shminux comments on Intentionally Raising the Sanity Waterline - Less Wrong

12 Post author: Gleb_Tsipursky 13 November 2014 08:25PM

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Comment author: ChristianKl 13 November 2014 10:27:42PM 10 points [-]

As people become more advanced, we will orient them toward more advanced rationality, at Less Wrong and elsewhere. Now, there are those who believe rationality should be taught only to those who are willing to put in the hard work and effort to overcome the high barrier to entry of learning all the jargon.

I think that's a strawman. I haven't meet anyone who argued that the entry barrier of learning all the jargon is important.

The main problem is that giving someone a rationality mug and a rationality T-Shirt doesn't mean that you have raised the sanity line.

Videos are often great for teaching people buzzwords. I have seen smart people accept pretty stupid ideas that spread through Youtube videos. Videos that actually promote critical thinking are aren't clear and concise.

The website currently has: - Blog posts, such as on agency; polyamory and cached thinking; and life meaning and purpose.

If you want to reach a broad public I'm not sure that articles advocating polyamory are the most efficient way to do so.

"How Do You Live Happily Ever After When There’s A Love Triangle?" This sounds like a title that would neither make me want to read the article when it goes over my facebook news feed nor be great for SEO.

The article also doesn't engage deeply with the topic. A lot of people do feel jealousy and that's a concern when you want to guide them towards polyamory. On LW we talk about the value of steelmanning opposing arguments and that most issues have good arguments on both sides.

Asking for dark art techniques to promote the project is a strategic choice. It signals not seeing truth as a high value. That might be a bad strategic choice for promoting rationality.

Comment author: shminux 14 November 2014 03:45:43AM 5 points [-]

I have read plenty of opinions about LW which start with "they have this weird jargon..."

Comment author: ChristianKl 14 November 2014 07:32:37AM 2 points [-]

That's not the same thing as people saying: "We need to keep our weird jargon to filter out people who don't fit."

Comment author: Gleb_Tsipursky 14 November 2014 03:44:50PM 2 points [-]

I think there was a misunderstanding about the nature of my comments about jargon. The sentiment I heard expressed was not that "we need to keep our weird jargon to filter out people who don't fit," but that "it is necessary to have the jargon because otherwise we won't be able to say things precisely and will not be able to communicate efficiently" with the implication that those who don't want to learn the jargon don't deserve the benefits of Less Wrong. For examples of this sentiment expressed on LW, see the comments to this post.