fubarobfusco comments on Designing Rationalist Projects - Less Wrong
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I think we should be a little careful of using the word "cult" as a mental stop sign, since that does seem to be what's happening here. We need to be a bit more careful about labeling something with all the bad connotations of a cult just because it has some of the properties of a cult -- especially if it only seems to have the good properties. But... that doesn't mean that this good cult property won't lead to the bad cult property or properties that we don't want. You should just be more explicit as to what and how, because I'm wavering back and forth on this article being a really, really good idea (the benefits of this plan are obvious!), and a really, really scary and bad idea (if I do it, it'll make me become part of a groupthinky monster!).
The problem I have is that both sides in my own head seem to be influenced by their own clear cognitive biases -- we have the cult attractor on one hand and the accidental negative connotations and stopsigny nature of the word "cult" on the other. So if you could semi-explicitly show why adopting the idea this article puts forth would lead to some specific serious negative consequences, that would clear up my own indecision and confusion.
Conjecture: Sufficiently dedicated groups that do not take measures against "bad cult properties" will fall down the cult attractor. So if you want a group to not fall down the attractor, you have to think about bad cult properties and how to avoid them.
Various folks have come up with lists of just what "bad cult properties" are; one of my favorites is Isaac Bonewits' "ABCDEF". Bonewits' motivation appears to have been to help people be more comfortable involving themselves in unusual groups (he was a neopagan leader) by spelling out what sorts of group behavior were actually worth being worried about.
I won't repeat Bonewits' list here. I think it's worth noting, though, that several of the properties he outlines could be described as anti-epistemology in practice.
Having read the list, LW-as-it-was-last-week-and-presumably-is-now seems to be unsurprisingly good at not being a cult. It does occur to me that we might want to take a close look at how the incentives offered by the group to its members will change if we switch to a more recruitment-oriented mode, though.
See also.
Yeah, I figured I wasn't going to be too worried about LW's cultishness unless/until rules for sexual behavior got handed down, to which Eliezer was exempt.