Labelling people this way is a blunt instrument.

It seems like the introvert/extrovert split, where few people are near the poles and there's a lot more going on in the middle.

E.g. I might check if someone has weekend plans before asking if I can stay with them. Or, I might ask outright, but specify it's not important, I just want to catch up, and the nearby hotel looks nice.

These seem like important differences even though they're both in the middle of ask and guess.

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nlawalker 19 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yes, I don't support labelling people as one or the other, but defining and articulating the two kinds of behaviors and expectations relative to each other is incredibly useful for communication and understanding.

	▲	jraph 19 hours ago \| parent [-]
		If these behavioral models are indeed good and close enough to the reality. But that whole stuff comes from some internet comment! I agree it's better to label behaviors or situations than people.

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orwin 19 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

But it is useful if you apply that labeling to yourself. It also helps with empathy.

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jraph 19 hours ago | parent [-]

Labelling can be a shortcut around empathy. Empathy is the real deal.

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derektank 19 hours ago | parent [-]

It’s hard to imagine what a guesser is feeling if you don’t understand the differences between their expectations and yours as an asker, and vice versa.

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jraph 19 hours ago | parent [-]

You are presupposing that the internet forum comment on which all this is based has correctly modelled the world and that this asker-guesser thing is indeed real.

Usually it takes one or ideally several studies, with large groups of people, with a solid hypothesis and some strong, rigorous protocol.

Until then, it's not worthless, but it's at best an inspiration.

Social stuff is rarely that easy, seducing, cute, with two clear, beautiful categories of people.

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TeMPOraL 17 hours ago | parent [-]

All models are wrong. Some are useful.

It makes sense to judge models by how useful they're in some situation, and compare them by usefulness in context[0]. It doesn't make sense to ask which is right, because they're all wrong.

Here, at least for me, but I guess(!) many other HNers, the "Askers vs. Guessers" model is very useful.

Would some RCT studies be nice? Sure. I don't expect them to prove the model to be accurate. But it doesn't have to be, that's not the point. Just pointing out that there's some variability between people along these lines is very useful.

Diverse modes loosely held, eh?

[0] - Consider Newtonian vs. relativistic motion. The latter is more accurate and gets you better results at large scales - but in almost all circumstances in life (up to and including landing a probe on the Moon, or landing a shell in someone's back yard), the Newtonian model is much simpler and therefore much more useful.

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jraph 10 hours ago | parent [-]

Of course we could say that all models are "wrong" because they are simplifications of the reality. But there's wrong and wrong. We don't usually say a model like the Newtonian motion is wrong, it's not a very useful way to deal with models.

Newtonian motion has been shown to be repeatable and to accurately predict motion within limits. It has scientific backing.

The asker-guesser model isn't even shown to be a simplification of the reality. And actually, later in that High-context and low-context cultures [1] Wikipedia article:

> A 2008 meta-analysis concluded that the model was "unsubstantiated and underdeveloped".

Which is scientific speak for bullshit.

There's a world between scientifically backed "wrong" Newtonian movement and random internet forum comment backed social model found to be "unsubstantiated and underdeveloped".

The Newtonian movement is an evidence-backed simplification. The asker-guesser model is a persuasive illusion.

Are you really comparing some internet commenter with Newton and the broader scientific community?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-context_and_low-context_c...

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TeMPOraL 7 hours ago | parent [-]

> The Newtonian movement is an evidence-backed simplification. The asker-guesser model is a persuasive illusion.

Both are evidence-backed simplifications. The difference is in the amount of evidence and degree of simplification. Both are better than random in their respective domain, and can be useful depending on your tolerance for errors.

Sometimes even a very broad simplification is useful. E.g. it's perfectly valid to assume that π = 3 or even π = 5 to simplify some calculations, if you don't need the value to be more accurate than "non-negative and less than 10". It'll probably cost you something somewhere (e.g. you end up ordering too much paint), but being able to do the math in your head quickly is often worth it.

I could keep inventing examples, but surely you'll be able to come up with some of your own, once you realize there's no hard divide between what's scientific and not. These are just rough categories. In reality, you have models of varying complexity, correlation with reality, and various utility. It's a continuum.

Also:

> Are you really comparing some internet commenter with Newton and the broader scientific community?

Yes. Don't be biased against Internet commenters. Papers don't write themselves ex nihilo, and are generally distillation of existing ideas, not the first place where new ideas are ever published. And scientists are Internet users too.

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jraph 7 hours ago | parent [-]

> Both are evidence-backed simplifications

Which evidences do we have for this asker-guesser thing? Naive intuition doesn't count. That's not how robust knowledge works. There's a freaking meta analysis finding we don't have strong enough evidence. This is pseudo science. It could be discovered later that this stuff indeed works, but we don't know yet. It's a sexy topic, the lack of any convincing publication for all this time makes this pretty unlikely.

> Yes.

Ok, I'm done here.

If you don't see how an internet comment from a random person and a proper paper written by Newton (or even by a random scientist) are fundamentally different when it comes to robustness and reliability of the described knowledge, even accounting for all the flaws scientific publishing has, I don't see how this discussion can be productive any longer. This won't lead to anything interesting.

I think I've written everything I had to write on the topic, several times. I'll leave you with your pub / armchair science. You do you.

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TeMPOraL 7 hours ago | parent [-]

> Naive intuition doesn't count. That's not how robust knowledge works.

Sure it does. Data is actually plural of anecdotes. That's how most actual research started. The difference between "science" and "armchair science" of this kind is a matter of degree.

	▲	jraph 5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Anecdotes is already a plural, of anecdote. Data is not a plural of anecdotes, or anecdote, it is plural of datum (kinda, data is often used as a mass/uncountable noun, in which case it's not a plural). Under which hypothesis (formulated before the observations), how you collect it and its statistical significance and then how you interpret it (guided by the hypothesis) are key. Such data is nothing like anecdotes. Anecdotes are at best inspirations to formulate hypotheses. Intuition is a core element in research (it guides the formulation of hypotheses) but doesn't constitute evidence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method

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the__alchemist 19 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Indeed. There is likely more of a spectrum. That said, I think applying the label to a given scenario, or a person's tendencies can be useful.

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sublinear 15 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I agree, but the fundamental problem is a blunt one to begin with. It should not be a way to label people, but decisions.

Guess culture is playing defense against the outcrowd. Ask culture is playing offense to achieve higher-level thinking and goals.

This isn't always a deliberate thing. Still, everyone has to pick their plays with every interaction they have.

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19 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[deleted]