[michael_dorfman]

If a headline is phrased as a question, the answer is always "no." If the answer were "yes", they wouldn't have phrased it as a question.

[indiecore]

Hacker News law of Betteridge's law of headlines: If the headline is applicable Betteridge's Law will always be mentioned.

[zerostar07]

That's because geeks like to back their answers with science (or almost science)

[georgemcbay]

More like geeks like to prove they've already heard of the idea behind something.

Dropping the name Betteridge or Dunning-Kruger or Godwin tells everyone "I heard about this phenomenon before it was cool and even know the name for it".

Basically a geeky way to be a hipster.

[zerostar07]

I don't think so. Geeks like to win arguments and value facts above opinions. Scientific arguments are generally irrefutable. Of course the only scientific of the 3 is the Dunning-kruger effect.

[potatolicious]

> "Geeks like to win arguments and value facts above opinions."

I'd rephrase that to be "geeks like to win arguments and like to think they value facts above opinions"

In my experience geeks are no more objective than any other messed up human being on this planet. We just have a giant collective superiority complex about our own supposed factualness.

This is related to the many, many posts you see on HN where programmers belittle professionals of other fields as if they were economists, political scientists, biologists, medical doctors, rocket scientists, architects, structural engineers, or what have you.

[stcredzero]

"Do geeks always back their answers with science?"

[GotAnyMegadeth]

"Can all headlines that are questions be answered with no?"

[zerostar07]

Are 2 data points enough to disprove our theory?

[stcredzero]

"Does this headline amount to more than linkbait?"

[arnemart]

"Will Betteridge's law be mentioned if this headline is submitted to Hacker News?"

[pjscott]

Do you notice the times when nobody mentions it?