So, am I the only one who thinks new users shouldn't be expected to read the sequences before participating? There are works of brilliance there but there are also posts that are far from required reading.
I mean, if a cognitive psychologist shows up and wants to teach us about some cool bias why the hell would she need to read about many worlds or Eliezer's coming of age as a rationalist?
What the FAQ should do is say what topics we've covered, what we think about them and from there link to posts in the sequences where our positions on those topics are covered in more depth. So if someone shows up they can look over the material, decide they want to talk to us about physics and read the posts on physics, and then say what they want to say.
Besides, if someone is just reading the new posts as they come they'll eventually pick up most of what is in the sequences just from links and repetition.
This is Eliezer's baby... but making the second question about him kind of screams "cult!" Objections to changing it?
Why is "claim an objective morality" on the list of things you shouldn't post against consensus about? I'm a moral realist; historically this has gotten me only slightly heckled, not decried as an obvious amateur.
"We need a FAQ" is solution language.
Why do we think we need one? What appears to be the problem?
What is the desired outcome?
Great idea, Kevin. I would also suggest adding the FAQ to the About page here: http://lesswrong.com/lw/1/about_less_wrong/, to allow new users to find it more easily.
Just thought I'd jump in to say that, when I was a newcomer, the most confusing thing for me were constant references to AI and FAI. To be honest, I am still left puzzled by such discussions. I would suggest the FAQ contain a brief outline of what FAI is, and if anybody knows a basic-level post about it, I'd be personally obliged.
What tone do people think the FAQ should take? Right now it is pretty serious and straight forward, jokes would make us less intimidating. But maybe that is a bad idea.
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Yes, morality is a two-place word -- the evaluation function of whether an action is moral has two inputs: agent, action. "Agent" can be replaced by anything that conceivably has agency, so morality can be considered system-dependent, where systems include social groups and all humanity, etc.
I wouldn't say morality is what the agent wants to do, but is what the agent ought to do, given its preferences. So I think I am still using it in the usual sense.
What word do you use to means what actually ought to be done? The particular thing that you and, to a large degree all humans would want to do under specified circumstances?
I can talk about what I ought to do, but it seems to me I can't talk about what another agent ought to do outside their system of preferences. If I had their preferences, I ought to do what they ought to do. If they had my preferences, they ought to do what I ought to do. But to consider what they ought to do, with some mixture of preferences, isn't incoherent.
I can have a preference for what another agent does, of course, but this is different than asserting a morality. For example, if they don't do what I think is moral, I'm not morally culpable. I don't have their agency.
As far as I can tell, we don't disagree on any matter of fact. I agree that we can only optimize our own actions. I agree that other agents won't necessarily find our moral arguments persuasive. I just don't agree that the words moral and ought should be used the way you do.
To the greater LW community: Is there some way we can come up with standard terminology for this sort of thing? I myself have moved toward using the terminology used by Eliezer, but not everyone has. Are there severe objections to his terminology and if so, are there any other terminologies you think we should adopt as standard?
Less Wrong is extremely intimidating to newcomers and as pointed out by Academian something that would help is a document in FAQ form intended for newcomers. Later we can decide how to best deliver that document to new Less Wrongers, but for now we can edit the existing (narrow) FAQ to make the site less scary and the standards more evident.
Go ahead and make bold edits to the FAQ wiki page or use this post to discuss possible FAQs and answers in agonizing detail.