daenerys comments on Help! Name suggestions needed for Rationality-Inst! - Less Wrong

20 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 28 January 2012 02:24AM

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Comment author: markette 28 January 2012 04:06:48AM *  26 points [-]

One obvious question: when is the name most important? When first heard; Introductions.

Some common names take the form of "[identifier] [word for a group]" or similar, eg: [Rationality] [Institute]

Use online thesauruses to find synonyms for good words, make long lists of words to combine. http://thesaurus.com

Google how to come up with good names, skim chapters in marketing textbooks for meta-ideas.

Don't react fast/naturally (eg: "the name Waterline is a clever meaningful in-group signal and sounds pretty."), ask yourself how your target will react (eg: "what's that, whale environmentalists?").

Who are your targets? Intelligent ambitious young men or their uninterested 45 year old mothers? Academics? From which field? etc.

Common reaction to mention of the group will be to assume their arrogance (suggesting they can teach smartness, that they have smartness), behaving guarded but curious.

Suggestions: Insight House/ Bayesian House

Reaction: "what does bayesian mean?" it's the math (credibility+++) of how to decide (arrogance-) etc. Bring evidence into discussion if target identifies as being "logical" (young smart men).

Comment author: [deleted] 28 January 2012 04:38:43AM *  3 points [-]

Suggestions: Insight House

I like "Insight". It alludes to "Incite", which is an exciting word that is related to the organization (definition- to give rise to, to urge into action, to stir up, etc). And it also can be broken into "in sight", which can be related to having your goals in sight, striving to reach for an attainable goal, etc.

So it's one word, with 3 positive connotations (Insight, Incite, and In Sight)

How about:

Sanity Insight
Rationality Insight
<Insert Postive Word Here> Insight
Insight Institute

Edited: Changed all "InSight" suggestions to "Insight", because I agree with markette's critique below.

Comment author: markette 28 January 2012 04:45:16AM *  8 points [-]

Forget cleverness for its own sake, optimize for the consequences.

someone reads "InSight", their brain says "oh, I get it, they combined insight and in sight. Their name is a pun." imagines suited marketing man. Where do you want to go for lunch?

Capturing that first thought and directing it somewhere useful is crucial

Comment author: [deleted] 28 January 2012 05:11:50AM *  2 points [-]

I think you're right.

Good word, bad capital "S".

I edited my suggestions to fix it.

Comment author: lessdazed 05 March 2012 03:43:59AM 0 points [-]
Comment author: ArisKatsaris 28 January 2012 05:06:36AM *  6 points [-]

I like "Insight" too, but probably not "InSight" as part of the name, feels a bit gimmicky, as markette says.

"Insight Institute" has nice alliteration.
"Applied Insight" has good connotations for caring about effectiveness, as opposed to mere philosophizing. It also has the same initials as "Artificial Intelligence" which I'm not sure if it's a minus or a plus.

Comment author: Larks 28 January 2012 02:56:37PM 3 points [-]

Then they could use old "SIAI" headed notepaper to refer to the union of SI and AI!

Comment author: markette 28 January 2012 05:18:50AM 3 points [-]

"Applied Insight" [...] has the same initials as "Artificial Intelligence" which I'm not sure if it's a minus or a plus.

Can you imagine anyone's opinion being altered by such a thing? Its value rounds to zero (It's nonzero, but the smallest credit the human mind could give it is, I suspect, too much).

Comment author: ArisKatsaris 28 January 2012 02:09:59PM *  4 points [-]

I get your point -- but still: If something's initials mean something different, this means it effectively can't be referenced or googled by those initials.

Yeah, this is a minor point if the name is just two words, but still something to consider if someone has name ideas that include "Figuring Better Ideas", "Cognitive Insight Applications" or for that matter "Neural Augmentation and Methodical Bettering of Life Alliance" . :-)

Comment author: [deleted] 28 January 2012 05:30:47AM 1 point [-]

Inciting Insight Inside is In Sight!

(Sorry, couldn't help myself...)

Comment author: [deleted] 28 January 2012 11:36:30AM 0 points [-]

"Insight" reminds me first of Consensus Buddhism. I'd think of anyone speaking of insight in general as selling some form of vipassana. See for example the very influential Insight Meditation Society.