Poll Question: What are communities are you active in other than Less Wrong?
Communities that you think are closely related to Less Wrong are welcome, but I am also wondering what other completely unrelated groups you associate with. How do you think such communities help you? Are there any that you would recommend to an arbitrary Less Wronger?
Contra dance. Closely correlated with LessWrong; also correlated with nerdy people in general. I would recommend it to most LessWrongers; it’s good even for people who are not generally good at dancing, or who have problems interacting socially. (Perhaps even especially for those people; I think of it as a ‘gateway dance.’)
Other types of dance, like swing dance. Also some correlation with LessWrong, somewhat recommended but this depends more on your tastes. Generally has a higher barrier to entry than contra dancing.
I’m going to second Contra Dance. It’s really fun and easy to start while having a decent learning curve such that you don’t hit a skill ceiling fast. Plus you meet lots of people and interact with them in a controlled, friendly, cooperative fun fashion.
My local hackerspace, and broadly the US and European hacker communities. This is mainly because information security is my primary focus, but I find myself happier interacting with hackers because in general they tend not only to be highly outcome-oriented (i.e., inherently consequentialist), but also pragmatic about it: as the saying goes, there’s no arguing with a root shell. (Modulo bikeshedding, but this seems to be more of a failure mode of subgroups that don’t strive to avoid that problem.) The hacker community is also where I learned to think of communities in terms of design patterns; it’s one of the few groups I’ve encountered so far that puts effort into that sort of community self-evaluation. Mostly it helps me because it’s a place where I feel welcome, where other people see value in the goals I want to achieve and are working toward compatible goals. I’d encourage any instrumental rationalist with an interest in software engineering, and especially security, to visit a hackerspace or attend a hacker conference.
Until recently I was also involved in the “liberation technology” activism community, but ultimately found it toxic and left. I’m still too close to that situation to evaluate it fairly, but a lot of the toxicity had to do with identity politics and status games getting in the way of accomplishing anything of lasting value. (I’m also dissatisfied with the degree to which activism in general fixates on removing existing structures rather than replacing them with better ones, but again, too close to evaluate fairly.)
The only two communities I am currently active in right now (other than career/family communities) are Less Wrong and Unitarian Universalism.
In the past had a D&D group that I participated very actively in. I think that the people I played D&D with in high school had a very big and positive effect on my development.
I think that I would like to and am likely to develop a local community of people to play strategy board games in the future.
I’m active in Toastmasters and martial arts (mostly the community of my specify school). Overall Toastmasters seems pretty effective at its stated goals of improving public speaking and leadership skills. Its also fun (at least for me). Additionally, both force me to actually interact with other people, which is nice and not something that the rest of my live provides.
I’m active in (though not really a member of) the “left-libertarian” community, associated with places like Center for a Stateless Society (though I myself am not an anarchist) and Bleeding Heart Libertarians. I’m also a frequent reader and occasional commenter on EconLog.
Less related, I’m an active poster on GameFAQs and on a message board centered around the Heroes of Might and Magic game series.
I also used to be active on GameFAQs. For about a year in 2004 it was most of my internet activity, specifically the Pikmin boards. That was a long time ago though when I was a high school freshman.
Orthogonal to LW, I’m very active in my university’s Greek community, serving as VP of a fraternity. It’s been excellent social training and I’ve had a very positive experience.
Poll Question: What are communities are you active in other than Less Wrong?
Communities that you think are closely related to Less Wrong are welcome, but I am also wondering what other completely unrelated groups you associate with. How do you think such communities help you? Are there any that you would recommend to an arbitrary Less Wronger?
Contra dance. Closely correlated with LessWrong; also correlated with nerdy people in general. I would recommend it to most LessWrongers; it’s good even for people who are not generally good at dancing, or who have problems interacting socially. (Perhaps even especially for those people; I think of it as a ‘gateway dance.’)
Other types of dance, like swing dance. Also some correlation with LessWrong, somewhat recommended but this depends more on your tastes. Generally has a higher barrier to entry than contra dancing.
I did that for a while. It was popular at mathcamp so I started, but I haven’t done it recently. Maybe I’ll start again.
I’m going to second Contra Dance. It’s really fun and easy to start while having a decent learning curve such that you don’t hit a skill ceiling fast. Plus you meet lots of people and interact with them in a controlled, friendly, cooperative fun fashion.
I am actually planning on having a contra dance at my wedding.
My local hackerspace, and broadly the US and European hacker communities. This is mainly because information security is my primary focus, but I find myself happier interacting with hackers because in general they tend not only to be highly outcome-oriented (i.e., inherently consequentialist), but also pragmatic about it: as the saying goes, there’s no arguing with a root shell. (Modulo bikeshedding, but this seems to be more of a failure mode of subgroups that don’t strive to avoid that problem.) The hacker community is also where I learned to think of communities in terms of design patterns; it’s one of the few groups I’ve encountered so far that puts effort into that sort of community self-evaluation. Mostly it helps me because it’s a place where I feel welcome, where other people see value in the goals I want to achieve and are working toward compatible goals. I’d encourage any instrumental rationalist with an interest in software engineering, and especially security, to visit a hackerspace or attend a hacker conference.
Until recently I was also involved in the “liberation technology” activism community, but ultimately found it toxic and left. I’m still too close to that situation to evaluate it fairly, but a lot of the toxicity had to do with identity politics and status games getting in the way of accomplishing anything of lasting value. (I’m also dissatisfied with the degree to which activism in general fixates on removing existing structures rather than replacing them with better ones, but again, too close to evaluate fairly.)
The only two communities I am currently active in right now (other than career/family communities) are Less Wrong and Unitarian Universalism.
In the past had a D&D group that I participated very actively in. I think that the people I played D&D with in high school had a very big and positive effect on my development.
I think that I would like to and am likely to develop a local community of people to play strategy board games in the future.
Do you mean online communities or IRL?
Both
I’m active in UK competitive debating (mainly real life, but I also run some discussion forums).
[Good question. Its interesting to see the variety of people’s responses.]
I’m pretty active in lots of social activist/environmentalist/anarchist groups. I sometimes join protests for recreational reasons.
Could you give examples?
I’m active in Toastmasters and martial arts (mostly the community of my specify school). Overall Toastmasters seems pretty effective at its stated goals of improving public speaking and leadership skills. Its also fun (at least for me). Additionally, both force me to actually interact with other people, which is nice and not something that the rest of my live provides.
I’m active in (though not really a member of) the “left-libertarian” community, associated with places like Center for a Stateless Society (though I myself am not an anarchist) and Bleeding Heart Libertarians. I’m also a frequent reader and occasional commenter on EconLog.
Less related, I’m an active poster on GameFAQs and on a message board centered around the Heroes of Might and Magic game series.
I also used to be active on GameFAQs. For about a year in 2004 it was most of my internet activity, specifically the Pikmin boards. That was a long time ago though when I was a high school freshman.
Orthogonal to LW, I’m very active in my university’s Greek community, serving as VP of a fraternity. It’s been excellent social training and I’ve had a very positive experience.