Certainly many of those who are closer to the things than I am, have had harsh enough things to say, on all the subjects I listed. It hardly seems necessary for me to add to that.
Can you (or anyone else) link to such complaints? (For example I don’t think I’ve ever seen a complaint that almost all “rationalist communities” in the United States or the concept of “rationalist community” is harmful on net.)
I wrote the grandparent comment in order to communicate, to Ray (and the rest of the LW team, and any others who may be in a position to affect the future of Less Wrong), what my views on this matter are.
My model of the LW team is that they would disagree with a lot of your cons prior to seeing your views, and seeing your views (without knowing the reasoning behind them) wouldn’t cause them to make a large update in your direction. Would you agree with this, and if so how do you plan to cause them to update or otherwise to accomplish the goal of “the list of Cons has not only not been added to, but the current entries on it forgotten and passed into misty memory, left far behind and overshadowed by the Pros”?
I’d prefer, if possible, not to turn this discussion into an airing of dirty laundry.
Why not? You mentioned “most of the folks involved aren’t bad people” but if they are actually doing bad things surely it doesn’t make sense to let them keep doing those things just to spare their feelings?
FWIW, I appreciated Said giving a response that was a succinct but comprehensive answer – I think further details might make sense as a top-level post but would probably take this thread in too many different directions. I think there’s something useful for people with really different worldviews being able to do a quick exchange of the high level stuff without immediately diving into the weeds.
My model of the LW team is that they would disagree with a lot of your cons prior to seeing your views, and seeing your views (without knowing the reasoning behind them) wouldn’t cause them to make a large update in your direction.
To a first approximation, nothing that anyone ever says to anyone, on any topic on which the target already has any sort of opinion, causes them to make a large update in the speaker’s direction. All we can hope for is small updates (assuming we do not discard the “update” model altogether—which I rather think it’s time we did; but that is a separate discussion).
Why not? You mentioned “most of the folks involved aren’t bad people” but if they are actually doing bad things surely it doesn’t make sense to let them keep doing those things just to spare their feelings?
If others, who are closer to the matter, have already spoken, and more specifically, more critically, and more plainly, then what hope do I have of stopping anyone from doing any bad things? My intent is to do what I can to nudge Less Wrong toward the direction in which I think it should go. That is all. I have no greater ambitions for this discussion.
Can you (or anyone else) link to such complaints? (For example I don’t think I’ve ever seen a complaint that almost all “rationalist communities” in the United States or the concept of “rationalist community” is harmful on net.)
My model of the LW team is that they would disagree with a lot of your cons prior to seeing your views, and seeing your views (without knowing the reasoning behind them) wouldn’t cause them to make a large update in your direction. Would you agree with this, and if so how do you plan to cause them to update or otherwise to accomplish the goal of “the list of Cons has not only not been added to, but the current entries on it forgotten and passed into misty memory, left far behind and overshadowed by the Pros”?
Why not? You mentioned “most of the folks involved aren’t bad people” but if they are actually doing bad things surely it doesn’t make sense to let them keep doing those things just to spare their feelings?
FWIW, I appreciated Said giving a response that was a succinct but comprehensive answer – I think further details might make sense as a top-level post but would probably take this thread in too many different directions. I think there’s something useful for people with really different worldviews being able to do a quick exchange of the high level stuff without immediately diving into the weeds.
To a first approximation, nothing that anyone ever says to anyone, on any topic on which the target already has any sort of opinion, causes them to make a large update in the speaker’s direction. All we can hope for is small updates (assuming we do not discard the “update” model altogether—which I rather think it’s time we did; but that is a separate discussion).
If others, who are closer to the matter, have already spoken, and more specifically, more critically, and more plainly, then what hope do I have of stopping anyone from doing any bad things? My intent is to do what I can to nudge Less Wrong toward the direction in which I think it should go. That is all. I have no greater ambitions for this discussion.