When thinking of insularity, the first example of content from LW that came to my mind was a post where someone supported what might be called "LW-native" politics, and the most highly upvoted comment was a defense of the "LW-outsider" politics. This seems incredible non-insular.

When thinking of productivity, my first thought was of previous intense lamentation of problems being social that I saw all over the site when I joined, and comparing it to the very positive social interactions that people seem to have had and be having at meetups.

So in short... I agree with Luke. Either I don't understand you at all or I entirely disagree.

I have rarely if ever experienced websites (short of, say, wikipedia) where people used scientific sources to figure out what to post. I would love to see an example of another site where that is an established social norm.

All that said, I also agree that Less Wrong is not organized in a way that is optimal for how I (and apparently most people) use it. I think Villam's Forum/articles/announcements structure would make more sense and be more in line with how I use the site.