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Normal_Anomaly comments on Can we stop using the word "rationalism"? - Less Wrong Discussion
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I'm very leery about using terms like "LessWrongism" or "Yudkowskian" anything. If the problem with "rationalism" is that people won't know what it means, the above two are worse. People won't know what it means and it will make us sound like a cult.
The problem with "rationalism" is not that people don't know what it means, it's that it means something different to most people then it does to us. With terms like "LessWrongism" or "Yudkowskian", at least people will realize that they don't know what they mean.
The rationalism-empiricism philosophical debate is somewhat dead. I see no problem in using "rationalism" to mean LW rationalism. "Rationality" (1989) by Rescher defines rationality in the way LW uses the word, but doesn't use "rationalism", ostensibly because of the risk of confusion with the rationalism-empiricism debate. Neither LW nor average people are subject to similar limitations as the academic Rescher, so I think it is prudent to overwrite the meaning of the word "rationalism" now.
Maybe "rationalism" used to mean "rationalism in the rationalism-empiricsm debate", but the concept of "rationality" has become very important during the past century, and that "rationality" means the LW type rationality. Yet, "rationality" is only a method. What LW clearly advocates is that this method is somehow the best, the only right method, the only method, a superior method, or a method that ought to be used. Hence, LW is somewhat founded on a prescriptive belief that "rationality" is a good method. It is very reasonable to call such a belief "rationalism", as someone without belief in the superiority of rationality could still use rationality without being a rationalist.