Discussion article for the meetup : First Salt Lake City Meetup: 22 January 2012 03:00PM
Hello and Happy Belated New Year! After the December announcement revealed that there were many residents of Salt Lake City who were also Less Wrongers, it is time for a Meetup!
It will take place next Sunday the 22nd at 3:00 pm.
The venue is Mestizo Coffee House. It's located at 631 West North Temple. I've been there once before and I liked the atmosphere. The 22nd was the first available time I could book the gallery space. The coffee house does not allow outside food or drinks.
While browsing current Meetup announcements, I stumbled across this inspiring account (http://lesswrong.com/lw/4ul/less_wrong_nyc_case_study_of_a_successful/) of a successful meetup. It posed the question: "Do you want a community badly enough to build one yourself?" That reminded me that yes, I think I do. I have quite a large number of ideas for future meetup possibilities already.
The agenda will first and foremost be to meet each other. We'll also discuss future meetups, both logistics and possibilities. We could also start with a short discussion near the end about some Less Wrong topic: leave a comment as to what you think that should be.
Just to clarify: the December announcement was just to gather information and in no way means that there aren't LWers in SLC determined to have a meetup. There are plenty and we will have a meet up.
That is all.
You are right. Mormonism is an especially relevant and important topic in Utah. It would be a fantastic example to explore those LW themes and more as part of real life reasoning, and it's practically a MUST that we discuss it in-depth at some point. Are we ready though?
Are we REALLY ready? Are we certain that our internalization of LW basics, our ability to keep a conversation level-headed and on-topic, is strong enough to keep our heads and discuss to Aumann Agreement instead of attacking each other(s arguments)? (Same thing really, when the conversation goes far enough south.) Keep in mind it's not just yourself you are answering for, but everyone in the conversation.
Some of us want LW meetups for a supportive community in which to learn and perfect personal rationality before we want them for heady conversation and debate. I would personally prefer that we are all on the same page about how to discuss topics effectively before we try to defuse irrationality minefields like politics or religion. Might I point out that such mind-killing topics are avoided even here, on the main site? There's a reason for it. Devolving into unproductive arguments is unproductive. Arguments cause resentment, which leads to subconscious avoidance of situations that cause them, which leads to SLC LW community wheezing and whining then puttering out like an old beater.