Hacker News Reader

Comment by lagadu | Hacker News Reader

Everything is worthy of discussion and everyone's opinion is valuable no matter how much I may dislike them/disagree with them.

I feel like this because the alternative is having a gatekeeper who tells everyone whose opinion is worth spreading and whose should be silenced and I prefer living in a non-totalitarian society.

Unless I'm that gatekeeper of course: I'm down for subjugating society to my personal preference of what's right and wrong.

edit: I may think that Alex Jones is an idiot but I still want him to be able to get as much exposure as someone I like.

View on HN

Everyone's opinion is NOT valuable. That thinking is exactly why 5G towers are being burned down. The media - Joe Rogan included - has decided that your OPINIONS carry the same weight as scientific FACT and "let the listeners decide". That'll absolutely attract viewers from all walks of life - and it's a disservice to all of them.

I get what you're saying but letting the people decide what policy to follow is what a democracy is all about: if enough idiots in a sovereign nation decide to go "fuck 5g" then that's exactly what that nation should do. Do I think it's stupid and wrong? Yes. Do I think they should be allowed to choose that? Yes.

So you're suggesting we let people be misinformed? Where do you draw the line? Do we let our teachers teach the earth is both flat and round and "let the students decide"? The earth is the center of the universe and just a part of the milky way? The holocaust happened and didn't happen?

You can't possibly expect people to make rational decisions about science they don't understand. And letting people straight up LIE and expect the common man to spend hours researching a topic they probably don't even understand to figure out they're being lied to is RIDICULOUS. There's a reason why we have ethics in journalism...

Who/what decides who is “misinformed”. Again, there needs to be a gatekeeper if you go that direction, and that direction leads to exactly what the mainstream media of today is.

The fact you’d advocate putting someone on tv to tell the world that 5g towers cause covid—19 and give them the same courtesy as a scientist explaining factual information about the world around us tells me you’re either delusional or upset that the media “gatekeeps” fascists and racists.

Who decides what’s misinformed? Science, the same thing that allows you to post on HN.

Just because you think the state should allow any discussion and any opinion, doesn't mean you need to think its content is worthy or valuable. Do you think nazism should get as much exposure as something you like? Creationism? Flat-earthism? Any fringe idea with five believers?

Creationism is not a fringe idea! I think that illustrates the major flaw of your mindset. If you screen off entire categories of ideas as not worth thinking about, you're going to get a systematically incorrect view of the world.

Why would screening off entire categories of ideas lead to a systematically incorrect view of the world? Or why would entertaining those ideas lead to a less incorrect view of the world?

It stops you from noticing what other people believe and why, which stops you from understanding them even if you ultimately believe they're wrong.

Which pressures them into either keeping it to themselves or being pressured by society to change their beliefs. The “respect everyone’s opinion” is how we got Charlottesville. Tolerance can and should have limits.

> Creationism is not a fringe idea!

When people discuss creationism they're usually talking about Young Earth Creationism which is absolutely a fringe idea

It is not. Over a third of American adults believe humans were created by God in their present form.

It really depends on how you ask them the question: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/how-many-c...

> When asked the single-question version, just 18 percent of U.S adults say humans have always existed in their present form, while 81 percent say humans have evolved over time.

For example, most of these folks wont say the Earth is 10,000 or 6,500 years old. When asked they'll say the planet is much older.

Yes, actually. I legitimately think that no viewpoint or idea should be censored no matter how distasteful I may find it to be.

Would I prefer to live in a nazi or communist society? No, but I prefer to live in a society that in theory can, in a worst case scenario, turn into either of those eventually than in one that cannot.

edit: unless we include some sort of utopian society where we're ruled by some perfect AI or where everyone has perfect information access and decision-making of course but that's science fiction.

I'm not talking about censorship. I'm talking about all ideas getting equal exposure. If you follow that "equal exposure" idea to its conclusion, then what should be taught in "biology" class for example is evolution, protestant creationism, catholic creationism, sunni creationism, shia creationism, scientologic creationism, last thursdayism etc ad nauseam. Now, there isn't much to talk about regarding last thursdayism. But if everything should get equal exposure, then logically you must teach as much about evolution as last thursdayism, which is to say not a lot. So eventually you'd reduce ideas to the minimum viable size of an idea . And then there might be so many ideas that you'll die of old age before you're done being taught all the ideas.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com