From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Thu Jun 10 1999 - 11:21:28 MDT
Rob Harris Cen-IT wrote:
>
> > I am fully in favor of explaining things to novices, but
> > not *arguing* the basics with them.
> >
> Might this be a bad idea? Do you want people that just accept, no thought?
> The fact that they are old ideas does not make them 100% correct and
> valid.....Plus, debate on the basics helps to clear up misconceptions at
> this level....misconceptions which would be greatly increased if debate on
> the basics was made out of bounds.........
Is there anyone here who was initially unconvinced, but became converted
after arguing for more than, oh, say, a week? My impression - perhaps
formed by spending too much time around bright people - is that the
novices we want to keep *ask* questions, *ask* for clarification if they
don't like the answers, and generally settle in within a week.
There are plenty of Web sites devoted to the basics. I don't believe
that rewriting those Web sites improves the list.
--
sentience@pobox.com Eliezer S. Yudkowsky
http://pobox.com/~sentience/tmol-faq/meaningoflife.html
Running on BeOS Typing in Dvorak Programming with Patterns
Voting for Libertarians Heading for Singularity There Is A Better Way
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