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RichardKennaway comments on Rationality & Low-IQ People - Less Wrong
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Don't show them thinking, show them doing. If you show their thoughts at all, show their conclusions, not their reasons. They think and reason, but you don't put it on the page. Have them be involved in matters not stereotypically associated with intelligence but which actually have scope for its application: craftsmen rather than scientists, sergeants rather than generals, etc.
In short, have them actually be as intelligent and rational as you like, but omit all the superficial clothing that people mistake for these things, and use the opposite clothing.
All right. How does this work as pro-rationality propaganda? We're not simply talking about getting rational characters, but getting rationality to appeal to mid- or low-IQ folks.
"Rationalists should win", right? You could show an ordinary person solving a problem because s/he doesn't fall for some bias or other.
If the rationalists win, but normal people don't realize they're rationalists, or what made them so...
...then they avoid a lot of tedious ideological dick-waving.
See your post's great grandparent... sure, tedious dick-waving is tedious and dick-waving, but if we're trying to get a point across... maybe I should drop that metaphor.
If we're trying to cultivate appreciation of rationality, it seems inefficient to beat around the... aargh.
Take 3: It seems inefficient to completely neglect to mention rationality.
...and go off to wave their dicks at some other issue :-D
That's why I don't agree with "don't show them thinking, show them doing". Of course, you'd have to show the thinking in ordinary words that a person of normal intelligence who hasn't had a lot of formal education might use. Proverbs might help; they could be part of the way your rationalist thinks, they could be part of the way /she explains things to others, and they could help your reader to remember it later, if/when they encounter similar situations in their own life. And you wouldn't call them a rationalist, that's a 'big word'. Other people would call them 'wise', and they themselves would probably say 'it's just common sense'.