No:  The main purpose of the merit system is to reward and encourage good posts.  Why is everybody focusing on the implicitly consequential negative, rather than the explicit primary positive?


Good idea; so do I.  Then, perhaps you should rely on my post as to which you replied.  Look above.

In Development & Technical Discussion, I also suggest that you should watch posts awarded merit by DannyHamilton.  If you are a learner, follow his own posts, too:  He excels both at providing good information, and tearing apart misinformation.

There are other expert users whose merit endorsement should tell you that a post is meritorious on technical grounds; but I think those are the most consistently active.  Merit is somewhat transitive; thus if you see that a particular user is often awarded merit by somebody whose technical judgment you trust, then merit awarded by that user should be a good guide, too.

As such, consider Dev & Tech merits to function as a de facto peer review and reputational system.