There is a positive relationship between the number of comments in a thread and the rate at which the Yule’s I characteristic increases.
We can also use this equation to draw a line predicting the meaning generated in a thread using the coefficient of the X Variable1 (0.02) and the intercept (-9.09).
\(\begin{equation}{Yul}e^{{}^{\prime}}s\ I\ Score=\ -9.09+\text{Comments\ }\times\ 0.02\nonumber \\ \end{equation}\)
This means what with each extra comment in the threads studied, the Yule’s I score increased by 0.02.
Why?
More research is needed to test any of these assumptions.
Reddit’s Hot algorithm shapes debate by determining how many commenters will comment on a thread. An increase in the number of commenters is associated with an increase in meaning generated per post.
Therefore, Polemic Science issues on Reddit are examples of the Alternative Loop. As more people talk about polemic science issues on reddit, the threads become more complex. Consensus is not developed, but this is a rich environment for new ideas.

How does this contribute to the literature?

By studying which Loop is dominating an area online, we can determine if new ideas are being developed or if they are stagnating. According to Luhmann’s conception, a social system is driven by two clashing impulses:
  1. A desire to reduce the complexity of the world around us into an easily understandable form
  2. An accumulation of meanings, in the past choices made by the system. Reddit and Wikipedia are excellent at accumulating meaning. On the other hand, Twitter and Facebook are much better at simplifying complexity. Both Twitter and Facebook have more advanced source code and algorithms that are not open to the public. Reddit and Wikipedia’s source code has barely changed in the last decade. Facebook and Twitter are great simplifying tools, but this might wash away valuable nuance. Some issues can’t be argued coherently in and 140 characters or less (Twitter’s limit). When we oversimplify, we might lose pieces we need to actually understand and solve an issue.
According to its mission statement “… Facebook’s mission is to give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected…” In this aim, Facebook’s engineers manage people’s home page feed (newsfeed) so that voters see things they like and stay longer. For example, if a voter is interested in politics will show posts by their friends that support their political views but repress those that would clash \cite{Keegan2016}. Why is this a problem? By only showing views that users are likely to agree with, they are sheltered from new ideas. They end up trapped in an echo chamber listening only to the similar. These echo chambers inflame crises and divisions by only showing one set of opinions and blocking out the rest- killing any chance for compromise. If the world seems to be going mad, part of the reason is algorithms meant to keep us looking at advertisements.
Unlike Facebook, Reddit’s crude code is worse at creating echo chambers. When a thread appears on the front page, diverse contributors with many different interests and points of view can join in and comment on that thread. I believe that this is the reason that linguistic richness and meaning increased as the number of commenters increase.
I do not think that in general popularity leads to complexity. The top five most viewed videos on YouTube are music videos. Videos of Luhmann and systems theory languish almost unknown.
People can build great things on social media. We can process information together, take concepts that would have normally taken years of study to understand and make them accessible after 30 minutes of research. People can also be petty, vain, and destructive. Algorithms shape how we act on social media thereby shaping what kind of online societies we will create and wheat they will produce. As more and more about social activity moves online, it is critical that sociologists, behavioral scientists, and social psychologists understand what these algorithms are doing and study the effects that they have on their users.