Disclaimer: I'm still fairly new here, and though I did use the search bar it's entirely possible this has been discussed before. Just point me in the right direction if this is so.
While reading about 4chan's Japanese progenitor website, it occurred to me that I know nothing about the state of rationality in the non-English-speaking world, and more specifically the non-English-speaking internet. Is there a Russian version of SIAI? A Japanese Less Wrong? What about Korean Robin Hansons and Eliezer Yudkowskys?
If we take Religion as any indication of irrationality then America should be one of the least rational countries in the world. So if there are like-minded individuals out there speaking in languages we don't know, are we doing anything to collaborate with them? Do they have their own sequences and their own HPMORs which we could be reading?
And if there are no Singularitarian, Cryonics-Supporting, Utilitarianism-Advocating websites for the majority of the human race, isn't that a huge deal? Aren't Europeans and Asians more likely to be open to rationality, if only because of their atheism? If we want Friendly-AI to be developed, should we be translating the sequences into Chinese and Hindu as quickly as possible?
Existence or non-existence of a deity is not a question that can be answered experimentally, so arguing either way is a waste of bits.
That's wrong for at least three reasons.
First, while certain deific claims that are so vague as to be close to meaningless cannot be falsified, most deities don't fall into that category. For example, all the classical Abrahamic religions make testable claims. Religions have only adapted to more generic, harder to test claims when those claims failed. There's a relevant bit in the sequences about this.
Second, even weaker claims like vaguely just deities who wa... (read more)