Thinking/acting style: “mainstream rationality” or “x-rationality”.
Social behavior: ignores the LW community entirely, reads the website, posts on the website, attends meetups, meet other rationalists even outside meetups, lives in a group house.
Identity: identifies as a “rationalist”, or just “someone who hangs out with rationalists, but is not one of them”.
And even this is not clear. Using Zizians as an example, they are clearly inspired by some memes in the LW community, but they also clearly reject some other memes (such as ethical injunctions), are they “x-rationalists” by thinking style? They used to live in the Bay Area and recruit among the rationalists, but they also protested against MIRI and CFAR, were they members of the community at that moment? No idea whether they identified as “rationalists” or whatever else.
The Zizians are a small, renegade, spin-off group with an ideological emphasis on veganism and anarchism, which became well known in 2025 for being suspected of involvement in four murders. The Zizians originally formed around the Bay Area rationalist community, but became disillusioned with other rationalist organizations and leaders. Among the Zizians’ accusations against them were anti-transgender discrimination, misuse of donor funds to pay off a sexual misconduct accuser, and not valuing animal welfare in plans for human-friendly AI.
I am actually quite okay with this. It mentions the important things: “spin-off group” (i.e. their membership is a history), “veganism and anarchism” (their motivations other than rationalism). The only way I can imagine it better from my perspective would be to add more years to make it clear that their participation in the community was 2014-2019, and the murders 2022-2025 (i.e. no overlap).
The part I don’t like is the introduction to the “Zizians” article, which starts with:
The Zizians are an informal group of rationalists with anarchist and vegan beliefs
With the word “rationalists” pointing to the “Rationalist community” article. You see the rhetorical trick: anarchism and veganism are their beliefs, but rationalists is what they are. The sentence does not claim explicitly that they are members of the community (as opposed to just someone trying to be more rational), but that’s where the hyperlink points at. Also, the present tense.
This all is a spin; one could equally validly say e.g. “Zizians are an informal group of anarchist vegans who have met each other during the years they spent in the rationality community.”
Even more distinctions are possible...
Thinking/acting style: “mainstream rationality” or “x-rationality”.
Social behavior: ignores the LW community entirely, reads the website, posts on the website, attends meetups, meet other rationalists even outside meetups, lives in a group house.
Identity: identifies as a “rationalist”, or just “someone who hangs out with rationalists, but is not one of them”.
And even this is not clear. Using Zizians as an example, they are clearly inspired by some memes in the LW community, but they also clearly reject some other memes (such as ethical injunctions), are they “x-rationalists” by thinking style? They used to live in the Bay Area and recruit among the rationalists, but they also protested against MIRI and CFAR, were they members of the community at that moment? No idea whether they identified as “rationalists” or whatever else.
I am actually quite okay with this. It mentions the important things: “spin-off group” (i.e. their membership is a history), “veganism and anarchism” (their motivations other than rationalism). The only way I can imagine it better from my perspective would be to add more years to make it clear that their participation in the community was 2014-2019, and the murders 2022-2025 (i.e. no overlap).
The part I don’t like is the introduction to the “Zizians” article, which starts with:
With the word “rationalists” pointing to the “Rationalist community” article. You see the rhetorical trick: anarchism and veganism are their beliefs, but rationalists is what they are. The sentence does not claim explicitly that they are members of the community (as opposed to just someone trying to be more rational), but that’s where the hyperlink points at. Also, the present tense.
This all is a spin; one could equally validly say e.g. “Zizians are an informal group of anarchist vegans who have met each other during the years they spent in the rationality community.”