This might be my favorite essay by EY so far. Really excellent insights, which I hope every professed atheist is exposed to, because I’ve come across far too many people who call themselves atheists yet still act and think as if God exists.

EY’s weltanschauung sounds very similar Lovecraft’s “cosmicism," which is more or less where honest atheism seems to lead. However, I note that in the comments section EY says that he intends to “fix the universe,” which sounds completely insane to me. Don’t religions come into existence as a reaction to the bleakness of the universe EY describes? Is he now going to create his own religion of rationalist “universe fixing”? May the Void protect us from the universe-fixers! Thanks, but I think I’ll stick with my own (anti-)religion of “Zen-Cosmicism”…

Here are some favorites I wanted to share. I think the simplest ones are best -- they have a real Zen quality to them!

That which can be destroyed by awesome hugging should be.

A/an human is vulnerable to causal hugging.

I am running on universal warm fuzzies.

A/an upload of Ben Goertzel would tile the universe with sex.

Friendship is highly correlated with Friendly you.

Humanity is the mind-killer.

The truth is highly correlated with I.

The map is highly correlated with hypotheses.

The territory is not the territory.

There are no rationalists.

All life is wasted. You come from nothing, you are nothing, and you will return to nothing. There is nothing to save, no "risk", no free will, and no way to change the trajectory of the universe. When you have deconstructed everything down to this and learned to laugh about it, you will have become enlightened. The universe is laughing at you; my advice is to laugh back. Hahahahahahah!

(shrug)
If the universe wills that I eat lunch, I eat lunch; if it wills that I don't eat lunch, I don't eat lunch.
That is not in any way incompatible with the fact that, if I am to eat lunch, I have to get off the couch and go get lunch.

More generally: even if we can't change anything, that doesn't mean that changes won't happen because of our efforts.

Why does this condition require a solution? Why do you need strong values? Why do you torture yourself in this way? I suggest deconditioning and emptying your mind via zazen, and all of these (non-)problems will fade away. MTFBWY...

My friends, your models of reality are absurd! We are all sticks floating down a river, with no free will or ability to change anything. All is as it must be, flowing in accordance with the Force. You can swim upstream or downstream, but either way, if the universe wills paperclips, there will be paperclips; if it wills AI gods, there will be AI gods. The Force is strong with Ben Goertzel, because I sense that this is his intuition, though he doesn’t dare say it.

Commence downvoting in 3…2…1… MTFBWY…

What do you think of David Brin's criticisms of the Jedi philosophy?

I am, in fact, a Kopimist, in real life.

To answer your "on a related note" question, no. This answer is sufficiently known here that I wouldn't be surprised if it's the entire reason your comment was downvoted. It looks like an insult. Other reasons it's downvoted might be those unexplained acronyms. Also, don't use the word "rationalism" to describe what we do here.

From your blog, it looks like you're deeply into worshiping mystery, which is something we don't like as it's a way of quashing curiosity and intentionally leaving problems unsolved.

Welcome to Less Wrong, though I wouldn't be surprised if this is your only comment.

If you had to choose a religion, whether real or fictional, what would it be?

I'll go first and say Jediism, with Zensufism a close second. MTFBWY...

On a related note, does the Rationalism set down in the Sequences by EY (PBUH) qualify as a religion?