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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   3206 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 15, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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"We received a lecture on how the offshore team was very sensitive to criticism, and we had to make sure that no one lost face."

"Maintaining face is very important in many cultures."

"In Software Culture, maintaining face is not hard. It's actually very simple. The rule of thumb is: don't formally submit code that looks like it was written by two cats copulating on top of a keyboard."

I can't breathe, this guy was amazing. Really miss that text to speech format, don't even know what it was called.

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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."

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