daenerys comments on Call for Anonymous Narratives by LW Women and Question Proposals (AMA) - Less Wrong

20 [deleted] 09 September 2012 08:39AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (364)

You are viewing a single comment's thread.

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 08:42:43AM 2 points [-]

Question Submissions

Feel free to ask questions you would like answered by the women of LW as a response to this comment.

Remember, Crocker's Rules will apply for the answers, and one question per comment, please!

Comment author: Douglas_Reay 09 September 2012 09:31:19AM 1 point [-]

What software feature (or policy) would you like to see added to the LessWrong forums and up/down vote system?

(There may or may not be a gender difference in perceived value of proposed features. I don't know. That's why I'm asking.)

Comment author: Alicorn 09 September 2012 06:05:28PM 2 points [-]

I want more support for the public votes feature (I want it to work backwards and on comments). I'd also like built-in polling support.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 09 September 2012 06:27:23PM *  8 points [-]

Trn (a comprehensive system for managing long discussions which was used on usenet and was never rewritten for the web). I'm expecting an age difference on this one, not a gender difference.

Up-down karma vote histories.

However, I'm fine with anonymous voting. I think we'd get even more conflict and less good voting if votes had names attached to them.

Built-in polling would be excellent, preferably with some way of handling whether people's poll answers were correlated. I don't know whether most polling systems have this-- the only one I've used is livejournal, and it doesn't.

Comment author: ciphergoth 11 September 2012 06:43:20PM 3 points [-]

Oh Gods yes, I wish for Trn, or better still, Gnus.

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 10:19:07PM 3 points [-]

I'm new to less wrong so my opinions may not be seen to count as much as more regular users. But anyway, I definitely think the voting should be anonymous in order to avoid petty conflicts. I also think there may be some flaws in the voting system. While I think it is a good thing that long time users and regular contributors to less wrong as well as interesting and insightful comments are recognised and rewarded for their input with karma points I feel there may also be some downsides: For example in some situations people may want to say something that conflicts with the opinion of the majority of users commenting on a thread but decide against it due to the prospect of being down voted (as well as comments). I noticed that in this thread alicorn said she had felt this way about commenting on threads about gender issues. Also if someone decides to say something controversial anyway (compared to other attitudes on the thread) this may get down voted and become invisible. I think this is bad because it is preferable to have a variety of views represented on any thread or the discussion may suffer due to one sidedness. I have read before that people tend to seek out those who share their view point and ignore opposing opinions but i think it would be better to have a debate when such situations arise rather than completely sidelining views that we don't agree with which is a danger with the down voting system. Of course it is a different case when a comment is unacceptable to the standards of the community by being obscene etc but that could be dealt with by the "report" function. I don't think the up/ down vote system should be abandoned but maybe some modifications could be made.

Comment author: lucidian 10 September 2012 03:30:35AM 7 points [-]

I'd like an option to hide all karma scores. There's two reasons for this:

  • I worry that by seeing the karma of a post before reading the post, I will be unfairly biased toward or against that post. I'd really like to make up my own mind about these things before seeing what the community has decided. I'm pretty sure my opinions change drasticallly based on the opinions of the group I'm in, and this seems counterproductive for rationality (although very useful for social cohesion).

  • I'm embarrassed to admit that karma scores affect my emotions a lot. Each time I lose a karma point, it's like an emotional punch in the face. If someone politely disagreed with my post, I would not have this reaction. If someone violently disagreed with my post, I'd either be slightly upset, very amused, or both. But when I lose a karma point, I feel intense shame. Also, when I gain karma, I feel intense pride. When I post here, I feel like I'm talking to "win karma", not to engage in an interesting discussion with thoughtful, intelligent people. This isn't a motivation/reaction I like to have, and that's why I almost never post here, and instead spend all my time on IRC. Basically, because of the karma system, I try not to say anything that might be disapproved of, and I'm reluctant to engage in candid discussion. Those of you who know me on IRC or IRL might be surprised to hear this, because in those situations I almost always discuss my thoughts/opinions candidly without fearing social rejection; in fact, in those situations, I genuinely don't care whether I'm rejected. I don't know why the karma system on LW is so different for me. Anyway, I'm going to try to train my emotional system to ignore karma altogether the way I've trained it not to care about IRL rejection; we'll see how that goes.

Comment author: Alicorn 10 September 2012 03:43:56AM *  8 points [-]

There is a browser extension called the anti-kibitzer that will, among other things, hide karma scores on comments/posts.

Comment author: lucidian 10 September 2012 04:01:06AM 0 points [-]

=O Thanks muchly! I'm trying it out right now. It doesn't seem to work properly, but perhaps I'm doing it wrong; I'll play with it more.

Comment author: Douglas_Reay 09 September 2012 09:38:29AM 13 points [-]

How do you think LessWrong does at productive discussion of gender issues (when discussed) compared to other communities you have experience of that have a similar gender ratio (eg the Science Fiction community)? Do you think the LessWrong community would benefit most from a higher, lower, or about the current frequency of such discussions?

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 04:22:45PM *  9 points [-]

How do you think LessWrong does at productive discussion of gender issues (when discussed) compared to other communities you have experience of that have a similar gender ratio (eg the Science Fiction community)?

I think LW mistakes "not a screaming flamewar all or most of the time" for "productive conversation." It's certainly true that LW is more civil about things. But that civility seems overrated, too -- someone with little or no stake in an issue can often discuss it with far less emotion than someone with a lot of stake in it, precisely because of that differential. That doesn't mean the former party is more likely to be objective or make the right decision; the norm just acts as a filter for certain kinds of personality, or for the ability to make your feelings and preferences sound smart. If you look at similar discussions that have been going on recently in similar spaces (LW is not alone here; the SF and atheist subcultures have been in the middle of a similar round of topical debate), things are noisier, and often a great deal more vitriolic -- but I'm not sure what's been gained here, that isn't being gained in those places. I don't think LW as a community has generated any special insights here.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 11 September 2012 06:01:35PM 1 point [-]

I think that change is a long process. It's probably not yet possible to see whether the more overt conflict in other venues pays off better than the more polite style at LW, or vice versa.

Also, rationality might be a confounding factor. It's possible-- not guaranteed-- that the group norm of paying attention and updating will have good results, even if it's much slower for highly emotionally fraught issues than for procrastination.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 06:30:20PM *  5 points [-]

I think that change is a long process. It's probably not yet possible to see whether the more overt conflict in other venues pays off better than the more polite style at LW, or vice versa.

It's certainly perilous to make too much of an analogy, but when I look at the broader history of social justice movements (at least in the US), it's not obvious to me at all that keeping to a majority idea of polite gets much done. It's fashionable for white people who didn't live through, say, the black Civil Rights movement to talk about MLK vs Malcolm X, as polite vs confrontational (hell, that conception of them has become a mass media archetype -- see Professor X vs Magneto in the X-Men franchise, or virtually anything else that deals in discrimination against fantastics), forgetting how much confrontation King and his followers actually engaged in.

Comment author: Larks 11 September 2012 06:50:49PM 8 points [-]

it's not obvious to me at all that keeping to a majority idea of polite gets much done.

The idea of observing norms of behaviour isn't to "get things done", it's to reduce the damage when what you want is the wrong thing. I'd much prefer both my communists and my liberals be peaceful than both be violent. Yes, maybe it might be better if the good guys were confrontational and the bad guys meek; but for the good of the tribe, we should avoid killing for the sake of the tribe. You cannot run an algorithm "violate social norms when I'm right" - you can only run "violate social norms when I think I'm right".

Personal advances should constrained by social mores and individual rights so as to reduce damage when the subject doesn't appreciate them. Even if you're sure you're right you should still ask for premission; even if it were the case that not obeying social rules (e.g. being creepy) got more done.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 06:57:52PM 4 points [-]

Yeah, see, part of the problem here is that you appear to consider making noise a really good indicator of being willing to kill for the sake of the tribe.

Comment author: Larks 11 September 2012 07:41:39PM 3 points [-]

No (though it obveously constitutes at least weak bayesian evidence), that wasn't my point at all. My point was that the reason you should obey social norms in controversial situations applies in both cases.

Equally, "making noise" is to minimise that which I am objecting too. Talking politely, quietly, slowly, with a smile makes noise, but is normally fine. I do object to Malcolm X, though.

Comment author: Benja 12 September 2012 10:13:57AM 6 points [-]

Equally, "making noise" is to minimise that which I am objecting too. Talking politely, quietly, slowly, with a smile makes noise, but is normally fine. I do object to Malcolm X, though.

Yeah, see, the discussion you were replying to was about whether it would be useful to have confrontational or non-calm comments in discussions, one reason being that listening only to calm people might mean hearing only one side of the story, because it's easier to be calm if you have little to lose (because you're on the more powerful side), and another reason being that the truth may be confrontational, so hearing only non-confrontational comments may lead you to miss it.

In the comment you were originally replying to, Jandila was arguing that MLK tends to be cast as non-confrontational, vs. Malcolm X as confrontational, in young white people's discourse today, but that in fact MLK and his followers were quite confrontational. Thus, looking at history, non-calm confrontational speech seems like a reasonable tool if you want things to change something for the better, even if the people who would be the target of that confrontational speech misremember the actually-society-changing civil rights movement as being less confrontational than it was.

Both of your comments seem to consider only the extremes of "talk politely with a smile" and something in the space between black nationalism and actually killing people who disagree with you (I'm not sure what exactly you're objecting to in saying you "object to Malcolm X"). This seems unhelpful in a discussion about whether or not it would be useful to also have people participate in discussions who talk confrontationally with angry raised voices.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 12 September 2012 03:45:10PM *  6 points [-]

There's confrontation, and then there's confrontation. I see a difference between "We will make it emotionally and/or financially expensive for you to not change" and describing people as white devils. One sort of confrontation is based on the premise that people can change, and the other is based on the premise that they won't and/or can't.

Comment author: Larks 11 September 2012 06:44:36PM 5 points [-]

someone with little or no stake in an issue can often discuss it with far less emotion than someone with a lot of stake in it, precisely because of that differential. That doesn't mean the former party is more likely to be objective or make the right decision

Really? It seems that keeping yourself in system 2 mode would lead to better reasoning on such matters. Certainly I don't feel particularly rational when frothing at the screen and TYPING IN CAPS LOCK.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 06:56:15PM *  5 points [-]

Yeah, no. I've watched perfectly calm and reasonable-sounding people sincerely debate whether some group of other people (queer folks and disabled folks come to mind) have a right to exist that should not be overridden in favor of euthanasia to satisfy their own utility functions. I've watched this happen in the halls of supposedly respectable institutions while members of the group under discussion protested outside.

The people going "Hey, this is really fucked up that our right to exist can just be casually debated with or without us in a mainstream, powerful institution, and our not raising a fuss about that is apparently more important to people than the actual suggestion" weren't polite or unemotional, but they did seem to understand the situation for what it was a whole lot better than the folks inside. I'm not sure I want to be around people who can't perform that kind of sanity check on occasion.

Comment author: Larks 11 September 2012 07:33:32PM 1 point [-]

Sure, system 2 can make mistakes. Though it is not uncontroversial to classify all the instances you point to as mistakes - I'm thinking pro-abortion people, and Peter Singer.

But in any case, the question is whether it is in general more prone to them than system 1, a questions which requires data rather than anecdotes. However, I'm willing to bet the angels of our better nature show through more when we're thinking than when we're not.

Comment author: Yvain 11 September 2012 07:40:25PM *  3 points [-]

What's the alternative to rationally debating ideas that violate our moral sensibilities, assuming some people hold them?

Is it to declare with 100% certainty that any idea that violates our moral sensibilities is false? Is it to say that maybe there's a small chance that ideas violating our moral sensibilities are true, but even so we must never discuss them so if they're true we're out of luck and will never reach that true belief? Is it to say we may discuss them, but not rationally - that is, we must let the screaming protesters into the debate so that they can throw eggs and mud onto the debaters because that will improve the quality of discourse?

Also, I bet (and correct me if I'm wrong) that whatever debate you've watched was not about "Let's round up the [Other Folk] and execute them." My guess is it was either about allowing them voluntary euthanasia, allowing abortion or infanticide on the part of their parents, or ceasing to specifically allocate scarce health resources to them.

That means that what we're really talking about is "Any idea that can be massaged into sounding like an idea that violates our moral sensibilities is 100% certainly wrong, or should never be discussed, or needs more egg-throwing."

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 08:00:21PM *  6 points [-]

What's the alternative to rationally debating ideas that violate our moral sensibilities, assuming some people hold them?

When inviting a guest speaker for an honorarium to hold forth in front of an audience on a subject that affects few or none of them directly, and just giving them that platform without any semblance of discourse apart from taking questions at the end...yeah, I'm gonna say "Rationally debating ideas that violate our moral sensibilities" is not what was going on. Doubly so since in many cases those ideas actually affirm the moral sensibilities of some fair portion of the population.

Also, I bet (and correct me if I'm wrong) that whatever debate you've watched was not about "Let's round up the [Other Folk] and execute them." My guess is it was either about allowing them voluntary euthanasia, allowing abortion or infanticide on the part of their parents, or ceasing to specifically allocate scarce health resources to them.

Yeah, you're wrong -- we're talking about folks who honestly and straightforwardly suggested it was an ethical good to terminate the lives of these people which they felt either had no value (usually through "gentle" methods of euthanasia, and I do not mean voluntarily applied), or had such small value in comparison to their suffering that it was worth it. This is not hyperbole -- though I find it interesting you found the idea so difficult to believe straight up that your interpretation must be that I'm just flipping my lid over a loose patternmatch and couldn't have possibly understood that right. It suggests you think it doesn't happen often enough for rational people to be concerned about.

That means that what we're really talking about is "Any idea that can be massaged into sounding like an idea that violates our moral sensibilities is 100% certainly wrong, or should never be discussed, or needs more egg-throwing."

No, you're not listening to what I'm actually saying, you're just assuming from the get-go that I'm a screaming mindless chimp flinging feces because The Bad Thing Is Bad.

Comment author: Yvain 11 September 2012 08:22:18PM *  11 points [-]

You're right, I apologize.

(although to be fair, you did say you watched "calm and reasonable people sincerely debate this" and that people were objecting to it being "casually debated", so I don't think it was my fault for assuming it was a debate rather than one person going on about it unopposed.)

Now I'm very curious what exactly was going on, although I understand if you don't want to look like you're pointing fingers at specific people.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 09:11:19PM 6 points [-]

Upvoted for owning up to it.

(although to be fair, you did say you watched "calm and reasonable people sincerely debate this" and that people were objecting to it being "casually debated", so I don't think it was my fault for assuming it was a debate rather than one person going on about it unopposed.)

Yah, I'm not being very clear with that, though it's at least partly because I'm just generally underslept and sick, and have been for a couple of months now, so it's hard to "say what I mean" rather than "verbalize something that's more on-target for what I mean, than not." (Gotta love autie language brain...)

Some of what I'm referring to is just conferences, symposia, guest speaker talks or, yes, actual debates, usually hosted at an academic institution that I or someone I knew was attending. I was particularly uninclined to take anybody's word for much of anything at the time, and insisted on looking into it a bit myself before really trying to interpret what they were upset about .

Some of it is just random discussions with other people over the years, both on and off of LW.

Comment author: MixedNuts 12 September 2012 02:22:07PM 5 points [-]

Wait. You've heard people proposing to gently euthanize queers? Can you say in what country and decade, if you don't want to give too much information? I can't see the mercy-killing crowd going against queers, nor the gay-murdering crowd preferring gentle methods to hanging.

I'm also surprised people are still openly supporting involuntary euthanasia after WW2. Forced sterilization isn't even done on whole groups anymore since the seventies.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 11:46:38PM 1 point [-]

Are you familiar with Not Dead Yet?

Comment author: Douglas_Reay 09 September 2012 10:07:26AM 11 points [-]

What topics (if any) have you considered posting about (or replying to), but then decided not to because of fear of gender-specific negative response or attention? If there any specific question you'd be interested in participating in a future discussion upon, on the same anonymous lines as this one?

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 12:02:03PM 10 points [-]

I'd be interested in knowing more generally how many people refrain to post or reply about potentially mind-killing topics in general because they (think they) are in a group underrepresented on Less Wrong (e.g. conservatives or theists).

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 04:12:18PM 4 points [-]

I'm neither a conservative nor a theist, but I often feel rather underrepresented here. I tend to refrain from posting, period, because of the general sense of how that goes; I usually go through a bit of a cycle where I won't post at all for a while, then find some random, pretty neutral thing I feel prepared to comment on intelligibly, then get drawn into whatever userbase-splitting argument is going on recently after it's been a while (this part mostly happens if I've been low on spoons, am feeling irate, or just generally am not feeling much impulse control at the time).

Part of this is just that I'm not very good at arguing-as-a-skill; I've noticed that even when correct I'm fairly easy to outmaneuver because that particular approach to language is fairly alien to me (probably to do with some of the neurological blah).

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 05:16:55PM 2 points [-]

Ditto.

And then certain types of misogyny or other dumbassery will end up making me rage-quit for a month or two, where I just no longer feel any desire whatsoever to participate, beyond maybe a media post.

Comment author: Alicorn 09 September 2012 05:53:35PM 4 points [-]

I post less to PUA/genderthings type threads than my naive inclination would be. Part of this is the (good thing) that there are some people around who sometimes find these threads before I do who I trust to say sane things, many of whom are better at keeping their cool than I am. Part of this is the (bad thing) that I expect to be attacked when I do post, via generalization or just insensitive badgering (and also by voting).

While in such threads, I make a general policy of withholding some relevant personal information, even when I think it could make me more convincing, because I don't want to paint more of a target on myself, or risk the greater emotional fallout of even that not being persuasive.

Comment author: lucidian 10 September 2012 03:34:24AM 3 points [-]

I don't think I've ever feared a gender-specific negative response when posting on LessWrong, though I also deliberately use a gender-neutral username.

Comment author: Sarokrae 10 September 2012 01:07:52PM 13 points [-]

I post more in PUA and gender type threads than I otherwise would because I worry about the male response to this question. Also, I find people are more receptive to my statement of pro-PUA points because I can include female-centric anecdotal evidence, and I have a feeling that men talking about PUA and gender differences is a massive ugh field.

I would love to be proven wrong about this, if guys want to answer this question.

Comment author: Kawoomba 09 September 2012 10:20:58AM 6 points [-]

Do you find the LW males - those for whom you feel you have a reasonably good model - on average to be more openly status-oriented, competitive and aggressive concerning their rationality expertise, compared to your female LW acquaintances?

Comment author: maia 09 September 2012 11:12:03AM 6 points [-]

I don't have any female LW acquaintances.*

*who I interact with regularly enough to answer this question.

Comment author: palladias 09 September 2012 01:00:31PM 3 points [-]

Ditto.

Comment author: Rubix 10 September 2012 02:51:40AM 7 points [-]

No, but I think my female LW acquaintances might as individuals object more to being described as "status-oriented, competitive and aggressive concerning their rationality" than my male LW acquaintances.

Comment author: lucidian 10 September 2012 03:48:01AM 4 points [-]

Datapoint: I'm female, and I'm paranoid about becoming status-oriented and competitive, so I try to cull any behaviors in myself that I'd classify as "showing off". I feel like I brag too much and worry constantly about being or becoming arrogant.

Comment author: Rubix 11 September 2012 12:02:41AM *  5 points [-]

I notice about equal proportions of my male and female acquaintances/friends showing this kind of fear of being seen as showing off. It seems like it's perceived as a much more attractive trait in women, so people create two categories to describe it: shy, insecure, awkward girls, and beta, submissive, loser men. [Note that I think this kind of behavior is perceived as a subset of beta-malehood, not the whole thing.]

My shot-in-the-dark theory is that men nearly always prefer to be described as aggressive, competitive, forward &etc, while for women there are serious tradeoffs in being perceived as such. I have an intuition that's not generally explicit that acting shy, nerdy and awkward is the best default behavior for me, and acting assertive and making strange claims is best for when I can reasonably expect to get away with it. So this intuition seems to categorize Spock Rationality as belonging in the first category (kind of like how hot girls memetically do countersignalling by saying they play video games) and actual rationality as belonging in the second.

I also notice that nearly everyone I know who's referred to themselves as shy, awkward, or insecure behaves, well, not shy once you get to know them; this suggests that my intuition is pretty widespread. When it's written out like this it's an obvious simple utility calculation - which action will result in me winning most often if I take it every time in situations like these? - but I don't have a good model of what the standard male version of this utility calculation is.

Comment author: lucidian 11 September 2012 02:36:30AM *  9 points [-]

This is fascinating. I agree that it's safer for a girl to act shy, awkward, and insecure, especially when first meeting people, and that agressive, competitive behavior is frowned upon. However, I feel like there's a happy medium between these two poles. Is it possible for a girl to be confident, forthright, and assertive, while remaining respectful and cooperative? That is the ideal towards which I strive.

Actually, I'm quite meta-self-conscious about my lack of self-consciousness. I'm neither shy nor insecure, and I worry that I'm violating some unspoken social rule of girlhood with my excessive self-esteem. For instance, I've had multiple exchanges of the following variety with male friends:

Him: You're very pretty.

Me: Thank you.

Him: What? You're not going to argue with me? But all girls deny that they're pretty.

I refuse to submit myself to this cultural meme of denying that I'm pretty. First of all, when a guy says "you're very pretty", I interpret it to mean "I find you very pretty", and who am I to argue with his perceptions? Secondly, many of my male friends have complimented my appearance, and I'm too much of an empiricist to deny that I'm pretty in light of so much evidence to the contrary. Lastly, were I to deny my prettiness, I would be subjected to a long stream of compliments, all of which I'd have to refuse. "I'm not pretty." "Yes you are. You have such nice <X>." "No I don't." "You do, and your <Y> is beautiful too." I despise this kind of feelgoodism and refuse to fish for compliments.

Compared to... well, all the girls I know IRL, I guess... I have excessively high self-esteem. I used to read Roissy regularly, which made me terrified that my confidence was unwarranted and I would never find a mate on account of it. After realizing how much that blog had affected my behaviors, I stopped reading it, but still I worry that my confidence is offputting to potential friends and mates.

When it comes down to it, though, I'll keep my self-confidence. I strive to base my self-esteem on purely internal measurements like the progress I've made towards my goals, not on external measurements like what my friends think. I don't want to rely on their validation for my self-worth, and I don't want to be crushed by rejection when it occurs. I don't want to put my self-esteem at the mercy of society's judgments. And that's why I refuse to play this insecurity game that society has thrust upon girls. If people dislike me and potential mates me reject me on account of this, so be it; my self-esteem doesn't rest on their acceptance or rejection anyway.

Comment author: Rubix 11 September 2012 03:11:07AM *  6 points [-]

I agree with almost all of what you've said here, except for the idea that taking the middle way is correct in this instance.

Also, let it be stated in advance that anything I say about my behavior patterns, social strategies and so forth is noticed in hindsight. I am not actually a Machiavellian mastermind who plots every interaction to maximize for making you all my slaves. (Of course I am telling you the truth. I am your friend. )

My favorite approach to social tactics is taking the Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres route: I perceive that people are generally trying to box me into a social role, namely self-consciousness, and it feels from the inside like my options are to allow this and be shy and uncomfortable, or rebel against it and be angry and uncooperative. Usually noticing those two choices causes me to pick the first, then the second in frustration, then the first because I want to be conciliatory, &etc.

Or... I can weird their paradigm. I can do this in many ways, but there are two I seem to choose most:

  1. Vacillating confusingly between acting shy, uncomfortable, innocent, stupid and generically cute, and acting energetic, forward, eccentric and Michael_Vassar-ish. Note that when doing this I don't necessarily take hits to my well-being or attack that of others, because when performed ideally both social roles feel like fun games. This can be described as going the fae route and is only suitable for use in the short term and preferably in settings with several other people, because otherwise it's just glorified gaslighting unless I know exactly what I'm doing.

  2. Making goddamn everything explicit. If I don't like a thing, I say, calmly, pleasantly, that I don't, and offer solutions or ask the other person to help me come up with solutions. If I like a thing, I say I like it. This doesn't mean telling everyone about all of my thoughts, but it does mean not stewing on a discomfort or distress, and trying to never subtly intimate things about my mental state.

My problem is that I'm too meta. Making the issue about my personal self-esteem leads me into a terrifying infinite conceptual loop of pleasure and displeasure with my characteristics. Noticing these characteristics and how I can best use them is much simpler for me - the issue of a self-worth feels like a wrong question when there are results to be got. This doesn't mean that I think women and girls with low self-worth are being Insufficiently Meta and therefore deserve what they get; it means that the issue of what happens in their minds is totally separate from that which happens in my own.

I notice in hindsight that this comment might read like one big essay about one-upmanship (against you and your philosophy.) It's not meant that way; the thing that happened is I noticed myself accepting your statements unquestioningly after reading them and not replying, and felt the need to fix that.

Comment author: Sarokrae 11 September 2012 01:02:23PM *  3 points [-]

I used to read Roissy regularly

I hope you eventually found the Game blogs where women are people too!

I tend to find that confidence is fine if you can consciously signal "you are higher status than me, I respect you, I won't upset your authority and hey look how mysterious and pursuable I am. Also I'm not at all annoying", which is a large part of what being shy is good for. If you can game their System 1, then confidence is better than shyness for properly engaging with the actual person.

Comment author: coffeespoons 11 September 2012 04:27:25PM 2 points [-]

I'd be interseted in Game blog recommendations. I'm trying to put a bit of time into researching it.

Comment author: Zaine 12 September 2012 02:49:16AM 1 point [-]

I have a pet theory that humans are attracted to generally autonomous behaviour, about which I'm no longer confident, but think is a cool theory anyway.

Autonomy is also in some ways dependent upon confidence.

I share this as I thought it would be a useful data-point to use in alleviating your self-consciousness self-consciousness.

Comment author: wedrifid 09 September 2012 10:23:25AM 3 points [-]

Do you like being treated as a celebrity in threads like this because you have boobs or would you prefer if people stopped obsessing over what sex you are?

Comment author: coffeespoons 09 September 2012 10:36:47AM *  2 points [-]

Is this comment intended as snark?

Comment author: wedrifid 09 September 2012 10:44:46AM *  5 points [-]

It is a sincere question. And I suspect I'd actually respect either an answer that the emphasis on sex and gender drama is tiresome or that the extra attention is flattering and empowering.

EDIT: The edit to the parent changed the meaning of my response. I'm glad I looked back. I should have quoted.

Comment author: coffeespoons 09 September 2012 11:17:51AM *  2 points [-]

To be clear, before editing my question was:

Is this comment intended as snark or is it a genuine question?

Sorry. I thought I edited it quickly enough that you would only see the edited question :). I certainly edited it before I saw your reply.

Comment author: wedrifid 09 September 2012 11:19:39AM 3 points [-]

I certainly edited it, before I saw your reply.

Understood, I realize making the meaning of my reply too highly dependent on unquoted context makes the meaning my comments fragile. I'm surprised I forgot to quote, actually.

Comment author: coffeespoons 09 September 2012 11:27:42AM 1 point [-]

Would the answer to your question influence whether you see this call for narratives as being useful or not?

Comment author: wedrifid 09 September 2012 12:27:17PM 1 point [-]

Would the answer to your question influence whether you see this call for narratives as being useful or not?

It would have some influence. And I'm curious about such things.

Comment author: AspiringRationalist 10 September 2012 10:02:19PM 5 points [-]

The wording of the question is problematic, because (a) it sounds snarky, and (b) it is trying to produce a specific answer. See, for example:

It's not really flattering (or, as Captain Hook would say "I want no such compliments!"). Being sexually harassed is not empowering, and trying to troubleshoot it isn't invigorating, it's just useful.

Please try to use a more neutral tone when asking questions. It will yield more (epistemically) useful answers.

Comment author: [deleted] 10 September 2012 11:00:19PM 1 point [-]

I also was offended both by the wording of the question, and by the "here are the answers that I would respect" follow-up.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 04:27:10PM 0 points [-]

It feels like not but trolling.

Comment author: palladias 09 September 2012 01:15:52PM 7 points [-]

It's not really flattering (or, as Captain Hook would say "I want no such compliments!"). Being sexually harassed is not empowering, and trying to troubleshoot it isn't invigorating, it's just useful. I'm glad to help people avoid pattern matching to behaviors that look like threats/seem condescending/just aren't fun, and I think it's appropriate to spend a little time discussing them.

I wouldn't want this topic to keep seeding new threads the way the Endless September discussion did, but I don't think starting the discussion dooms us to that fate. And if you're worried about that threat, start another quite interesting thread on a different topic.

Comment author: Vaniver 09 September 2012 05:40:27PM *  7 points [-]

(For those not familiar with the reference, it's a fun one.)

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 09 September 2012 02:42:19PM 6 points [-]

Why do you think those are the only alternatives? Or an especially interesting pair of alternatives?

I've assumed that daenerys gets karma and attention (at a fairly ordinary level) because they're a good poster about difficult topics.

Comment author: wedrifid 09 September 2012 02:59:33PM 8 points [-]

I've assumed that daenerys gets karma and attention (at a fairly ordinary level) because they're a good poster about difficult topics.

I had understood the questions to be abstract and anonymised, not to daenerys.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 09 September 2012 03:21:34PM 4 points [-]

Fair point about the question being more general than I took it to be.

However, that makes it seem even weirder to me. Would you care to write about why you chose those alternatives?

Comment author: DanArmak 09 September 2012 04:09:45PM 7 points [-]

I suggest availability bias because they are the two extremes of a simple spectrum of "pay no attention to women's sex... pay lots of attention to women's sex". It feels natural to think in these terms, even when I'm aware that actual behavior mostly lies between the two extremes, varies a lot for the same person, etc.

Comment author: lucidian 10 September 2012 03:56:50AM 6 points [-]

Some of each. I like attention, and bringing up my gender is a great way to get attention, because many people are interested in the rare female perspective on various LW topics. (It seems, though, that the attention I seek and receive on LW regarding gender is unrelated to my boobs.) When I don't want gender-related attention, I simply don't mention my gender; having a gender-neutral username is nice. Sometimes I like participating in discussions about gender/PUA/etc. without revealing that I'm female.

Comment author: Caspian 09 September 2012 10:27:08AM 12 points [-]

Can you describe some occasions when a man was creepy towards you at a social event, lesswrong-related or otherwise?

Comment author: Alicorn 09 September 2012 05:48:17PM *  20 points [-]

At a subculturey party, I made friends with a girl, and when I had to leave I went to say goodbye to her and ask her for a hug. She was talking to someone else who I didn't know at all, and after I hugged her, he went for a hug too. He was too close for me to think of a way to evade him beyond the overtly dramatic "ducking and dodging", so, what the heck, it was just a hug. But then instead of just hugging me he did a weird thing where he alternated the relative position of our heads a couple times. Then he kissed me on the cheek.

I still didn't know this guy at all, so, maybe that was a weird cultural thing or something, but I said "I was not comfortable with that, you shouldn't do that". Still could have been an innocent misreading, if he'd let me go and said "sorry" that would have been the end of it, but instead he said, "Well, I'll probably never have the chance to do it again, so that works out" - which made it Decidedly Sketchy and not-OK; kissing people who don't want to be kissed is not ever a case of things working out, trying to laugh off someone's discomfort is not cool, and the fact that he said this anyway cast all of the things he'd already done that were sketchy in a retroactively worse light.

(This is by far the sketchiest thing that has ever happened to me at a subculturey meatspace event, to be fair. Next closest thing was when I had to verbally signal the end of a hug and the guy let go instantly and apologized, and that's the only other thing I can think of.)

Comment author: juliawise 10 September 2012 01:48:15PM 0 points [-]

The face-side-switching kiss sounds like how women in parts of Europe often greet each other, but for a strange man to do it is definitely weird (especially given his vile response afterwards).

Comment author: Emile 10 September 2012 03:18:39PM *  12 points [-]

Not that weird; Frenchmen will usually greet women by kissing them on both cheeks, though we usually know that Americans are prudes and don't like that (also, we do it when saying hello, not goodbye).

(I agree that the ensuing behavior definitly puts this in "sketchy" territory)

Comment author: AspiringRationalist 11 September 2012 03:59:33AM 4 points [-]

I (male) felt similarly weirded out when a European woman greeted me this way (I was also unaware of the custom at the time). What you mentioned in the first paragraph is mostly culture shock thing, though what you mention in the second paragraph is characteristically male sketchiness.

Comment author: Alicorn 11 September 2012 04:46:40AM *  2 points [-]

I should point out that I do not know this guy to actually be European or anything. It happened in America, I did not detect an obvious accent when he spoke (though the environment was noisy), and when I later learned his name it didn't sound foreign.

Comment author: MatthewBaker 11 September 2012 09:17:01AM 0 points [-]

This made me 100x happier about our first interaction at the Irvine meetup with Yvain and co... Fanfiction chatting cooler than all other types of chattery :)

Comment author: juliawise 10 September 2012 01:45:38PM 29 points [-]

Unfortunately, this one illustrates that there isn't a hard-and-fast creepy definition. I was at a party, and a man was there who had been showing social but not physical interest in me was there. I was sitting on an empty sofa and he sat down right next to me so our sides were touching, which I found creepy.

But later in the evening a higher-status and more attractive man did basically the same, and I was pleased rather than creeped out. So the creepiness of an action depends on how much I like the person who does it.

Ironically, I'm now friends with the first man (who no longer hits on me) and not with the second (who has probably forgotten I exist.)

Comment author: Dreaded_Anomaly 10 September 2012 05:53:04PM 10 points [-]

So the creepiness of an action depends on how much I like the person who does it.

I think this is a very important sentence. It illustrates how typical, colloquial usage of the word "creepy" can run afoul of the fundamental attribution error.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 11 September 2012 06:42:03AM 25 points [-]

I don't think that sentence can be successfully said outside LW, but not because of the FAE, more like the Just-World Fallacy and Appeal to Consequences. It would go something like this:

1) In a just world, behavior standards would not vary for men by status or attractiveness (because in a just world they would all have equal status and attractiveness, or women would not be moved by status or attractiveness).

2) Therefore, unhappiness-avoiding behavior standards should not vary by status or attractiveness (contrary to the actual fact that in an unjust world, some things will make (some) women feel uncomfortable/unhappy only if the man's attractiveness/status is below a (varying) particular level).

3) Therefore, a woman who admits that behavior X would not make her feel creepy if a sufficiently more attractive man did it, is being unfair to lower-status men, is wrong to label the behavior "creepy", cannot justly blame the lower-status man for doing what would be okay for a higher-status man to do, is just being shallow, is applying a double standard, etc.

4) It's impossible to have an explicit social standard for men which says, "If you think you're in the upper 20% of attractiveness you can sit down next to a woman touching her, otherwise this will make her feel creepy and you should avoid doing so." This rule would not be optimal/justified in a just world, so it must not be allowed in this one either.

5) Thus if we admit that whether sitting down touching someone is "creepy" depends on how attractive they are, it will be impossible to prevent men from doing things that make women feel creeped out, or for women to be listened-to when they object, in which case women will feel creeped out, which is bad.

6) By appeal to consequences, it must not be true that a woman's sense of creeped-out-ness can vary with a male's attractiveness or status.

The typical resolution of a situation like this, I think, is that you have an explicit standard which says "You can't hug people without asking", but there will be an unspoken selective lack of prosecution (like how cops don't get traffic tickets and white people don't go to jail for drug crimes) when an attractive man engages in the behavior.

Comment author: thomblake 12 September 2012 01:30:54PM 3 points [-]

The typical resolution of a situation like this, I think, is that you have an explicit standard which says "You can't hug people without asking", but there will be an unspoken selective lack of prosecution (like how cops don't get traffic tickets and white people don't go to jail for drug crimes) when an attractive man engages in the behavior.

Yes, typical human hypocrisy. Not problematic for the average joe.

Comment author: [deleted] 10 September 2012 08:25:42PM *  16 points [-]

I have never felt creeped at a LessWrong event. There are other problems arising from social awkwardness, though. Here's an example:

A fellow LWer and I were discussing a mutual LW passing acquaintance. I mentioned that I had read him as cold and aloof. He didn't really respond any time I had tried to engage with him. My friend responded that his read had been that he was a warm, but shy person. Further discussion led us to the realization that because this person was attractive, well-dressed, carried himself well, and elsewise high-status, I was interpreting certain responses (monosyllabic answers, not really looking at me, or engaging with me, etc) differently.

If I was trying to engage with a person who presented as being more socially awkward, and they gave the exact same responses then I would have read that as being signs that they were shy and/or I was intimidating them. I would have adjusted, raised my patience level, and try to draw them into a one-on-one conversation. However, because this particular person managed to give off a superficial appearance of being socially skilled, I read the same responses as being aloof, cold, and dismissive. (which is what they would be, coming from a socially skilled person)


A sub-culture I have occasionally felt creeped out in, is swing dancing. I love swing and blues dancing, and will happily dance in a sensual manner, even with people I've never met before, am not at all attracted to, etc, as long as a) they are skilled dancers, and b) they aren't giving off "creepy" vibes. These are correlated, as most leads who have stuck around long enough to be skilled, have also figured out how to be not creepy.

A counter-example of a skilled dancer being creepy: An older male, who I used to enjoy dancing with, once came to a dance a little drunk, and was much more forceful during the dance with pulling me close (it's hard to explain the difference between good-lead-pulling-close, and creepy-forceful-lead-pulling close. ETA- A good explanation is that it is a "demand" rather than a "request"), and such. Now I don't even much like dancing him when he's sober any more.

Another problem is creepy new leads. They see the sensual dancing, and so think they can lead it. This is not okay. Intro classes are offered before every event, and they teach how to do the basic dances. Open position. Closed position. NOT full contact. A non-experienced, new dancer trying to pull me close, etc is NOT GOOD. Most new leads know better, and if anything are a little too shy (tend towards open position only, when closed position is perfectly acceptable).

My ad hoc explanation for this, is that you have to "earn" the more sensual dance moves by putting in your time enough to show that it is about the DANCE, and is NOT about skeeving on me. A guy who shows up to his first or second swing event, and tries to pull me close is communicating that he is more interested in skeeving on girls, than on actually learning to dance.

As an aside, I actually did get the same sort of tensed-up-omg-omg reaction that usually accompanies "creep" behavior, my very first time swing dancing. But I recognized it as a reaction to the fact that random guys where touching me, and in my personal space, in a way I wasn't used to. I realized that it was not AT ALL the fault of the really nice leads who were dancing with the new girl, and completely my own reaction to a physical situation that in my usual circumstances would be weird. I'm sure it didn't help that my first time at a swing event was because I just happened to be where at the location a late-night (post swing dance event that tends towards the more sensual dancing) was, when they showed up.

Comment author: khafra 12 September 2012 01:32:35PM 6 points [-]

This confirms every fear about the convoluted and thin line between being stiffly and unnaturally standoffish and creepy that's ever kept me from going to a dance class. I'm quite positive I would spend the first few classes being told to just loosen up a little, to not be afraid of my dance partner, finally try really hard to do that--and forever earn a reputation as a creep.

Please don't read this as a rebuke or admonishment; I'm actually glad to know that my fears were well-founded; and learning to dance isn't really that important to me.

Comment author: Alicorn 12 September 2012 03:53:55PM 1 point [-]

Well, you could try learning as a follow to start with, and get a sense of how leads act. This might be awkward if you're really tall, though, and would make it slightly more complicated to invite people to dance.

Comment author: [deleted] 12 September 2012 04:47:14PM 2 points [-]

It's really not that hard. I did not mean to make it sound complicated. Basically, any thing they teach you in the dance class is fine. If you see people blues dancing or something, don't attempt to copy their dance moves with a random follow during a random song. Don't get drunk.

That's pretty much all it takes.

Comment author: Caspian 09 September 2012 10:28:14AM 12 points [-]

Can you describe some occasions when a woman was creepy towards you at a social event, lesswrong-related or otherwise?

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 08:38:29PM *  6 points [-]

The following is my personal experience only, and does not negate the feelings and opinions of those with different experiences.

I have almost never felt creeped out by a female. Even if they are overly huggy or complimenty, it tends to lack the predatory or aggressive/disrespective vibe that makes me feel creeped. Or rather, it doesn't cause in me a reaction of feeling predated. At worst, I feel mildly uncertain.

I can only think of one time when I ever felt creeped out by a woman. It was a couple years ago, so my recollection is not the best, but to the best I recall: We had only been talking for about a minute or two, when out of nowhere she says something along the lines of "So, are you interested in women?" It was ugh-y.

As a straight-leaning female myself, who's good at social cues, I do get to be more huggy and complimenty with people, without having a significant chance that I am going to creep anyone out.

I do think I might have once mildly creeped a fellow LWer though. We had recently met for rationality camp, and she made a comment that I had read as being insecure about her appearance. My reply was along the lines of "Seriously, when I first saw you I thought 'Oh wow, she is so pretty!'" and then complimented her. Later I found out that I might have misread her first comment (not certain if I actually did or not, but realized later that there was a possible alternate interpretation to what she said), which would have made me all of a sudden complimenting her looks to be a weird and creepy thing. But I'm pretty sure that IF I did misread the comment, that she realized the miscommunication, and was just too polite to say. (So in other words, her response was "Oh, she thought I meant X and is trying to make me feel better. Well I don't want to hurt her feelings by saying she misunderstood" which is significantly better than "Oh my god, why is this random person all of a sudden complimenting my looks?!?")

ETA- At the time of this incident, I actually was dating a female, which is a factor that could push the interaction from "awkward" to "creepy".

That's the only time I can recall making a "creepy" faux pas, and realizing it.

Comment author: juliawise 10 September 2012 12:58:22AM 14 points [-]

This almost never happens to me. I can only think of one example, which was mostly obnoxious and only mildly creepy. I went to a party where there was only one other woman present. She was strangely warm with me and asked me lots of personal questions. When I got up, but was still well within earshot, she started asking my husband the same questions about me ("where did you two meet?") He said, "You just asked Julia those questions. You already know the answers." She said she was interested to hear the differences, but it felt like she was trying to catch us in some kind of deception. Then she drank my beer.

Comment author: CronoDAS 10 September 2012 11:26:01PM 2 points [-]

Then she drank my beer.

O_O

Comment author: gwern 11 September 2012 01:02:55AM 4 points [-]

At least it wasn't her milkshake?

Comment author: Sarokrae 11 September 2012 04:58:28AM 6 points [-]

I haven't ever felt a woman was creepy. Creepy essentially translates to unwanted (perceived) sexual advances, and, now I'm going to sound super-creepy myself, but I've never /not/ wanted a woman to come on to me. Like, obviously I don't think about it all the time, but it's always a welcome surprise if it happens. I don't have any exceedingly unattractive female acquaintances though.

I would imagine this would be different if I was straight. An example of creepy female-female interaction would be the way Amy often acts towards Penny on TBBT.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 12 September 2012 03:51:30PM *  7 points [-]

At a science fiction convention, there was a question about enough car space to get a party to a restaurant, and a woman kept saying that I could sit on her lap.

At a later convention, she upgraded a hug (I can't remember how consensual the hug was) to a kiss, and I threw her out of my life.

Marginally creepy but much less serious for me-- an older woman who would keep touching my hair (more dramatically curly at the time). The experience was more weird/dissociated for me than upsetting, so I didn't do anything about it. I actually didn't even think of it as possibly part of a larger social pattern until I read many accounts by black people of white people insisting on touching their hair.

Comment author: Caspian 09 September 2012 10:31:38AM 15 points [-]

Can you describe some occasions you met a new male friend (who you didn't previously know) at a social event, lesswrong-related or otherwise, and how it wasn't creepy, and what was fun/interesting/good about it.

Comment author: palladias 09 September 2012 01:06:36PM 20 points [-]

This is a gender-neutral example, but one of the best ways to forestall stress/creepiness when meeting new people was pretty well summed up by a PUA. He suggested setting up a time by which your conversation has to end when you start it. ("Oh, I want to make the next bus, but I've got five min"). One thing that is stressful about being approached by someone you don't know, especially if they seem a little off is having to simultaneously carry on a conversation and try to plan an exit. If you set up an exit when you approach and precommit ending the conversation then (unless you both are in the middle of something quite interesting) it's easier to just be present for the conversation.

Comment author: Alicorn 09 September 2012 05:43:10PM 8 points [-]

I meet most people on the Internet or by their having swung through my house while I was in more of a group living situation, but awhile ago I visited a minicamp and met a bunch of people, some of whom I hadn't known before. I'll use Andrew Critch as an example. I'd been hearing for a while from Anna that he wanted to meet me and kept missing me. (This was relevant for two reasons: a) he was not making meeting me his life's mission or he could have done it much sooner, b) Anna seemed to like him and think we should talk). We had a conversation about miscellaneous topics ranging from the tree we were sitting under to his school stuff. I inquired about his schedule and dietary preferences so I'd know when to invite him to a dinner party. Eventually it got dark out where we were and we were being bitten by mosquitoes, so we went inside and dispersed - we both had other people to talk to.

Comment author: juliawise 10 September 2012 01:04:34AM 12 points [-]

When I first went vegetarian as a teenager, most other teenagers' reactions were along the lines of "Oh, that's nice" or "I love to eat animals! They're delicious! I'm going to eat a hamburger right in front of you! Ha!" A friend introduced me to her boyfriend, and my vegetarianism came up. He immediately asked, "What do you do for protein, eat a lot of peanut butter?" I remember being impressed that even though he had no interest in being vegetarian himself, he could think from my perspective and notice a practical implication of my choice without passing judgement on it.

Comment author: Caspian 09 September 2012 10:31:51AM 8 points [-]

Can you describe some occasions you met a new female friend (who you didn't previously know) at a social event, lesswrong-related or otherwise, and how it wasn't creepy, and what was fun/interesting/good about it.

Comment author: Alicorn 09 September 2012 06:00:04PM 7 points [-]

I met some really neat girls by visiting the minicamps. They were friendly and most of them liked Luminosity. They were pretty huggy, but didn't make a big deal about it (didn't hold on too long or tense up strangely). (One of them wanted my autograph.) Despite the fact that I am Internet Famous and whatnot, they all clearly had other things to do too and could talk about other topics besides that, which was relevant; I was able to freely circulate through the parties/groups/whatever arrangement people wanted to be in and steer conversations around as easily as I can with people who I already know well.

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 09 September 2012 12:23:13PM 6 points [-]

What proposition affirmed in The Sequences do you find least probable?

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 09 September 2012 12:40:23PM 3 points [-]

If men think more like economists than women, then what explains this difference?

Comment author: Zaine 12 September 2012 03:16:30AM 0 points [-]

In the brain females have more nerves (white matter), and males have more glia (grey matter); this doesn't mean much, though. Glia react to neurotransmitters, which means they may have processing capabilities as yet unknown; considering this and humans' neuroplasticity, nothing can be reasonably inferred from this distinction.

That's the only physiological difference of the cortex between sexes, as far as I'm aware.

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 12 September 2012 04:28:20AM *  2 points [-]

If you are correct, then brain physiology doesn't explain the difference. So then, what does?

I ask the question because I have a suspicion that whatever causes women to think less like economists than men also makes them less likely to join communities like Less Wrong. I, myself, do not have a good answer to this question. Furthermore, I suspect that until we do have a good answer to this question, our strategies for increasing the proportion of females on Less Wrong will be ineffective.

Comment author: Nick_Tarleton 12 September 2012 05:20:13AM *  1 point [-]

The only macroscopic physiological difference (as far as you're aware). This is not very informative; we wouldn't expect to know about the vast majority of possible differences.

Comment author: Sarokrae 09 September 2012 01:15:44PM 7 points [-]

What is your evaluation of your own introspection abilities? (More precisely, how often do you consider the motivations for your emotions, attitudes, tone of speech, etc, and are you successful.)

I'd also like to ask this to the men.

Comment author: Alicorn 09 September 2012 06:04:10PM *  3 points [-]

I am Luminosity Girl! Wheeeeee!

(Tone of speech in particular I don't think I have special control over.)

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 11:55:40PM 2 points [-]

I'd also like to ask this to the men.

Okay, then...

(More precisely, how often do you consider the motivations for your emotions, attitudes, tone of speech, etc,

Usually, several times per week.

and are you successful.)

I can seldom find good ways to test my introspection, so I don't know.

Comment author: J_Taylor 10 September 2012 01:37:25AM *  4 points [-]

are you successful

Measuring the success of introspection (as in epistemic success, as opposed to instrumental success) runs into a Wittgensteinian problem heavily. That is, it is ‘As if someone were to buy several copies of the morning paper to assure himself that what it said was true’.

Comment author: Sarokrae 10 September 2012 02:03:21AM *  0 points [-]

I usually measure my success by whether I can predict my system 1 responses to a situation ahead of time. The point is to model myself properly anyway.

Also, my OH can read me like a book. We mutually developed the me-trospection so we checked reads with each other.

Comment author: J_Taylor 10 September 2012 02:19:25AM 1 point [-]

We mutually developed the me-trospection so we checked reads with each other.

Could you please explain this sentence?

Comment author: Sarokrae 10 September 2012 03:00:34AM 2 points [-]

We learned to read my mind at the same time, so could tell if at least one of us was wrong, by differing. Also we're not the same person, so rationalising in different directions means we were rarely both the same kind of wrong.

Comment author: lucidian 10 September 2012 04:10:40AM 0 points [-]

I introspect almost constantly, and try to keep a detailed archive of my thought processes so I can trace how my beliefs and opinions have evolved over time. I've found introspection extremely effective, especially when I discuss the results of my introspection with various analytical friends.

Comment author: Athrelon 09 September 2012 02:02:25PM *  8 points [-]

Remembering Asch's conformity experiment:

What statement would you expect the majority of responders to say, that you disagree with?

Comment author: lucidian 10 September 2012 04:16:47AM 4 points [-]

"Death is a bad thing."

I find death aesthetically pleasing as part of the great circle of life, and I also feel that the earth is overpopulated enough as it is. I bring this topic up because it's been noted that females, even rational ones, are often opposed to cryonics. I'm female, and I'm opposed to cryonics.

Comment author: Alicorn 10 September 2012 04:32:53AM 1 point [-]

I also feel that the earth is overpopulated enough as it is

The standard reply to this is a reversal test. What's your reply to that?

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 10 September 2012 04:37:54AM *  6 points [-]

"Overpopulated" seems to already reply to the reversal test (i.e. yes, the population should be reduced). The reversal test might apply to a different claim that the current population is all right and shouldn't be increased further.

In the grandparent comment, the reversal test might apply to lifespan (the relation of lifespan to population is not completely straightforward if we control other parameters such as birth rate).

Comment author: Alicorn 10 September 2012 05:14:20AM 3 points [-]

I should have elaborated more. The reversal test I was thinking of was "if the problem is overpopulation and death's a good solution to it, should we be killing people?"

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 10 September 2012 05:22:52AM *  3 points [-]

Right. I was thinking of "death" as having status quo ("natural") death as the intended interpretation, which seems to exclude this possibility as stated, but allows a version where we prevent future attacks of status quo death by e.g. stopping all medical research (not just anti-aging research).

Comment author: jsteinhardt 10 September 2012 05:34:34AM 4 points [-]

Except that most people have a deontological objection to actually killing people, so even if lucidian didn't think we should be killing people, it wouldn't necessarily imply contradictory beliefs (or rather, the contradiction comes from contradictions in deontology, not anything related to cryonics).

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 11 September 2012 06:53:47AM 8 points [-]

It is fair to observe that when somebody claims that their utility function says one thing but their deontology prevents them from following up, that is at least suspicious for one or the other being not-fully-motivating, not-fully-thought-out, etc.

Comment author: jsteinhardt 11 September 2012 07:01:00AM 3 points [-]

I agree, but deontology is well-known to be a problematic but widely-held philosophy, which should explain away the observed inconsistency (e.g. desires could be consistent but deontology prevents the desires from being acted upon). I think that the proposed alternate test of asking about slowing down longevity research should reveal whether there is a further inconsistency within the desires themselves.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 01:52:24PM 1 point [-]

(e.g. desires could be consistent but deontology prevents the desires from being acted upon)

The question is why the deontological concerns are motivating. If they are motivating though a desire to fulfill deontological concern, then they belong in the utility function. And if not through desire, then how? An endorsed deontological principle might say 'X!' or 'Don't X', but why obey it? Deontological principles aren't obviously intrinsically motivating (in the way anything desired is).

Comment author: Zaine 12 September 2012 02:04:05AM *  1 point [-]

In this instance, I don't think the reversal test will establish much. I imagine that most who hold a belief similar to lucidian believe that there is a population homeostasis, or at least upper bound, which is determined by Earth's resources' ability to accommodate human existence.

If this homeostasis or upper bound is exceeded, either Earth's resources' ability to accommodate human existence must be improved, or humans must be killed. I imagine those I previously identified would favor the former.

The former could be achieved by ceasing pollution, disbanding mass cattle and feces pits, and investing in research investigating ways to remove airbourne methane as well reducing existing environmental damage. This route may prove more laborious than genocide or random en masse killings, but preferable nonetheless.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 03:47:56PM 2 points [-]

I wouldn't call myself "opposed" to cryonics (the concept of medical suspended animation strikes me as mostly a convenience if you can get it to work, and interesting for potential social implications), but I do tend to think it's overly-boosted here. After a thorough review of the actual work done by the major players in the field (a concise history of which reads like the script to a Coen Brothers movie), and looking over the biological x-factors involved vs the typical understanding of those x-factors here, I just don't find the case compelling. The idea's neat, but it seems like the cryo-boosters here are settling for a business/cultural model rife with consistent bad decisionmaking, built-in overconfidence (including in their messaging), a severe professionalism deficit, and not incidentally a long and sordid history of laziness, incompetence, and actual fraud.

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 09 September 2012 02:13:22PM 2 points [-]

Do men and women suffer from the same cognitive biases (and to the same extent)?

Comment author: Viliam_Bur 09 September 2012 03:47:01PM *  11 points [-]

Sorry.

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 09 September 2012 10:52:04PM *  5 points [-]

Forgiven.

Comment author: atorm 11 September 2012 07:17:25AM 4 points [-]

What's happening?

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 11 September 2012 08:03:00AM 3 points [-]

Move along; nothing to see here.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 12 September 2012 04:19:32AM 3 points [-]

Viliam said that this question would better be addressed as a survey and Jayson agreed, then they both deleted their comments for some reason.

Comment author: DanArmak 09 September 2012 04:15:32PM 10 points [-]

How aware are you of the gender or sexual orientation of other LW participants? Do you mentally assign a gender to each LW user whose comments you read, or who replies to you? Do you often get it wrong, and do you care when you do? Do you react differently based on the gender of other commenters? Does it differ from what you've experienced in other online communities?

Note: LW discussions where the gender of the participants is explicitly mentioned, or which are about gender themselves, don't count.

Comment author: Alicorn 09 September 2012 06:08:52PM 4 points [-]

I try not to form opinions about people's gender unless it seems indicated by something they say or their username, and I try not to actually pronoun anyone with a gendered pronoun unless I am pretty sure. (I think I've been mistaken once or twice even then.) To the best of my knowledge, apart from pronouns I don't handle posters differently based on gender except insofar as I have different priors on them having had various experiences.

Comment author: Sarokrae 09 September 2012 10:46:36PM *  5 points [-]

I'm the complete opposite to Alicorn, so I though I'd just pop in and say. I don't just keep track of gender, but also any other characteristics like age, occupation, nationality; personality etc. While I find it ok to just type like this on the internet, I find it much easier to actually communicate with people. Knowing these sorts of details help me interpret tone, which I think is a vital part of conversations, and the lack of respect for which often a source of internet conflict. I respond differently to aggression, for example, from high-testosterone males to females.

Having more accurate priors of the person I'm talking to also lets me decide if an argument is a lost cause, helps me choose between ambiguous interpretations, and assists me in making the most palatable presentation of my point.

Comment author: [deleted] 10 September 2012 12:08:28AM *  4 points [-]

I'm not a woman, but...

How aware are you of the gender or sexual orientation of other LW participants?

As for gender, I start with an about 90% prior probability (from the last survey results) that they are male, and update it according to what I read (most often the username alone is enough to bring the posterior to epsilon or 100% minus epsilon). As for orientation,I don't really care: I know EY is straight but he'd like to self-modify to become bi, and I think Alicorn is bi and lukeprog is straight but I'm not fully sure. That's it. I have read by comments by others mentioning their orientations but I can't even remember them.

Do you mentally assign a gender to each LW user whose comments you read, or who replies to you?

As in aliefs? Usually but not always. (And sometimes the alief is wrong. For example, there's a LWer who, despite having an obviously feminine username, comes across to my alief system as male (not sure why) and there's a Wikipedian (with an apparently feminine username, but he has explained that it's actually a Latin neuter plural and he's male) who comes across to my alief system as a female -- likely because of his username and because of the dingbats such as smileys, heartsuits and musical notes he uses to express his mood. I even called him 'she' by accident a couple times.)

Do you react differently based on the gender of other commenters?

I try not to. And in discussions which don't have anything to do with gender I think I almost always succeed.

Comment author: [deleted] 09 September 2012 09:33:42PM 3 points [-]

What do you think the LW community does right? What good experiences have you had?

Comment author: juliawise 10 September 2012 02:10:35PM 5 points [-]

People have been welcoming and not sketchy at my local meetup. I look forward to going there. I'm pretty constantly aware that I'm the only or one of the only women there, but I don't feel that other people treat me differently because of it. Sometimes I enjoy the gender ratio. My college and most of my jobs were mostly-female, so being in a mostly-male space is novel and interesting. But I also really enjoyed it when a new woman joined the meetup, because it was nice to feel there was someone a bit more like me (female, with good social skills, smart but not a programmer/scientist).

Comment author: novalis 10 September 2012 07:51:03AM 4 points [-]

What factors would tend to give you a bad impression of a community, either online or in person? (That's sort of two questions, but they're related)

Comment author: Sarokrae 10 September 2012 01:21:48PM *  4 points [-]

Online: systemic irrationality. Systemic self-reinforcing irrationality. That's why I hang out here :P

In person, a mass lack of social skills make events unfun. Groups are much easier to get along with if they contain a reasonable mix of extroverts and introverts (read: at least two people who act like each).

Comment author: Dreaded_Anomaly 11 September 2012 02:31:28AM 3 points [-]

The unbalanced gender ratio in the atheist/skeptic/rationalist spheres (and the science/programming spheres, more generally) has negative effects on both genders. Women may feel objectified and marginalized, while men may feel romantically frustrated and hopeless. These reactions can lead to mutually defeating behavior. Typical responses - for women, abandoning those spheres; for men, acting inappropriately toward women - only widen the gender divide and make the problems worse.

I am interested in working toward better outcomes for both genders. My question for the women of LW is this: what specific advice do you have, for either gender, that you think will improve the situation? How confident are you that your advice will be helpful, and on what evidence do you base that confidence?

Comment author: wedrifid 11 September 2012 04:54:01AM 5 points [-]

My question for the women of LW is this: what specific advice do you have, for either gender, that you think will improve the situation?

For men: Consider the women in the subculture "male for all social purposes" and seek romantic interests elsewhere.

Comment author: Alicorn 11 September 2012 04:57:23AM 1 point [-]

But I like dating subculture boys. Also, the bisexual one I see sometimes would not be deterred by considering me male for all social purposes.

Comment author: wedrifid 11 September 2012 05:53:34AM 7 points [-]

But I like dating subculture boys.

And yet for all your interest and your polyhacking I suspect that you and those like you just don't have sufficient time or sexual and romantic interest to satisfy the demand. (My apologies if I have underestimated your enthusiasm and endurance!) This inflates your value and means at a grossly simplified level that for a given level of attractiveness a male that doesn't qualify to date you within this culture may attract women outside the subculture as attractive to you. Those that do qualify to date you could expect general population dating opportunities with women who are even sexier than you, or better at sport or who perhaps have neck-down alopecia.

I'm sure you'll not be lacking for available, interested males. Unless all the males started looking elsewhere and didn't notice that the incentives at the margin had changed. They'd also have to resist any overt advances you should happen to make!

Also, the bisexual one I see sometimes would not be deterred by considering me male for all social purposes.

Of course bisexual males also have more potential romantic interests, not being limited to the scarce female population. Perhaps that means this 'avoid scarcity' principle doesn't even need special case treatment for bisexual males. Homosexual males on the other hand may get all confused if they try to implement it!

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 11 September 2012 06:56:42AM 11 points [-]

I've only ever seen one case of a man who'd previously had a rationalist mate going back to nonrationalist mates afterward. The reason why the gender skew of our culture is a mating problem for men is that once you go rationalist you don't go back.

"Go to the physics department, find a woman you consider attractive, point her at HPMOR, and see if anything develops" sounds like more useful advice to me.

For (straight) men who insist on dating externally, asking a woman whether she would prefer a certainty of $500 or a 15% chance at $1 million seems likely to be a surprisingly good filter on potential mates. I didn't believe it either as first, but I've verified that many women, and in at least one case a female grad-student doing advanced math homework, says she would rather have the $500; while every woman I've tested inside our community - regardless of her math/science/economics level or her ability to talk glibly about explicit rationality - takes the 15% chance at $1M with a puzzled look and 'Is this a trick question?'

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 08:10:31AM 5 points [-]

once you go rationalist you don't go back.

This.

True for both genders.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 11 September 2012 09:06:52AM 6 points [-]

Yep, though it's weaker evidence to observe that (straight) female rationalists don't go back when they can have their pick of mates and/or an entire harem by staying.

Actually, I have seen a couple of cases of women using their newly acquired Sanity Attractiveness Points(*) to pull in hot guys they want from outside the community, though in both such cases they still had rationalist mates on the side.

(*) = According to the one woman whose case I know in detail, this is apparently a pretty strong effect - a female from within rationalist culture, dealing with a guy from outside rationalist culture who has an unmet need for sanity, may appear unto him as a Goddess. Sort of the dating equivalent of what happens when people with unmet needs discover LW or read HPMOR.

Comment author: wedrifid 11 September 2012 09:16:49AM 1 point [-]

to pull in hot guys they want from outside the community, though in both such cases they still had rationalist mates on the side.

Now that is a strategy I can endorse.

According to the one woman whose case I know in detail, this is apparently a pretty strong effect - a female from within rationalist culture, dealing with a guy from outside rationalist culture who has an unmet need for sanity, may appear unto him as a Goddess.

I could believe that.

Comment author: coffeespoons 11 September 2012 04:36:31PM 4 points [-]

I wonder what effect rationalist culture has on the attractiveness of guys who date outside the community. Are they more or less appealing than non-rationalist guys?

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 04:39:23PM 0 points [-]

Ah, yes. I completely agree, and should clarify what I personally mean by "rationalist". I care less whether they are (already) a part of the community, especially considering that the community in this city consists solely of people that were brought into it either by Jesse or myself.

Those "guy(s) from outside rationalist culture who has an unmet need for sanity, [she] may appear unto him as a Goddess."--Yeah, that's true, and I just consider them to be "Rationalists Who Don't Know It Yet."

Comment author: wedrifid 11 September 2012 08:20:44AM *  13 points [-]

I've only ever seen one case of a man who'd previously had a rationalist mate going back to nonrationalist mates afterward.

I have dated rationalists and gone back. Rationalist subculture affiliations count very little to me. It doesn't make people all that rational and does make people more annoying when they are, in fact, being irrational. I do enjoy having some shared interests with those I date but honestly I'd assign more 'attraction' points for a fitness obsession, enjoyment of games (board games, cards) or, say, medical knowledge than "being a rationalist".

The reason why the gender skew of our culture is a mating problem for men is that once you go rationalist you don't go back.

That sounds like an argument that one shouldn't date a rationalist even when an attractive option is willing and available. You don't want to permanently degrade your future options for (possibly) short term pleasure with what is immediately before you.

"Go to the physics department, find a woman you consider attractive, point her at HPMOR, and see if anything develops" sounds like more useful advice to me.

If you say so yourself!

I don't know, if a woman had tried that with me she'd have found I didn't make it through to the end (didn't read the last batch after the pause before it). And she'd find that I argue with the author, rejecting some of the "rationalist" morals he promotes in the chapters that get preachy. If she is too enarmored of the work it could disqualify me!

For (straight) men who insist on dating externally, asking a woman whether she would prefer a certainty of $500 or a 15% chance at $1 million seems likely to be a surprisingly good filter on potential mates.

If I happen to marry (or otherwise have significant resource sharing with) a woman who is poor at this kind of decision making I'll first make sure she is willing to let me have final say on critical financial decisions. (Irrational and stubborn or egotistic about it is what would black-ball her.)

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 11 September 2012 09:04:07AM 0 points [-]

I hate to No-True-Scotswoman you but I can't help but wonder exactly how rational she was - the cases I know have all been drawn from either East Coast or West Coast whole communities with corresponding personal transmission of skills.

Comment author: MatthewBaker 11 September 2012 09:34:18AM 5 points [-]

You two are so cute when your argue!!!

Comment author: wedrifid 11 September 2012 10:09:30AM *  10 points [-]

I hate to No-True-Scotswoman you but I can't help but wonder exactly how rational she was - the cases I know have all been drawn from either East Coast or West Coast whole communities with corresponding personal transmission of skills.

Enough that by my best estimate based on what exposure to and information that I have about those communities she could easily soar to high levels of status within either (take that either way). Probably collecting an arbitrary sized harem in a matter of weeks.

Rationalist skills are impressive and sometimes convenient for lovers to have but again, I'd be just as impressed with and drawn to an interested prospective mate with Taekwondo or Jujutsu skills who was willing to spar with me. I'm reasonably aware of what I look for in a companion and a lover and that which is required to be respected as a rationalist just doesn't happen to be near the top of the list.

I actually suspect there is an element of in group bias at play here---the same bias I see in my Christian friends and relatives who tell each other how much superior other Christians are as friends and romantic interests.

Comment author: John_Maxwell_IV 11 September 2012 09:19:14PM 9 points [-]

I actually suspect there is an element of in group bias at play here---the same bias I see in my Christian friends and relatives who tell each other how much superior other Christians are as friends and romantic interests.

I've noticed a pretty strong in-group bias in myself WRT Less Wrong.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 11 September 2012 11:30:24AM *  1 point [-]

Should rational men take into account when considering very long term relationships with women that the women are likely to remain physically and mentally healthy longer than the men are, with the effect being amplified if the woman is younger than the man? If that factor is considered, then independent good sense is very valuable.

To make it more specific, it's highly likely that in a very long term heterosexual relationship, the woman will be wrangling medical personnel for the man. Of course, it's also pretty likely that at some point, the man will wrangling medical personnel for the woman, just not as likely.

Numeracy level of both marriage partners has a large impact on lifetime savings

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 11 September 2012 04:55:01PM 7 points [-]

Would it be useful to distinguish between rationalist subculture affiliation and habitually rational?

Comment author: wedrifid 11 September 2012 04:57:00PM 1 point [-]

Would it be useful to distinguish between rationalist subculture affiliation and habitually rational?

Probably. In this case it is the subculture affiliation that matters---given the context of considering what strategies to use in response to the gender imbalance therein.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 05:10:54PM 2 points [-]

I think this is a useful distinction. I care much more about "habitually rational" than "subculture affiliation," when it comes to social interactions.

Comment author: Dreaded_Anomaly 11 September 2012 01:57:18PM *  3 points [-]

"Go to the physics department, find a woman you consider attractive, point her at HPMOR, and see if anything develops" sounds like more useful advice to me.

While I understand the sentiment, the physics department will not usually have a significantly higher volume of women than the local rationalist/etc. group.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 11 September 2012 02:03:58PM 3 points [-]

As long as it's got at least one lady who hasn't already been recruited, what difference does that make?

Comment author: Dreaded_Anomaly 11 September 2012 02:49:10PM 4 points [-]

On an individual level, this will work fine for a few people. It makes a difference, though, if everyone tries that specific strategy. The strategy will lose its effectiveness quickly, and the overall effect on the gender divide will not be very large.

Trying to bring more women into the relevant spheres is clearly a big part of the answer. However, simply moving women from one low-density area to another doesn't seem very productive to me.

Comment author: LucasSloan 11 September 2012 08:50:42PM 1 point [-]

It is true that you receive dimishing marginal returns whenever you try to import people. Even if we were to use the largest available population sink, eventually we'd run into limits. The larger the population sinks you use, the less it has been filtered, so while your returns diminish more slowly, the effort required at the outset is larger.

Given the small size of our group, physics departments are more than large enough population sinks for the forseeable future.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 04:51:06PM *  6 points [-]

I actually dislike the focus on pulling in people from physics/computer programming/math. As Dreaded_Anomaly mentions, these are fields which have just as bad of a gender ratio as here. As long as we continue focusing on those fields, I don't think the gender ratio problem is going to get much better.

Also, I don't think there's anything inherent in rationality that means that it requires physics/programming/math types. But I think our current community is generally set up in a way to self-perpetuate that.

I can understand that STEMM types might more frequently lean towards rationality, which is why recruiting from there is often a suggestion. (If you have a .5 probability that a random intelligent STEMM person would be amenable to rationality, but only a .2 probability that a random intelligent person of another field would be, for example.)

A way to get around that: Personally, I've found that anyone I have a match of >94% on OKC has a high probability of being the aforementioned Rationalists Who Just Don't Know It Yet. I myself was "recruited" this way. Dated someone from OKC (We no longer date, but are still REALLY good friends) who I was a 99% match with, and they pointed me toward HPMoR, then LW, etc, all while modeling "proper rationalist behavior" in our discussions. I think that's all that it takes, often, to get someone interested in rationality (once you filter for interest, whether you use okc for this or not)

Comment author: drethelin 11 September 2012 04:56:17PM 0 points [-]

A useful corollary of the last point is that anyone with the HPMOR tag on their profile is likely to be a very high match :)

Comment author: Alicorn 11 September 2012 05:30:59PM 5 points [-]

STEMM

What is the extra M for? Googling yields a band.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 05:41:31PM 6 points [-]

Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, Medicine

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 12 September 2012 12:50:47AM 4 points [-]

Agree that the OKCupid technique probably works too. But I wasn't suggesting that we put up broad recruiting posters in the math department to solve the gender ratio thingy; I was suggesting that rationalist men seeking convertible mates try to date mathematical women. As Lucas observes, our community is still small enough that this provides a relatively large pool.

Comment author: [deleted] 12 September 2012 01:02:33AM 1 point [-]

Good point! I understand what you are getting at. So long as it is also understood that mathematical does not necessarily equate to rational, and that rational does not require a person to be mathematical, etc.

Comment author: Desrtopa 12 September 2012 01:36:28AM 1 point [-]

A way to get around that: Personally, I've found that anyone I have a match of >94% on OKC has a high probability of being the aforementioned Rationalists Who Just Don't Know It Yet.

Really? Back when I first joined I wouldn't have been surprised by this, but they've fiddled around with the match algorithms since then, and 94% matches have gone from extremely rare compatibility to fairly trivial (and yes, I've checked against people whose match values I knew from before the algorithm changes to make sure it's not just a result of a larger userbase.) These days, I could browse through a considerable number of people with that match rating before finding anyone I would expect to relate to.

Comment author: Vaniver 12 September 2012 01:11:09AM 8 points [-]

For (straight) men who insist on dating externally, asking a woman whether she would prefer a certainty of $500 or a 15% chance at $1 million seems likely to be a surprisingly good filter on potential mates. I didn't believe it either as first, but I've verified that many women, and in at least one case a female grad-student doing advanced math homework, says she would rather have the $500; while every woman I've tested inside our community - regardless of her math/science/economics level or her ability to talk glibly about explicit rationality - takes the 15% chance at $1M with a puzzled look and 'Is this a trick question?'

I have a (male) friend who answered $500 to this question. He teaches math (at the middle school level). It was a sad day.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 12 September 2012 02:15:08AM 6 points [-]

Of course it's not just women! Women (outside the community, that is) are more likely to respond that way than men, but that's from a study on both risk aversion and hyperbolic discounting which showed that "Women can't take small risks and men are creatures of the now", with both effects diminishing as scores on the Cognitive Reflection Test increased.

I now wonder what would happen if I asked a man on the street to choose between $500 immediately or $1 million in 10 years (= 113% annual interest) - a version that extreme wasn't in the original study, just the extreme version of the risk-aversion Q. I wouldn't expect it to work, but then I wouldn't have expected it to work with risk aversion either!

Comment author: [deleted] 12 September 2012 02:31:54AM 6 points [-]

Single point of evidence- I would have to fight my inner self REALLY hard to choose the 15% chance at a million. (Inner turmoil!! Logic says Do Thing A, but I really Don't Want To!!).

OTOH, the million in ten years is intuitively obvious to me and choosing it would be what I would've done even PRE-rationality.

Comment author: TheOtherDave 12 September 2012 04:03:55AM 7 points [-]

I would expect that to depend a great deal on their confidence that you would in fact provide $1 million in ten years.

Comment author: ciphergoth 12 September 2012 06:49:32AM 5 points [-]

I would be curious to know how people answer given the opportunity to spend $500 on a $1M/15% lottery ticket.

Comment author: Alicorn 12 September 2012 06:52:37AM *  4 points [-]

I might actually not want to buy one. (When no loss is involved I take the chance at a million.) I might want to buy five, or go in together with several friends on one.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 12 September 2012 08:45:01AM 7 points [-]

(instantaneous reflex activated)

What if I gave you $500, then asked you if you wanted to spend it on the ticket?

I'd also like to know whether some unexpected expense, like needing a $500 dental crown, would change your mind about accepting the free $500 instead of the free ticket.

Comment author: Alicorn 12 September 2012 03:26:28PM 1 point [-]

If you gave me $500 and then immediately alerted me to the availability of a ticket you'd probably catch me before the $500 entered the "my money" mental bin, because I'd still be a little confused about why you randomly handed me $500 and expect to have to give it back.

Risks of medium-sized unexpected expenses like that are already factored into how conservative I am about handling money on this scale, so I don't think that would have an effect.

Comment author: katydee 12 September 2012 10:38:55AM *  5 points [-]

That depends a lot on the nature of the lottery. If it was a typical lottery that for some reason had a 15% chance to win, a $500 ticket would not be worth it as all, since thousands of people would win and split the prize amongst themselves and the expected value would be much less than you would assume at first glance.

If it's just "spend $500 for a 15% chance of gaining a million," though, I'd take as many tickets as I could get!

Comment author: thomblake 12 September 2012 01:27:41PM 0 points [-]

Yes, that version seems much less problematic, and I think the average person might be in favor of buying infinity tickets.

Comment author: lucidian 11 September 2012 11:16:02AM 2 points [-]

I am a girl and I approve of this suggestion. I'll also note that LW has been very good about this in all of my experiences here (discussion forum, IRC, and meetups IRL).

Comment author: Sarokrae 11 September 2012 05:08:25AM *  14 points [-]

For women: you have a great deal of control over how other people react to you. You can take some responsibility for how you are perceived.

personal anecdote: I'm a female maths undergrad, and most of my social circle is male. First term there I concentrated on making friends, so I adopted casual, unisex clothing styles. I attracted male attention only when I dressed in a stereotypically girly way for fancy dress parties and social events.

Second term I was on a mate hunt, so I overhhauled my wardrobe and started wearing skirts and behaving in a mate-attracting way. According to my now OH, that's when he "realised I was a girl".

So basically if you don't want men to view you as a potential mate, it's helpful to not act like one. Think hoodies and ill-fitting jeans. And if you have got attracting mates in the back of your mind, and your body language shows it, then you shouldn't be surprised if men notice you.

Second piece of advice for women where it applies: tracking your menstrual cycle is the easiest first step towards luminosity. Different hormones induce different kinds of bias, and also prompt changes in body language and attitude, which may cause people to react differently. The effects can then be harnessed or corrected for.

Comment author: lucidian 11 September 2012 11:25:51AM 2 points [-]

This strategy makes a lot of sense, but I wonder whether it's applicable to professional settings. Jeans and a hoodie don't just signal nongirliness; they also signal casualness. Does anyone know of equivalently gender-neutral clothes that are appropriate for formal settings? Or is it unnecessary because the formality prevents people from making unwanted advances anyway?

Comment author: Sarokrae 11 September 2012 11:53:23AM *  6 points [-]

I don't have much experience of professional settings, but from my knowledge of women's clothing: you can get tailored shirts in fairly male cuts and straight-leg trousers or long skirts that don't hug the figure. I'd imagine one would be received differently for wearing a very modest shirt and trousers combo vs a v-neck blouse and pencil skirt.

In most places, I think it's now acceptable for women to wear a tuxedo for black tie, if you go to that kind of thing and feel that cocktail dresses attract too much attention. Alternatively, keep a modest dress in your wardrobe.

Comment author: coffeespoons 11 September 2012 03:49:31PM *  3 points [-]

I tend to prefer to wear flattering clothes, whether looking for a partner or not, because they make me feel more comfortable/confident. It's possible to wear clothes that are flattering, but not sexy, I think. Maybe I need to work on this more.

Comment author: shminux 11 September 2012 03:59:27PM *  1 point [-]

It's possible to wear clothes that are flattering, but not sexy, I think.

For a female? No, it really is not. But just in case I misunderstand what you mean, care to tell the difference between flattering and sexy? Or link to a couple of pictures of each type and we can let the males here provide feedback on whether what you consider simply flattering is also sexy.

Comment author: coffeespoons 11 September 2012 04:18:15PM *  0 points [-]

I'm not confident of it - I'd like it to be possible! I think workwear (suits etc) is probably the closest thing to it, but even that's often made quite sexy.

Comment author: shminux 11 September 2012 04:32:23PM 2 points [-]

I'm not confident of it - I'd like it to be possible!

I share your dreams of living in a should-universe :)

Comment author: coffeespoons 11 September 2012 04:46:27PM *  0 points [-]

Mostly I'd like to have a solution that doesn't involve me having to wear uncomfortable and unflattering clothes :)!

Comment author: shminux 11 September 2012 05:12:53PM *  2 points [-]

doesn't involve me having to wear uncomfortable and unflattering clothes

Comfortable is easy, comfortable but flattering is harder, comfortable, flattering but not sexy is harder still. Also, I suspect that when women say "comfortable", they often mean something other than what straight guys mean by the same term. For example, many women would say that wearing basic sweats and a hoodie in public is uncomfortable.

Comment author: TimS 11 September 2012 05:17:32PM 2 points [-]

Um, high heels?

Comment author: coffeespoons 11 September 2012 08:24:07PM 1 point [-]

Sorry, I meant "clothes that I feel uncomfortable in," not "clothes that are physically uncomfortable." I would feel uncomfortable/less confident in sweats and a hoodie. I appreciate it was the wrong choice of words.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 06:56:15PM 1 point [-]

For a female? No, it really is not.

Not sure of this. A large, colourful wool sweater can be flattering for certain women, but it's not particularly sexy (in my eyes at least).

Comment author: Sarokrae 11 September 2012 04:10:21PM *  4 points [-]

It depends on what you mean by flattering. If you want to emphasise a feminine figure, then that's always going to be sexy I'm afraid, so you'll probably want a different approach for deflecting male attention. You can, however, get well-fitted jackets, shirts etc in good materials that don't cinch in at the waist, and trousers cut straight to deemphasise the rear if you merely wanted good quality clothes. Look for the androgynous style fashions from the last couple of years.

Comment author: coffeespoons 11 September 2012 04:45:39PM *  3 points [-]

Another problem that I can see is that if I dress in attractive clothes and start dating someone, they might not want me to start dressing in unflattering clothes after we start dating (esp if looking like a girl is part of what attracted them to me). I either have to disappoint my new partner and wear baggy clothes, or to continue wearing flattering clothes and continue to deal with guys perceiving me as available.

ETA: I tend to go for guys who have a sense of style (not always, but often) and I'd be disappointed it they started wearing baggy jeans and hoodies because "now I have a girlfriend I don't have to make an effort."

Comment author: Sarokrae 11 September 2012 11:11:33PM *  4 points [-]

There are other ways of deflecting male attention. If you're at a social event alone, instead of signaling 'I am not a potential mate', you could signal 'I am in a monogamous relationship and my boyfriend is higher status than you'. It's a bit harder, and I'm still working on it, but certainly possible.

It's more frustrating for the guys though.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 11 September 2012 05:01:58PM 8 points [-]

For women: you can control how other people react to you. You can take responsibility for how you are perceived.

This is an overgeneralization. There are ways to improve the odds, but no guarantees.

Comment author: Sarokrae 11 September 2012 11:29:04PM 4 points [-]

Agreed and edited.

Comment author: MatthewBaker 11 September 2012 09:30:53AM 0 points [-]

What tricks do you use to control yourself while tripping when you dont have people you trust to help you? I have a inkling that the reason I have a harder time teaching role play control to girls is somewhat to do with gender roles but insofar I've failed at deducing why.

Comment author: lucidian 11 September 2012 11:37:20AM 6 points [-]

In discussions such as these, how do you prefer that the community refers to its female members? Do you like when female community members are called "women"? "girls"? "females"? Do you actively dislike any of these options? What is your opinion on gender-neutral pronouns, and what do you use for the third-person-singular-neuter? I'm also interested in any other observations you've had on the linguistics of gender.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 11 September 2012 12:24:06PM 4 points [-]

In general, I prefer "women". If it's a far view discussion, then "females" is ok with me as long as it's paralleled by "males". I don't like "girls" being used to refer to adult women.

I use the singular "they". I don't mind invented pronouns. I get annoyed at male pronouns used to refer to people in general and still get startled at female pronouns used to refer to people in general.

Comment author: Alicorn 11 September 2012 05:16:44PM 6 points [-]

I have a purely idiosyncratic, aesthetic distaste for the words "women" and "men", so I use "girls" and "guys", occasionally "boys", sometimes "males" and "females", if I'm being a little silly "dude" and "lady". I do sometimes use "women" and "men" when talking in a more formal register.

I like Spivak pronouns when talking about specific gender-unknown individuals where "they" is ambiguous or strange-sounding.

I hate being mispronouned. (I wouldn't mind if someone Spivaked me, but I'd then inform them of my gender.) I hate it even more when people think I'm being ridiculous for hating it.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 05:38:38PM 4 points [-]

"Women" and "females" are both fine for me. The worst thing is when men are referred to as "men", and women are referred to as "girls" in the same discussion. No.

"Girls" is only ok when referring to children, or in very casual use to refer to a group of female friends. i.e. "Hey, going out with the girls tonight?", or if the male pronoun in that situation would be "boys" or "guys".

If a discussion is going on about gender, as long as no one uses "girls", I don't like when someone brings up "Hey, you should use the term "women" instead of "females"" (or vice versa). It reads as just another way to get the discussion off-track from the important issues.

Comment author: [deleted] 11 September 2012 07:05:03PM 4 points [-]

I tend to prefer women. "Girls" often feels a bit demeaning, especially when contrasted with "men" or "guys".

"Females" sounds like somebody's trying to lend their remark a little too much apparently-biological weight.

I like gender-neutral pronouns when they're handy, for people who want them, or for the generic case. I used to be a bit mixed on which one sounded good for just general conversation, but after reading the Eclipse Phase RPG I pretty much stopped having any sympathy for the idea that "singular they" is awkward. It flows very well for me and sounds quite natural, and it's a common term in English so there's no trouble with inflecting it.

what do you use for the third-person-singular-neuter?

They, them, their.

Comment author: Desrtopa 12 September 2012 03:23:49AM 5 points [-]

I tend to prefer women. "Girls" often feels a bit demeaning, especially when contrasted with "men" or "guys".

It's problematic that there isn't really an age-indeterminate female pronoun to act as a counterpart to "guys," since a not-insignificant fraction of our members are still in their teens.

Comment author: chaosmosis 12 September 2012 01:14:47PM *  0 points [-]

On a related note, I generally either use the neutral form of the word, or put a note about how even though I used the masculine form I don't like patriarchy. It's just sometimes a hassle to neuter everything, and I like going with the tradition of using the masculine form because I've already internalized it. But I don't want it to feel like I'm overlooking women's concerns.

Anyone here dislike that?

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 12 September 2012 04:36:57PM 3 points [-]

I've found that it's possible to avoid gendered pronouns with a little work. You may find that practice helps.

If they can't be avoided there's always "he or she", possibly alternated with "she or he".

For what it's worth, I don't like male as the default human. It's very far from the worst thing ever, but I recommend avoiding it.

Comment author: chaosmosis 12 September 2012 05:35:33PM -1 points [-]

So, specifically, if I used the masculine form but then also put down a note about how I don't like patriarchy, would you would still feel bad or think I'm supporting bad assumptions? The note thing is what I generally do in the status quo, and what requires the least effort on my part.

I can understand if you would still feel bad, I just wanted to make sure you saw the note caveat I mentioned because you didn't mention anything about it in your comment.