One obvious question: when is the name most important? When first heard; Introductions.
Some common names take the form of "[identifier] [word for a group]" or similar, eg: [Rationality] [Institute]
Use online thesauruses to find synonyms for good words, make long lists of words to combine. http://thesaurus.com
Google how to come up with good names, skim chapters in marketing textbooks for meta-ideas.
Don't react fast/naturally (eg: "the name Waterline is a clever meaningful in-group signal and sounds pretty."), ask yourself how your target will react (eg: "what's that, whale environmentalists?").
Who are your targets? Intelligent ambitious young men or their uninterested 45 year old mothers? Academics? From which field? etc.
Common reaction to mention of the group will be to assume their arrogance (suggesting they can teach smartness, that they have smartness), behaving guarded but curious.
Suggestions: Insight House/ Bayesian House
Reaction: "what does bayesian mean?" it's the math (credibility+++) of how to decide (arrogance-) etc. Bring evidence into discussion if target identifies as being "logical" (young smart men).
Based on my research, "foundation", "Institute" and "center" are the most common nouns that are used in the names of nonprofits in approximately that order. "Center" might be inappropriate because the organization in question will probably not be based out of a single building.
In my view, the most important things are that the name should clearly communicate what the organization does, should not sound cultish, and should sound good in the same sentence as "the singularity Institute". (This may rule out &qu...
The Singularity Institute wants to spin off a separate rationality-related organization. (If it's not obvious what this would do, it would e.g. develop things like the rationality katas as material for local meetups, high schools and colleges, bootcamps and seminars, have an annual conference and sessions in different cities and so on and so on.)
We can't think of a name for this organization.
We can't think of any names that seem good enough to be audience-tested.
We don't have any ideas good enough that we'd want to mention them in this post.
Help.