How do you cure "something is wrong on the Internet" syndrome? It bugs me when people have political opinions that are simplistic and self-congratulating, but I've found that arguing with them wastes time and energy and rarely persuades them.
For me debating with people on LessWrong somehow cured the syndrome. Now when I see a political debate among non-LessWrongians, the participants seem like retarded people -- I no longer expect them to be reasonable; I don't even expect them to be able to understand logical arguments and process them correctly.; I don't feel any hope of conveying anything meaningful to any of them. (At best we could have an illusion of understanding.) Speaking with them would be like speaking with a rock; certainly not tempting.
I am not saying this is a correct model of the...
This is a thread where people can ask questions that they would ordinarily feel embarrassed for not knowing the answer to. The previous thread is at close to 500 comments.