It's not about scoring imaginary internet points, it's about deciding what is and isn't acceptable in our community. For me the bar for "unacceptable content" is a lot higher than just "dislike."
As others have mentioned, if I disagree and think it's worth the time to engage, I'll respond and hopefully we have a fruitful discussion. Like/dislike doesn't really come into it. If I really dislike it I just close the tab or ignore the comment.
I was led to believe that the opposite was true:
I'd like to see a wider range of options that have different effects on a post/comment like specific agree/disagree buttons that don't have the effect of making the comment move up/down or be lighter/darker, maybe just shows a count for both agree and disagree, not a single number that moves up for agree and down for disagree like votes do. Flag-like reactions should require some type of write-up, single-click actions are too convenient for users in a rage.
Who’s “we” here and on what basis are you able to speak for that group? It has been stated by pg himself a long time ago that it’s ok to downvote to express dislike or disagreement.
> Although it's unavoidable to some extent, I really don't want HN to develop a strong filter bubble where only things I agree with get shown. I want to see dissenting opinions and ideas.
HN already has a strong filter bubble on various topics. Yes, it may seem better than some other communities, but any place that constantly allows new users to view or participate will have them (the new users) see some sort of filter bubbles established and enforced by the ones who have been around for longer (and have these as blind spots that they cannot recognize).