Actually, it's Dusti, not kudu. It's not like we didn't see the disaster coming; I filed bug tickets and harassed people on IRC about this over the course of the last two months. And then it happened anyway. It reminds me of Hurricane Katrina insofar as it was a disaster that everyone expert knew was coming, but nothing happened anyway. I've informed that this is a last chance.
I believe I've been called on to say something about criticism. I think I'm going to start with the cliche I learned from the Perl community: Mistakes are the best way of learning. There's no real harm in small mistakes; in fact they're to be valued for learning. We have a website about literary criticism, ultimately, so learning and teaching is what we do. This, of course, applies to the admins too. If we're not learning too, what's the point of it all?
At a deeper level, it's I want all of my philosophy to be reversible, unless there's some obviously irreversible process going on. (Sorry for the thermo terms applied outside the field, but it's what I know.) Something that applies to me has to be able to apply to everyone else. It's a very useful tool; I can use it to discount Ayn Rand's philosophy out of hand.
So I usually have no reason to assume that I'm the right one in an argument. I have no cause to qualify an argument other than its merits -- wisdom may come from a child or an elder, just typically more often with the latter. I am entirely anti-authoritarian; because an authority "says so" is never a good reason to do anything. "Because the authority has guns" or "because the authority thought about this problem and I haven't" are fine, though. But anyway, if I'm an authority, that doesn't actually justify anything I do. Since criticism is necessary to counterbalance and inform authorities, it's an absolutely necessary part of All The Tropes.
Anything particular I should address?
-- ∇×V
I believe I've been called on to say something about criticism. I think I'm going to start with the cliche I learned from the Perl community: Mistakes are the best way of learning. There's no real harm in small mistakes; in fact they're to be valued for learning. We have a website about literary criticism, ultimately, so learning and teaching is what we do. This, of course, applies to the admins too. If we're not learning too, what's the point of it all?
At a deeper level, it's I want all of my philosophy to be reversible, unless there's some obviously irreversible process going on. (Sorry for the thermo terms applied outside the field, but it's what I know.) Something that applies to me has to be able to apply to everyone else. It's a very useful tool; I can use it to discount Ayn Rand's philosophy out of hand.
So I usually have no reason to assume that I'm the right one in an argument. I have no cause to qualify an argument other than its merits -- wisdom may come from a child or an elder, just typically more often with the latter. I am entirely anti-authoritarian; because an authority "says so" is never a good reason to do anything. "Because the authority has guns" or "because the authority thought about this problem and I haven't" are fine, though. But anyway, if I'm an authority, that doesn't actually justify anything I do. Since criticism is necessary to counterbalance and inform authorities, it's an absolutely necessary part of All The Tropes.
Anything particular I should address?
-- ∇×V