behind individualised tutorials")

That's not what the blog post here is doing, but it is definitely bad language use that is doing more work to obscure ideas than illuminate them

[qlm]

Yes, you articulated my issue in a much better way than I managed to!

[dauertewigkeit]

It's a middle school essay that is trying to score points based on the number of metaphors used. Very unappealing and I wouldn't call it technical.

EDIT: For all the people saying the writing is inspired by math/cs, that's not at all true. That's not how technical writing is done. This guy is just a poser.

[qlm]

> I wouldn't call it technical

Fair. Perhaps I should have said it gives the illusion of being technical.

[Dilettante_]

I'll be the first to admit I was unable to follow the article because of this.

[botanical76]

I mean, I talk like this as well. It's not really intentional. My interests influence the language that I use.

Why is the rationalist movement asinine? I don't know much about it but it seems interesting.

[auggierose]

Just reading the abstract, I have to agree with you.

[krick]

To be fair, it's always an artistic choice if you think it is appropriate here or not, but, yeah, this article is a really heavy offender. Reading the "Abstract claim" I caught myself thinking that this word salad hardly makes any sense, but I don't know and am just gonna let it go, because I am not yet convinced that it's worth my time to decipher that.

Also, "asinine contemporary "rationalist" movement" is pretty lightweight in this regard. Making an art out of writing as bad as possible has been a professional skill of any "academic philosopher" (both "continental" and "analytical" sides) for a century at the very least.

[DuperPower]

no, we need more of this, the opposite of this is Robin Williams destroying the poetry theory book in dead poeta society, the result was weak kids and one of them commited suicide. More technical stuff in relation to art is a good thing, but its expected that anglosaxon people have allergy to this, they think is somehow socialist or something and they need art to be unfefined etc

[exasperaited]

I am not sure you watched the same movie I did.

[qlm]

Respectfully, I have no idea what you're talking about. Dead Poets Society is a story and the message of the story isn't that Robin Williams' character is bad.

Are you saying my perspective is anti-socialist? What is "refined" art?

[DuperPower]

of course in the movie they sell the idea that art is not subject to scientific or technical analysis, but if you do an indepent analysis you realize those kids didnt become stronger or freer. Art like the article explained is related to effort and technique. but people in the US LOVE stuff like Jackson pollock, they need for art to not being a thing you put effort and mind into

[cestith]

You can put art through all sorts of scientific and technical analysis. Being analyzed is how we teach the techniques to new artists. A mechanical reproduction of it from that analysis is not art, though, and sometimes you get the break the rules in favor of the expression.

Did you know, for example, that Shakespeare coined a great many words and phrases used in English to this day? Before Sam Clemens, people tended to speak in proper schoolhouse English no matter the setting or character. Poetry and prose are not just the ability to arrange words on a page. Novels and plays are not limited to the three-act or five-act story arc. Simile and metaphor are often encouraged, but overused ones are actually frowned upon.

[danparsonson]

You're confusing art with technical skill. You like art that demonstrates technical skill, that's fine. But art doesn't have to demonstrate technical skill to be artistic - indeed defining what 'art' is exactly is surprisingly difficult.

[qlm]

Can you give an example of an artwork you think is acceptable?