The core of what LessWrong is about isn’t studying social constructs. I would even say that a lot of the posts about social constructs are of lower quality than other LW posts. If I would show LW to someone who has never heard of it, I wouldn’t take a post about social interaction.
A lot of the sequences contain social constructs, or at least can have social impact for readers. The entirety of the book’s subsections titled ’Fake Beliefs”, “Mysterious Answers” or “Politics and Rationality” falls under social construct commentary.
If it helps, I’d define social constructs as topics relating to how humans communicate, and what is considered socially acceptable knowledge by certain demographics . What passes as knowledge according to rational traditions will lead one to accept or reject what is considered socially acceptable by others, and social construct commentary would be the act of commenting on such acceptance or rejection, defining what should be accepted or rejected. Rational study MUST include social commentary simply because we’re stuck with human communication as the only form of transmission of ideas between others. Why is this relevant? Because how one communicates rational concepts can be considered socially unacceptable. And also because what is considered socially accepted in certain demographic areas can directly reject rational pursuits.
Unless of course you’re ready to call the “Fake Beliefs” section low quality, I’d say social commentary is unavoidable when it comes to the study of AI or rational improvement of the mind. After all having vastly different ideas of what passes as reality for yourself can have lasting impacts on social cohesion with others if their maps differ from yours (unless you were a fantastic liar).
When I’m speaking about lower quality posts about social constructs I’m referring to posts about status signaling and ask&guess culture.
As far as core posts of the sequences go, they are written in a polarizing way. That means that they have their fans and other people react strongly negative. That’s generally how writing gets popular in the age of blogs.
Double crux is about social interaction. The main benefit of it most likely is the fact that it presents the disagreement as something to work on together, instead of something to fight over it.
The core of what LessWrong is about isn’t studying social constructs. I would even say that a lot of the posts about social constructs are of lower quality than other LW posts. If I would show LW to someone who has never heard of it, I wouldn’t take a post about social interaction.
* I wouldn’t classify a post like http://lesswrong.com/lw/o6p/double_crux_a_strategy_for_resolving_disagreement/ as being about social constructs for the way I’m using the term here.
A lot of the sequences contain social constructs, or at least can have social impact for readers. The entirety of the book’s subsections titled ’Fake Beliefs”, “Mysterious Answers” or “Politics and Rationality” falls under social construct commentary.
If it helps, I’d define social constructs as topics relating to how humans communicate, and what is considered socially acceptable knowledge by certain demographics . What passes as knowledge according to rational traditions will lead one to accept or reject what is considered socially acceptable by others, and social construct commentary would be the act of commenting on such acceptance or rejection, defining what should be accepted or rejected. Rational study MUST include social commentary simply because we’re stuck with human communication as the only form of transmission of ideas between others. Why is this relevant? Because how one communicates rational concepts can be considered socially unacceptable. And also because what is considered socially accepted in certain demographic areas can directly reject rational pursuits.
Unless of course you’re ready to call the “Fake Beliefs” section low quality, I’d say social commentary is unavoidable when it comes to the study of AI or rational improvement of the mind. After all having vastly different ideas of what passes as reality for yourself can have lasting impacts on social cohesion with others if their maps differ from yours (unless you were a fantastic liar).
When I’m speaking about lower quality posts about social constructs I’m referring to posts about status signaling and ask&guess culture.
As far as core posts of the sequences go, they are written in a polarizing way. That means that they have their fans and other people react strongly negative. That’s generally how writing gets popular in the age of blogs.
Double crux is about social interaction. The main benefit of it most likely is the fact that it presents the disagreement as something to work on together, instead of something to fight over it.