<p>The competence you have and the competence you need has a big gap to understand the code.</p>

<p>You said that</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>He thinks (opinion) that I've lacked of effort, but actually I've
  studied Javascript at the university (fact).</p>
</blockquote>

<p>My assumption (might be wrong) is that you have taken one or two courses of JavaScript there. If you have studied JavaScript at the university, that does not prevent you to study more of it at your own to understand the basic code syntax better.</p>

<p>Overly exaggerated example of this case would be that someone asks at Physics forum:
"Could you explain me the theory of relativity in detail?"</p>

<p>...and the person has just taken one physics course in high school.</p>

<p>If many users ask that kind of questions, expect answers and get them on Stackoverflow, then it is full of similar questions and more experienced users have nothing else to do than to explain things in words of one syllable. In that case the forum would not work efficiently.</p>

<p>I did not answer to your questions, because I think that you are approaching this problem from a wrong angle.</p>

<p>Anyway, you are correct that users in Stackoverflow should behave more constructive way. People are more critical there to the formulation of the questions than in other StackExchange sites for some reason.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T10:41:55.203Z
I almost completely agree on what you are saying (+1). But one guy answered in a very profitable way.. And my question was specific to a JQuery plugin. And the concept were not so basic. And the next time someone asks a similar question he can be redirected to my question (marked as dup). The real question is: "does the question and answer add an information gain? or in common terms, are they useful? are they teaching something which may be useful for many?". I would say that it can be useful just for a few... million people. But also I got downvotes instead of explanations.. and a last stuff
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T10:44:45.160Z
"If many users ask that kind of questions, expect answers and get them on Stackoverflow, then it is full of similar questions and more experienced users have nothing else to do than to explain things in words of one syllable. In that case the forum would not work efficiently." this belief that you give as objective has many assumptions. One very big is that: "If many users ask that kind of questions". When you want to be objective you have to split any belief and wonder: "why I think this will happen? am I sure?" and also "why I am sure it's bad?" and when you give an answer you should again
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T10:46:00.020Z
Examine your answer and wonder: "I think it's bad for this reason, but have I really considered everything? Forecasting the future is not easy. Economics show it pretty clear. Inflation is good or bad? It's really really and hard question and it depends a lot, you could write a book on it.."
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T09:58:06.237Z
2014-10-31T10:17:00.053Z
2014-10-31T10:17:00.053Z
CuriousSuperhero
<p>I've <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/26655534/how-does-catcomplete-works">opened a question trying to point out every doubt I had on a language of development</a>: I thought it could be constructive.</p>

<p><strong>I'm pretty proud of the formulation of this question since it gives almost nothing as understood. While I was studying math at university many books were giving many concept as known.</strong></p>

<p>At the moment in which I'm writing 5 persons downvoted the question saying: "<em>How about learning something about 1) JavaScript objects ({}), 2) jQuery callbacks 3) jQuery plugins?</em>"</p>

<p>Actually there is a cognitive error in this sentence. He thinks (opinion) that I've lacked of effort, but actually I've studied Javascript at the university (fact). I've also tried to google for it (fact), but without the exact knowledge of what to look for I could not find an explanation. <em>I'm making an assumption interpreting his sentence.</em></p>

<p><strong>Another guy simply answered in a constructive way.</strong></p>

<p>I think that this cognitive error is pretty diffuse. How is it called? Is it an attribution error? Can it be motivated by the need for feeding self-esteem while putting no effort in making something constructive?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T10:35:32.017Z
@StrangeLoop: for judging I mean: choosing an opinion, making up a belief based on considerations. We judge as we breathe.. I think we cannot avoid judging. The problem is that the beliefs we make up can be rational or not..
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T10:49:54.387Z
@StrangeLoop: for me was useful in any case, and we cannot read his mind. But I got 5 dowvnote.. and he said: "How about learning something about..." which is different from saying: "look for...". However, I can be wrong for him, but what about the downvotes? Let's consider the hypothesy which explains the downvotes as motivated by this explanations or the one given by deviero here.
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T11:10:25.837Z
@StrangeLoop: yes, you are not wrong, but look also to this question which is really easier to google for: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4558754/define-what-is-a-hashset what do you say then? I could understand an answer like the comment of the user, but downvotes no..
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T11:14:43.400Z
@StrangeLoop: it's funny because we wrote almost the same thought.. but how to contrast easy downvoter should continue on the meta section.. maybe here: http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/275709/are-the-hurried-downvoters-improving-this-community
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T11:16:18.620Z
@StrangeLoop: but almost everything we do is motivated by our cognition.. To hit someone that we don't like we try to see him as bad or stupid before. Being proud is a very huge need for human.
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T11:40:09.287Z
@StrangeLoop: the user doensn't want to provide an explanation since it's boring for him. It would be constructive and if he would be coherent he should simply do it. He doesn't want to accept that he is more lazy and egoistic than he wants to admit to himself. So he has to focus a reason for not answering the question. This will let him distract from his defects to focus on other's. Almost everytime we blame someone we could choose to make an effort at his place (I could spend hours reading all the javascript manual for example). The nice of psychology is the lack of any etical judgement..
Revious
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-10-31T11:43:59.707Z
@StrangeLoop: for example.. people like to tell themself that they stay on this community to improve it. But they try to hide to themselves that they are doing it also to improve their self-esteem, that they do it in the working time, that they do it mostly because is a way to spend time, to get a self-esteem pumping and that they simply prefer to avoid some tasks and find a valid rational justification, focus on it and hide all the other also rational which say why he is lazy, wrong, unconstructive and so on
Revious
<cognitive-psychology>
Attitude to judge and avoid efforts
Revious
# Attitude to judge and avoid efforts

(Asked by: username_0 on 2014-10-30)

I've [opened a question trying to point out every doubt I had on a language of development](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/26655534/how-does-catcomplete-works): I thought it could be constructive.

**I'm pretty proud of the formulation of this question since it gives almost nothing as understood. While I was studying math at university many books were giving many concept as known.**

At the moment in which I'm writing 5 persons downvoted the question saying: "*How about learning something about 1) JavaScript objects ({}), 2) jQuery callbacks 3) jQuery plugins?*"

Actually there is a cognitive error in this sentence. He thinks (opinion) that I've lacked of effort, but actually I've studied Javascript at the university (fact). I've also tried to google for it (fact), but without the exact knowledge of what to look for I could not find an explanation. *I'm making an assumption interpreting his sentence.*

**Another guy simply answered in a constructive way.**

I think that this cognitive error is pretty diffuse. How is it called? Is it an attribution error? Can it be motivated by the need for feeding self-esteem while putting no effort in making something constructive?

**Tags:** cognitive-psychology

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: @StrangeLoop: for judging I mean: choosing an opinion, making up a belief based on considerations. We judge as we breathe.. I think we cannot avoid judging. The problem is that the beliefs we make up can be rational or not..  
> **username_0**: @StrangeLoop: for me was useful in any case, and we cannot read his mind. But I got 5 dowvnote.. and he said: "How about learning something about..." which is different from saying: "look for...". However, I can be wrong for him, but what about the downvotes? Let's consider the hypothesy which explains the downvotes as motivated by this explanations or the one given by deviero here.  
> **username_0**: @StrangeLoop: yes, you are not wrong, but look also to this question which is really easier to google for: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4558754/define-what-is-a-hashset what do you say then? I could understand an answer like the comment of the user, but downvotes no..  
> **username_0**: @StrangeLoop: it's funny because we wrote almost the same thought.. but how to contrast easy downvoter should continue on the meta section.. maybe here: http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/275709/are-the-hurried-downvoters-improving-this-community  
> **username_0**: @StrangeLoop: but almost everything we do is motivated by our cognition.. To hit someone that we don't like we try to see him as bad or stupid before. Being proud is a very huge need for human.  
> **username_0**: @StrangeLoop: the user doensn't want to provide an explanation since it's boring for him. It would be constructive and if he would be coherent he should simply do it. He doesn't want to accept that he is more lazy and egoistic than he wants to admit to himself. So he has to focus a reason for not answering the question. This will let him distract from his defects to focus on other's. Almost everytime we blame someone we could choose to make an effort at his place (I could spend hours reading all the javascript manual for example). The nice of psychology is the lack of any etical judgement..  
> **username_0**: @StrangeLoop: for example.. people like to tell themself that they stay on this community to improve it. But they try to hide to themselves that they are doing it also to improve their self-esteem, that they do it in the working time, that they do it mostly because is a way to spend time, to get a self-esteem pumping and that they simply prefer to avoid some tasks and find a valid rational justification, focus on it and hide all the other also rational which say why he is lazy, wrong, unconstructive and so on  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2014-10-31. Score: 1

The competence you have and the competence you need has a big gap to understand the code.

You said that

> He thinks (opinion) that I've lacked of effort, but actually I've
> studied Javascript at the university (fact).

My assumption (might be wrong) is that you have taken one or two courses of JavaScript there. If you have studied JavaScript at the university, that does not prevent you to study more of it at your own to understand the basic code syntax better.

Overly exaggerated example of this case would be that someone asks at Physics forum:
"Could you explain me the theory of relativity in detail?"

...and the person has just taken one physics course in high school.

If many users ask that kind of questions, expect answers and get them on Stackoverflow, then it is full of similar questions and more experienced users have nothing else to do than to explain things in words of one syllable. In that case the forum would not work efficiently.

I did not answer to your questions, because I think that you are approaching this problem from a wrong angle.

Anyway, you are correct that users in Stackoverflow should behave more constructive way. People are more critical there to the formulation of the questions than in other StackExchange sites for some reason.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: I almost completely agree on what you are saying (+1). But one guy answered in a very profitable way.. And my question was specific to a JQuery plugin. And the concept were not so basic. And the next time someone asks a similar question he can be redirected to my question (marked as dup). The real question is: "does the question and answer add an information gain? or in common terms, are they useful? are they teaching something which may be useful for many?". I would say that it can be useful just for a few... million people. But also I got downvotes instead of explanations.. and a last stuff  
> **username_0**: "If many users ask that kind of questions, expect answers and get them on Stackoverflow, then it is full of similar questions and more experienced users have nothing else to do than to explain things in words of one syllable. In that case the forum would not work efficiently." this belief that you give as objective has many assumptions. One very big is that: "If many users ask that kind of questions". When you want to be objective you have to split any belief and wonder: "why I think this will happen? am I sure?" and also "why I am sure it's bad?" and when you give an answer you should again  
> **username_0**: Examine your answer and wonder: "I think it's bad for this reason, but have I really considered everything? Forecasting the future is not easy. Economics show it pretty clear. Inflation is good or bad? It's really really and hard question and it depends a lot, you could write a book on it.."  

---

