[quote=@Captain Jordan]
I just find the whole 'thanks' and 'laughs' part so subjective. So are 'likes', sure, but at least you can imagine a broad spectrum for which someone liked the post. Seeing that someone has a lot of 'laugh' ratings, and then finding their posts completely unfunny, for me that would make the ratings suspect and hard to believe the next time I saw something like that. 

Same with helpful posts. There are so many naive problem solvers out there (like those of us in this topic, hey-o!) who produce suggestions and tips that aren't really all that helpful. Except, to the OP, they may just be considered helpful, or at least they [i]sound[/i] helpful. When someone with real knowledge in that field comes along, then, and sees all the 'thanks' ratings on a post that is completely off-base, it also makes such ratings suspect. 

This kind of thing shields users from true and accurate evaluation by masking their posts with 'likes' and 'thanks' and 'laughs' from people who may or may not actually get the intent behind the post, or who naively believe the post was helpful. I know we're in a society of instant gratification, of 'click and move on', and so forth, but this [b]is[/b] a writing community. Having ratings such as these which trend towards simple categorization of a person, rather than writing out a thoughtful response, is kind of defeating the point of this community. Which is why, if we must have some form of rating, let's make it as simple as possible. 

tl;dr: I think there's too much subjectivity in the specific ratings to base generalized opinions of a person on those ratings alone, and makes it a poor argument for having three ratings.
[/quote]

The rating system is useful as a giver->receiver token system, not as a character-evaluation model. The aggregate stats you see on the profile are interesting but rarely useful.

You're pretty much confirming why nobody uses aggregate ratings to evaluate people. Maybe the word "rating" and the rating-table on the profile confuse the intention, but someone with a high rating in a +1 system isn't guaranteed amazing, either. They've simply provoked a lot of positive ratings usually because they've just been around a while with a mediocre-friendly disposition (example: my Reddit profile :lol).

A "+1/-1" binary system is even more subjective with even more useless aggregates, but I'm not convinced that's an issue.

Worst case scenario, the granular rating system is trivially degraded into a "+1" system or removed entirely.