Comment by a_conservative | Hacker News Reader

Comment by a_conservative | Hacker News Reader

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I’m not saying this to try to start a fight or anything. You strike me as a kind person, so I’m going to give this a shot.

I am a bit of a contrarian about lots of things. Some of the smartest people I’ve ever known were major contrarians.

Are Linus Torvalds or RMS contrarians? What about Richard Feynman or Tesla?

I don’t really know if any of those examples would be widely considered contrarians, but my point is that people are multi faceted. Dismissing a person in a broad manner for unpopular opinions in one arena, strikes me as a religious mindset.

Does everyone have to pass a purity test before their opinions are able to be considered? Is that healthy?

Thank you for any consideration you can give this. I truly do not mean to start a flame war. One more thought experiment: is it ok to learn woodworking from an Amish person who likely would have wildly diverging views from most people?

So, I divide things into two camps. I think one can hold an unpopular opinion about subjective things, and it's fine. I won't judge you for preferring tabs over spaces, even if I think you're wrong. I won't weigh that opinion against your other work either. It's like preferring sweet potato to apple pie. You're still wrong, but again it has no bearing on objective facts. :^)

When you're outspoken about an objective fact that has been proven out by a mountain of evidence like vaccines being safe, or the earth being round, that's when I become very skeptical of any of your other opinions.

The amish woodworker is an interesting question. I wouldn't judge him for being wrong about things outside of his domain as I'd assume ignorance instead of malice, but if he started popping off very wrong theories on the nature of oak vs pine I'd probably be leery.

Thanks for the thoughtful response. I’m similar to you in this regard, but I’ve been thinking about the frailty of human knowledge lately.

We get it wrong a lot. It will be interesting to see how the vax debate and perception plays out over the next few years.

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