Comment by Etherlord87
3 years ago
> Now you're assuming the intent.
No, it's not assuming, it's interpreting based on prior experience in communication.
> The park could contain loose soil on the edge of a cliff.
Then the sign would mention that, simple as that.
> But the larger point is that people can adopt the "obvious intent" version of the rule when it suits them and the pedantic version of the rule when it suits them.
I agree with you here, it happens all the time, is a problem, and perhaps the test is useful to those, who haven't figured this truth so far. Probably not that many in the HN crowd…
I'll add that there's a problem with the test: "does it violate the rule" is not very meaningful. It could be understood in two ways:
- does it technically, strictly speaking, "violate" the rule, meaning, it does something the sign tells you not to do,
- or is the example acting against the intent of the author of the sign.
If the test asked "should violator be punished?" I think it would be more meaningful, otherwise it's just synthetic and the controversy is just about semantics, it doesn't incentive a discussion about our worldview and the rules we put in place, it just provokes to argue pedantically about how we phrase a message.
Moreover it possibly misleads people to think they disagree on something they really don't.
> No, it's not assuming, it's interpreting based on prior experience in communication.
It's assuming the intent without sufficient context to know what it actually is. Because very little context was provided. And the context that was provided strongly implied that the rule was important.
> Then the sign would mention that, simple as that.
We don't even know if there was a sign. None of that was specified.
> And the context that was provided strongly implied that the rule was important.
You're assuming that.
No, they were interpreting based on prior experience in communication.
> If the test asked "should violator be punished?" I think it would be more meaningful, otherwise it's just synthetic and the controversy is just about semantics
This is how I interpreted the test, but you're making a good point.
The test says not to interpret it like that:
"please answer the question of whether the rule is violated (not whether the violation should be allowed)."