David_Gerard comments on The Problem With Rational Wiki - Less Wrong

20 [deleted] 26 October 2012 11:31AM

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Comment author: KPier 28 October 2012 06:38:32AM 5 points [-]

LW paying RW this much attention while also claiming that the entire future of human value itself is at stake looks on the surface like a failure of apportionment of cognitive resources, but perhaps I've missed something.

What do you mean by "this much attention"? If Konkvistador's links at the top are reasonably comprehensive (and a quick search doesn't turn up much more), there have been 2 barely-upvoted discussion posts about RW in four years, which hardly seems like much attention. For comparison, LW has devoted several times as much energy to dating advice.

Is there a lot of discussion of RW that I'm missing, or are you claiming that even two posts in Discussion is totally excessive?

Comment author: David_Gerard 28 October 2012 08:50:20AM *  4 points [-]

This article is a response to this comment, which was actually mostly about this comment. Posting an entire article in response to half of that comment does strike me as an overreaction. (I'd be interested in Konkvistador's similar-length response to Jade's comment, though; there's a body of work there raising quite apposite concerns about problems with LW as a social environment - specifically, the existing real world problem of creepers at LW meetups - that won't disappear by merely downvoting them.)

Comment author: KPier 28 October 2012 09:35:14AM *  1 point [-]

Thanks for linking to the context! In fairness, though, if people are citing RationalWiki as proof that LessWrong has a "reputation", then devoting a discussion-level post to it doesn't strike me as excessive.

(On a related note: I hadn't read Jade's comments, but I did after you flagged them as interesting; they struck me as totally devoid of value. Would you mind explaining what you think the valid concern he/she's expressing is?)

Comment author: David_Gerard 28 October 2012 11:04:03AM *  1 point [-]

Well, for one thing, Jade appears to be a "she". But never mind, I'm sure it'll all work out fine.

Comment author: KPier 28 October 2012 08:34:45PM 4 points [-]

Fixed, sorry! (I'm female and that mistake doesn't bother me at all, but I know it really annoys some people. I'll be more careful in future.)

I completely agree that characterizing RW as contributing to existential risk is absurd.