Conversation

i feel like im going paranoid/insane cause i cant tell if ppl critiquing my research are doing it cause they don't like me or cause there's actually issues. it's a really inconvenient thing to get paranoid about because it conflates learning and growth with ppl trying to hurt me!

412

Aella

@Aella_Girl

Dec 29, 2022

there's *definitely* ppl picking my stuff apart motivated by idk, stuff not directly related to my research, probably something like 'hostility towards aella is trendy' or 'aella is a sex worker and uncredentialed' or 'aella isnt metaphorically wearing a lab coat'

Aella

@Aella_Girl

but often when someone makes a critique, i don't know enough about the critique to tell if they have nefarious motivations, and it's really high cost (going to learn deeply about the topic) in order to tease them apart. i have to decide if i trust them based on other cues.

10:54 PM · Dec 29, 2022

32.9K

Views

Replying to

Here's an attempt at good faith critique from a distance (not deeply familiar with your work). I think your work gives good and interesting insights about the type of people who would self select for your research, but I don't think they're generalisable across the population.

Replying to

astralcodexten.substack.com/p/selection-bi I don't believe I claim that it's more generalizable than it is, or at least my guess that it is. ppl comment acting like i'm out there making the ridiculous claim of 'yes my twitter polls are a correct reflection of the world population'

astralcodexten.substack.com

Selection Bias Is A Fact Of Life, Not An Excuse For Rejecting Internet Surveys

Show replies

Replying to

I'm sure you can find enough people who both like you and know about the topic to review the feedback with you. Collect, categorize, and treat it like the next step in the process.

Replying to

If you want to do rigorous research, there's no getting around learning deeply about those topics Keep in mind how much "top-tier" social science fails to replicate

Replying to

this is true of almost any peer review critique. You can either suspect it's in bad faith or take it at face value

Replying to

Everyone is Reviewer 2 until proven otherwise.

Replying to

Ahhh don’t worry about it. You’ll always get some nasty people on twitter. In amongst the weeds though, you’ll always find genuine people who are intrigued and curious by your musings. 👍

andrea — 1/100 blog posts

@dibiagioandrea

Dec 29, 2022

Replying to

@Aella_Girl

listen to the opinions of people you respect or that you understand that they know what they are talking about. ignore critiques you don’t understand by randos on the internet.

Replying to

Modern social science research has a lot of issues to begin with even in academia. Gaining meaningful information about humans is extremely difficult for everyone except companies that have built empires around harvesting data. Even those companies don’t always get it right