My default zap is 113: So it looks like multiple people zapped. Is this ethical? \ stacker news ~meta

My default zap is 113: So it looks like multiple people zapped. Is this ethical?

339 sats \ 4 comments \ @Michelson_Morley 28 Oct 2023 meta

It's clearly dishonest. Whatever my intentions were, (I want to encourage people to keep talking), I am now realizing that I'm also lying to them. It doesn't matter if I believe I'm doing it to help them, because lying in this way distorts their view of social support. Who the hell am I to "help" them this way?

Do you have an opinion? I'm going to change to 100 sats, because I'm not a liar. But I'm interested to know the community's thoughts on this. Just because my highest ideal is truth doesn't mean that I'm right, so though I wont change my mind, but Id like to see another perspective. (in other words, I wont debate you. I'll zap anyone who votes and responds in any way).

It is okay to zap 113100.0%

It is not okay to zap 1130.0%

You're not in charge of "helping" others0.0%

Other opinion0.0%

7 votes \ poll ended

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242 sats \ 1 reply \ @supertestnet 28 Oct 2023

zapping someone an odd amount is not a lie

there are multiple reasons why someone might receive an odd amount and only one of them is "multiple people zapped me"

a lie is when you say something false

you may want someone to be misdirected so that they think multiple people zapped them, but "desiring to misdirect" is not the same thing as "lying"

"Friendly" misdirection is wrong when the misdirected person has a right to know the truth, but that does not apply in this case

42 sats \ 0 replies \ @Michelson_Morley OP 28 Oct 2023

Thanks. I'm not sure about making "lie" a word that precludes intention. I'm often hyperbolic in my words, using the most evil word instead of a more nuanced one. That's how I do it in my head, because nuance confuses me.

My intent was to deceive. Plain and simple. Why I intended this, if it was to help, is just not relevant. I desired to misdirect.

I think often of a social engineering "trick" (and also self-help trick): Most people think behavior is caused by thought. But in reality, behavior begets behavior + justification.

If I do something that I personally think is lying, then no matter how logically wrong I am, if i keep doing it I'll train myself to lie, and simultaneously (because who wants cognitive dissonance?) I'll find reasons for why it was necessary.

It's a classic crowd manipulation trick. Make people say Heil Hitler while moving their arm in a specific way. Even if they know they're being manipulated, eventually they'll justify it, and be honest in their "heil hitler". Quoting hitler, as I fairly never have done before, on his description of effective crowd manipulation:

Repeat your message constantly: "[Propagandist technique] must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over. Here, as so often in this world, persistence is the first and most important requirement for success."[43][44] (Gustave Le Bon believed that messages that are affirmed and repeated are often perceived as truth and spread by means of contagion. "Man, like animals, has a natural tendency to imitation. Imitation is a necessity for him, provided always that the imitation is quite easy", wrote Le Bon.[45] In his 1881 essay "L'Homme et Societes", he wrote "It is by examples not by arguments that crowds are guided." He stressed that in order to influence, one must not be too far removed his audience nor his example unattainable by them. If it is, his influence will be nil.)[46]

On stacker you can see the same thing from many bitcoin maximalists. Repeat a simple message, keep repeating it. Shitcoin. Shitcoin. Affirm the ones who also repeat it. People think how "true" something is, is strongly proportional to the amount of times they hear/read it. Also, make an us vs them environment. Be strongly emotional. Never deviate from the message. Never engage with experts. They're all shitcoiners. Aren't they, @DarthCoin?

Also the same trick that makes habits easy to form, you just do the habit for 1 minute the first week, until you are bored and start doing 4 minutes, etc. Eventually you justify why you need to perform the habit :)

142 sats \ 0 replies \ @grayruby 28 Oct 2023

Generous.

100 sats \ 0 replies \ @DogFac3 28 Oct 2023

i do 10 so i can spread everywhere all the time