Saturday, April 25, 2015

Useful and useless commentary

As much as I disagree with LK, he* always has reasons for why he holds the views that he has, and why he disagrees with people. See, e.g. the comments for Marx's project and Measuring socially necessary abstract labor time. We came to an impasse, but we argued our way there.

*Presumably; I don't know LK personally, and he or she has never explicitly indicated his or her gender.

In contrast, this comment is completely useless. The commenter, the-stone-guest, clearly disagrees with me. I don't mind people who disagree; I always think I'm right (if I thought I was wrong, I would change my mind), but I think I can change my views based on evidence and argument. If someone agrees that I can, then I really would like to hear the evidence and arguments why I'm wrong. The cited comment, however, does not do that; it basically consists of "Larry, you're wrong about this idea, you're wrong about that idea, and you don't even understand this other idea." The author does not even explain what the correct idea is. I asked for clarification, but none has yet been forthcoming. Perhaps the author will respond later.

To be honest, I don't understand why the-stone-guest even commented at all. I suppose it made him or her feel better, but it didn't advance my own understanding one iota.

Remember: I already know that people disagree with me (I try not to write about things that everyone already agrees about); knowing that you personally disagree with me does not help me at all. Hardly anyone even reads this blog at all, and no one but me reads the comments, so if you don't want to help me (and are not trying to intimidate* me), why bother commenting on my blog?

*It's very difficult to intimidate me, but an attempt at intimidation is at least a reason I can understand.

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