Edit :Excellent suggestions in the comments. Two of them stood out for me:
- "Untaught" may be better. It is less connoted (if at all), conveys about the right meaning, and can be understood by about anyone (thanks, shminux).
- Using a word to name a category can raise walls around it. In this case, we must be extra careful not to stigmatize the very people we'd like to join us (thanks, daenerys).
We often use "insane" to describe people whose behaviour or beliefs are below the sanity waterline. But as most must would agree here, you cannot call someone insane with a straight face just because he happens to believe in magic.
I'm currently watching Future by Design, a documentary featuring Jacque Fresco and the Venus Project. Jacque came up with this word, "unsane", to describe people who basically, aren't rational because they haven't been exposed to the right ideas yet. Which would be different from "insane", which is more about irrevocably irrational people.
I like this word, because there isn't the tone of accusation we find in "insane". This neutrality makes it easier to say that we can do something about it. Insanity should be eradicated like vermin. Unsanty on the other hand can be fixed.
So, do you think this word, "Unsanity" might be worth using?
Since I wrote it a total of 7 links have been made to the parent, as attempts to do status damage either out of general hostility or opposition in a specific context. In each of those 7 cases wedrifid was, in fact, off cycle. That is, he was not benefiting from any injectable performance enhancers in any sense real or counterfactual. (Moderation is healthy!)
While I reflectively endorse my contributions in those contexts it does seems potentially significant that all such attacks occurred when the proposed influence was absent. Pure coincidence isn't out of the question. That and when I am busy being productive I don't waste nearly as much time on lesswrong so I'm less likely to provoke replies - obnoxious or otherwise.