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points

by catoc6 hours ago |
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upvoteby shimman6 hours ago|
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Yes, as we all know that unsourced unsubstantiated statements are the best way to verify claims regarding engineering practices. Especially when said person has a financial stake in the outcomes of said claims.

No conflict of interest here at all!

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upvoteby tptacek6 hours ago|
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I have zero financial stake in Anthropic and more broadly my career is more threatened by LLM-assisted vulnerability research (something I do not personally do serious work on) than it is aided by it, but I understand that the first principal component of casual skepticism on HN is "must be a conflict of interest".
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upvoteby godelski5 hours ago|
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  > but I understand that the first principal component of casual skepticism on HN is "must be a conflict of interest".
I think the first principle should be "don't trust random person on the internet"

(But if you think Tom is random, look at his profile. First link, not second)

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upvoteby malfist6 hours ago|
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You still haven't answered why I should care that you, a stranger on the internet, believes some unsubstantiated hearsay?
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upvoteby wtallis5 hours ago|
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Take a look at https://news.ycombinator.com/leaders

The user you're suspicious of is pretty well-known in this community.

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upvoteby godelski4 hours ago|
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Someone's credibility cannot be determined by their point counts. Holy fuck is that not a way to evaluate someone in the slightest. Points don't matter.

Instead look at their profile...

Points != creds. Creds == creds.

Don't be fucking lazy and rely on points, especially when they link their identity.

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upvoteby wtallis4 hours ago|
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I wasn't at all saying that points = credibility. I was saying that points = not unknown. Enough people around here know who he is, and if he didn't have credibility on this topic he'd be getting down voted instead of voted to the top.
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upvoteby godelski4 hours ago|
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Is that meaningfully different? If you read malfist's point as "tptacek's point isn't valuable because it's from some random person on the internet" then the problem is "random person on the internet" = "unknown credentials". In group, out group, notoriety, points, whatever are not the issue.

I'll put it this way, I don't give a shit about Robert Downy Jr's opinion on AI technology. His notoriety "means nothing to anybody". But instead, I sure do care about Hinton's (even if I disagree with him).

malfist asked why they should care. You said points. You should have said "tptacek is known to do security work, see his profile". Done. Much more direct. Answers the actual question. Instead you pointed to points, which only makes him "not a stranger" at best but still doesn't answer the question. Intended or not "you should believe tptacek because he has a lot of points" is a reasonable interpretation of what you said.

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upvoteby wtallis1 hours ago|
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Pointing to the profile leads someone on the path of understanding why to trust tptacek on security issues. Pointing to his points on HN explains why lots of users here already know that he's credible in this area and will recognize his username and upvote his comments on this topic and know better than to blindly accuse him of being a just a random person on the internet.

The problematic, ignorant comment that has been flagged asserted that what tptacek says "means nothing to anybody else", which is a very wrong statement about his role in the HN community.

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upvoteby drekipus5 hours ago|
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upvoteby delusional5 hours ago|
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How is this whole comment chain not a textbook case of "argument from authority"? I claim A, a guys says. Why would I trust you somebody else responds. Well he's pretty well known on the internet forum we're all on, the third guy says, adding nothing to the conversation.
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upvoteby hiccup_socks4 hours ago|
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it is literally just "authority said so".

and its ridiculous that someone's comment got flagged for not worshiping at the alter of tptacek. they weren't even particularly rude about it.

i guarantee if i said what tptacek said, and someone replied with exactly what malfist said, they would not have been flagged. i probably would have been downvoted.

why appeal to authority is totally cool as long as tptacek is the authority is way fucking beyond me. one of those HN quirks. HN people fucking love tptacek and take his word as gospel.

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upvoteby dinunnob5 hours ago|
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upvoteby catoc6 hours ago|
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A security researcher claiming that they’re not skeptical about LLMs being able to do part of their job - where is the financial stake in that?
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upvoteby dvfjsdhgfv5 hours ago|
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It doesn't mean we have to agree:

https://ludic.mataroa.blog/blog/contra-ptaceks-terrible-arti...

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upvoteby tptacek3 hours ago|
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Here's a fun exercise: go email the author of that blog (he's very nice) and ask how much of it he still stands by.
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