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by wpietri 4918 days ago
That is one of the most common young nerd mistakes. "If I don't see the value in something, the people doing it must be idiots!" Rather than, say, "... I must not understand something here."

I made it a ton as a youth. I had to have about a thousand, "Oh, now I see what they're talking about" moments before I learned to keep my mouth shut long enough to actually learn something.
1 comments
three14 4918 days ago
Agreed, but there has to be some filter. You can't just say, "I don't see the value in crystal healing, I must not understand something here." Sometimes, you do understand enough.
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wpietri 4918 days ago
Well, it depends on how you do it. My original reaction was, "duh, idiocy." But once I paid more attention, I learned a lot about the emotional motivations behind it, the placebo effect, and why western medicine is so unsatisfying to people.

That's helpful, in that you can convince anybody by saying: "Although I have no evidence, I'm sure that crystal healing is bullshit and I'm waaaay smarter than you." All they read from that is contempt and arrogance; that approach to skepticism is basically bullying.

I think a better approach is the one taken by my doctor. When people come in with concerns about vaccines, she first listens to their fears about kids and patiently explains why those particular fears might sound reasonable, but in this case are unwarranted. It's not really about the facts; it's about the hand-holding. For her, the interaction isn't about being right, but about persuading people.

So I agree, but for very high values of "understand enough". It's not enough for me to know that they're wrong; I want to understand why they're wrong sufficiently to have empathy for their situation.

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three14 4918 days ago
So how do you know DHH doesn't meet that threshold? (I don't think it's clear either way, but still "most common young nerd mistakes" is pretty dismissive.)
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wpietri 4918 days ago
He might, but he certainly hasn't demonstrated otherwise. In particular, he's not saying, "I see where the REST crowd is going, but their crucial mistake is X." That, combined with DHH's well-earned reputation for arrogance, makes me think he's just doing his usual.
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