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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   Edited 11mo ago   4923 thread views

Quality Contributions Report for May 2024

This is the Quality Contributions Roundup. It showcases interesting and well-written comments and posts from the period covered. If you want to get an idea of what this community is about or how we want you to participate, look no further (except the rules maybe--those might be important too).

As a reminder, you can nominate Quality Contributions by hitting the report button and selecting the "Actually A Quality Contribution!" option. Additionally, links to all of the roundups can be found in the wiki of /r/theThread which can be found here. For a list of other great community content, see here.

These are mostly chronologically ordered, but I have in some cases tried to cluster comments by topic so if there is something you are looking for (or trying to avoid), this might be helpful.

Quality Contributions in the Main Motte

@gattsuru:

@BahRamYou:

@johnfabian:

@2D3D:

@urquan:

@FCfromSSC:

Contributions for the week of April 29, 2024

@FCfromSSC:

@NullHypothesis:

@Felagund:

@self_made_human:

@Tenaz:

Contributions for the week of May 6, 2024

@gattsuru:

@cjet79:

@SlowBoy:

@Ben___Garrison:

Contributions for the week of May 13, 2024

@gattsuru:

@OliveTapenade:

@NelsonRushton:

@Gaashk:

@ares:

@Folamh3:

@faceh:

@Dean:

@Amadan:

@flitter:

Contributions for the week of May 20, 2024

@Walterodim:

@MadMonzer:

@NelsonRushton:

@urquan:

@FCfromSSC:

@Throwaway05:

@coffee_enjoyer:

Contributions for the week of May 27, 2024

@jeroboam:

@blooblyblobl:

@Rov_Scam:

@FiveHourMarathon:

@satirizedoor:

@blooblyblobl:

@gorge:

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Interesting that I think a few of those posts are bad or just not special. One of the post is just taking a simple argument and making it 5k words while still ignoring to address the criticisms that are evident in a 200 word synopsis. My definition of very bad writing when you just go for length.

Another I thought was just stringing together a few hot takes. Which I don’t think is generally bad because it can be a starting point for bringing up an issue but I wouldn’t consider for a quality contribution because it lacked specialized or depth of knowledge on the issue.

One of the post is just taking a simple argument and making it 5k words … My definition of very bad writing when you just go for length

In all likelihood, the post does contain more information than could be compressed into 200 words. It’s pretty hard to write coherent, sensible sentences that literally say nothing, unless you really go out of your way to do it.

Typically when people say that writing “uses too many words” or “says nothing”, what they actually mean is that there is content there, but they simply find the content to be trite, false, uninteresting, irrelevant, etc. All of which may be valid criticisms. But that’s different from there being no content at all.

Or that it's repetitive, saying the same thing in too many ways rather than saying new things.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


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