I fully agree with your premise that each of us should have some (or lots of) knowledge of trends and popular beliefs. I don’t think that means we should discuss it on LW. I very much hope LW isn’t your only, or even primary source of knowledge about the world.
It’s fine to link to outside pieces where they impact a recommendation you’re making or societal model you’re exploring. It’s likely even good to propose a model of significant subsets of humanity who don’t seem aligned with your values. However, I don’t think I’d declare open season. Such explorations and writings have a very high risk of being downvoted heavily, or infecting other conversations.
As a specific example of something that worked OK here (but never really resolved, AFAIK) is the Moral Mazes sequence. There was plenty of disagreement as to applicability and fidelity of the model, but it was far enough from true hot-buttons that it didn’t really go off the rails. Likewise Zvi’s writing about current events—I attribute that success to his skill (and the fact that he’s writing for a broader audience than just LW), and I don’t think I or most posters could replicate it.
Theres a difference between debating the merits of different political positions and merely announcing an apparent trend. I’m doing the later and I don’t think the risks associated with this are too severe. So it’s not exactly open season.
The decision to call a tiny number of people a new political trend is a political position. It’s the kind of discouse that leads even someone like Glenn Greenwald saying recently that NYT tried to dox Scott Alexander because he’s a right-wing blogger.
People like Thiel or Yarvis make great material to write interesting articles about them but their political thought is too complex to be believed by a broader public.
People like Thiel or Yarvis make great material to write interesting articles about them but their political thought is too complex to be believed by a broader public.
I expect what matters is whether they capture the elites. If they do, then the ideas will percolate down in the same way that Judith Butler’s ideas have percolated down (what percent of the population would even be able to define performativity?)
The article doesn’t show evidence of capturing a single elite chair till now. Judith Butler’s ideas were popular with a lot of academic professors and other people who had power because of the institutional authority that they hold.
I think traditional sources of authority are becoming less important. The media is an obvious example—its influence has been diluted by podcasts and Substack. I think this applies to academia as well. For example, I think that Twitter has something of a leveling effect as it is now much easier to get a platform based on saying interesting things, rather than more traditional credentials.
I fully agree with your premise that each of us should have some (or lots of) knowledge of trends and popular beliefs. I don’t think that means we should discuss it on LW. I very much hope LW isn’t your only, or even primary source of knowledge about the world.
It’s fine to link to outside pieces where they impact a recommendation you’re making or societal model you’re exploring. It’s likely even good to propose a model of significant subsets of humanity who don’t seem aligned with your values. However, I don’t think I’d declare open season. Such explorations and writings have a very high risk of being downvoted heavily, or infecting other conversations.
As a specific example of something that worked OK here (but never really resolved, AFAIK) is the Moral Mazes sequence. There was plenty of disagreement as to applicability and fidelity of the model, but it was far enough from true hot-buttons that it didn’t really go off the rails. Likewise Zvi’s writing about current events—I attribute that success to his skill (and the fact that he’s writing for a broader audience than just LW), and I don’t think I or most posters could replicate it.
Theres a difference between debating the merits of different political positions and merely announcing an apparent trend. I’m doing the later and I don’t think the risks associated with this are too severe. So it’s not exactly open season.
The decision to call a tiny number of people a new political trend is a political position. It’s the kind of discouse that leads even someone like Glenn Greenwald saying recently that NYT tried to dox Scott Alexander because he’s a right-wing blogger.
People like Thiel or Yarvis make great material to write interesting articles about them but their political thought is too complex to be believed by a broader public.
I expect what matters is whether they capture the elites. If they do, then the ideas will percolate down in the same way that Judith Butler’s ideas have percolated down (what percent of the population would even be able to define performativity?)
The article doesn’t show evidence of capturing a single elite chair till now. Judith Butler’s ideas were popular with a lot of academic professors and other people who had power because of the institutional authority that they hold.
I think traditional sources of authority are becoming less important. The media is an obvious example—its influence has been diluted by podcasts and Substack. I think this applies to academia as well. For example, I think that Twitter has something of a leveling effect as it is now much easier to get a platform based on saying interesting things, rather than more traditional credentials.