Comment · Tue, March 22, 2016 · Ceretropic & Nootropics Depot
The dark side of internet forums
Original post in this thread
rrtrda · 161 points
While these and other health forums contain a wealth of incredibly helpful information and inspiration, I believe their darker sides are often ignored. As people here generally tend to be keen to debate, I think certain issues should be addressed. Let’s see which ones you’ve encountered yourself:
Prejudice: Many people just don’t come here to find neutral information about a certain nootropic/drug. They want to get their preset opinion confirmed. And if nobody tells them what they want to hear, they google further, or dispute what others are saying. The longer you google, the more likely you will stumble across the correlation you were looking for. But how relevant is it?
Misinformation: Yes, there are some people out here that deserve respect. With their profound knowledge they enrich discussions and create value for the community. But they not only check sample size and Pearson’s r. Those people spot methodological flaws and inaccuracies in studies. And can assess their meaningfulness. But let’s be honest about it: those people are rare and most people don’t have the skill nor the time to do that. I myself would love to be one of those able to truly judge. Unfortunatel…
What they were answering
ahauben · 1 points
finding a way to make the science of nootropic substances more accessible to those not familiar could be a potential step. you could enhance the search function by having post categories like the r science subreddit has. it seems that many people visit this subreddit for practical purposes, without the desire to divulge heavily into the science and mechanisms.
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb · Ceretropic & Nootropics Depot
That would be interesting. I see how /r/Science has a filter by field in their CSS. I'll have to think what type of fields would be pertinent to /r/Nootropics.