Open Thread April 4 - April 10, 2016

Elo

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If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

Notes for future OT posters:

1. Please add the 'open_thread' tag.

2. Check if there is an active Open Thread before posting a new one. (Immediately before; refresh the list-of-threads page before posting.)

3. Open Threads should be posted in Discussion, and not Main.

4. Open Threads should start on Monday, and end on Sunday.

Many people are aware of Alicorn's post on polyhacking. There are a few things which have been written on bihacking, though I haven't seen bihacking discussed within the rationalist community as widely as polyhacking has been. Bihacking is the process of actively trying to become bisexual.

First, there are a couple sources which suggest that people can have "epiphanies", after which they become bisexual, or perhaps just recognize their latent bisexuality. This may be due to the fact that they are able to tell themselves different stories about their feelings towards others after having an epiphany. Here are two relevant links:

Ozy's Notes on the Success of Bihacking is the first post I'd recommend to anyone interested in bihacking.
This discussion also supports the idea that the stories people tell themselves about their feelings are more important than their feelings are in determining attraction.

Secondly, some people have had mild successes with working towards bisexuality by slowly starting to explore new experiences:

This highly upvoted comment strongly encourages this strategy.
This comment does too.
Both of the above two links focused on bihacking with online material. However, it may be easier to bihack via establishing a comfortable level of intimacy with your dispreferred gender of people (e.g. via cuddling a whole bunch of people), than it is to bihack via material.

I fear a time will come when people who don't want to try polyhacking bihacking will be labeled as homophobic. And that will just further dilute the term.

7bogus10y

Note that selection effects are going to be especially relevant here. People who happen to be interested in becoming bi are probably more sexually fluid than average, and so may find this sort of 'hacking' somewhat useful. Do keep in mind though that plenty of people try to change their sexual orientation in some way and fail, sometimes with detrimental side-effects.

12Viliam10y

To avoid only reading filtered evidence, people interested in polyhacking might also look at this SSC thread.