He is a rationalist who is deeply against living by social norms and just sees them as defaults, and is “non-default” about pretty much everything
As soon as I read that, I thought “uh oh, this is bad...”, long before getting to the part about the STI. And unfortunately, this first sentence describes too many people in the LessWrong community, even ones who are more careful about STIs. Maybe this will be a wakeup call to people to stop equating “rationalist” with “rejecting social norms.”
I think this one by Yvain works as a plausible explanation for why this is unlikely to change.
Do you deliberately pick topics that cause controversy here, or is your model of this community flawed? Either way I find people’s reactions to your posts amusing.
I think this one by Yvain works as a plausible explanation for why this is unlikely to change.
I love Yvain’s post on meta-contrarianism, and yeah, it pinpoints a major source of the problem. I guess I tend to be slightly more optimistic about the possibility of LessWrong changing in this regard, but maybe you’re right.
Do you deliberately pick topics that cause controversy here, or is your model of this community flawed? Either way I find people’s reactions to your posts amusing.
When I write my more controversial posts, I do so knowing I’m going against views that are widely-held in the community, though I often had difficulty predicting what the exact reaction will be.
If you’re going to argue using appeals to tradition, it helps to know something about the history of the tradition you’re appealing to. In particular whether it has centuries of experience behind it or is merely something some meta-contrarians from the previous generation thought was a good idea.
As soon as I read that, I thought “uh oh, this is bad...”, long before getting to the part about the STI. And unfortunately, this first sentence describes too many people in the LessWrong community, even ones who are more careful about STIs. Maybe this will be a wakeup call to people to stop equating “rationalist” with “rejecting social norms.”
I think this one by Yvain works as a plausible explanation for why this is unlikely to change.
Do you deliberately pick topics that cause controversy here, or is your model of this community flawed? Either way I find people’s reactions to your posts amusing.
I love Yvain’s post on meta-contrarianism, and yeah, it pinpoints a major source of the problem. I guess I tend to be slightly more optimistic about the possibility of LessWrong changing in this regard, but maybe you’re right.
When I write my more controversial posts, I do so knowing I’m going against views that are widely-held in the community, though I often had difficulty predicting what the exact reaction will be.
If you’re going to argue using appeals to tradition, it helps to know something about the history of the tradition you’re appealing to. In particular whether it has centuries of experience behind it or is merely something some meta-contrarians from the previous generation thought was a good idea.