Thanks for the welcome and the useful links, you're right about the tendency towards meetups which is why I'm going to the one in Bath tomorrow. The rationality diary seems like it should be a useful and interesting addition to my attempts at self improvement, so cheers.

Edit: That open thread is fascinating. I've never seen a community with such a high standard of discussion in real time. Even bestof archived depthhub threads don't touch it. I am going to have to think very carefully about any comments I might make to avoid accidentally eternal septembering this place. I can see I will also have to limit how much time I spend in such threads. I can fully imagine spending an inordinate amount of time on them learning fascinating things.