Why should the term “the sequences” even be in the title? What does it tell an uninformed reader? Does it have any useful meaning for anyone who hasn’t already read them? (Why are they even called that, anyway? I mean… I guess it’s just that it was a sequence of blog posts?) In what way is “The Sequences” or “[Some title]: the Sequences” better than “The Blog Posts” or “The Diary Entries”?
I think the increased publicity of both would outweigh any bugs. Showing all HPMoR readers a book on how to be Harry? Showing all MoR:BLW readers a fiction about magic, using everything they’ve now learned!
Becoming Less Wrong seems to be the best option so far.
Becoming Less Wrong: The Art of Debugging Yourself
Just have it as Becoming Less Wrong or Becoming Less Wrong: Something Catchier.
These won’t work for the same reason “Winning” wouldn’t be used.
They rely on the idea that people are actively hunting for ways to be more rational, but this just isn’t true, which means that the “Wrong” isn’t going to mean what you’re hoping it’ll mean. Odds are the people who pick this book up are in middle of a relationship, or something interesting happened at work, or they’re thinking about how to do a school assignment. In other words, everything they know about life is telling them that they’re doing alright, or rather, that they personally aren’t doing wrongly. They’ll decide “This book must be for somebody else, I’ve got all my things together”, or possibly “Things are going bad right now, but I’m working to fix it, so I don’t need a book telling me to change my attitude” and set it down. The point of the book was improve their decision making thinking, not fix their attitude, but the title didn’t convey that properly, so misunderstandings were had.
“Wrong”, like “Winning”, has a completely different context outside the Less Wrong community. It’s more closely associated with vitriol, bad guys and good guys, guilt, righteous resentment, arguments. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that those feelings are the real concept of “Wrongness”, and it’s only in this community that an exotic sort of quale became substituted.
And this is why market research on non-LWers is important.
I don’t think that popular usage of ‘wrong’ is so totally divorced from the usage here, although it may not be the only usage of the word. Ultimately, however, the best way to determine that is to ask some people.
Don’t know if this is where it comes from, but I always thought of “sequences” as an elaboration on the idea of rationality as a martial art; the term has some significance in theatrical swordplay, and it could also be compared to the Japanese kata.
If they’re editing this so much it’s a single cohesive work, that’s a huge amount of work. If they’re not, then the subtitle should be something like “Essays 2006-2009” or “Blog posts 2006-2009″ to make it clear that it’s not.
I suspect the name Sequences came from Levels of Organization In General Intelligence, where “sequiturs”, “belief consequents”, and “thought sequences” are used to describe high level, serial ordered thoughts in human brains (like an internal spoken narrative or train of thought) and how those thought sequences are generated in support of goal-directed behavior.
Why should the term “the sequences” even be in the title? What does it tell an uninformed reader? Does it have any useful meaning for anyone who hasn’t already read them? (Why are they even called that, anyway? I mean… I guess it’s just that it was a sequence of blog posts?) In what way is “The Sequences” or “[Some title]: the Sequences” better than “The Blog Posts” or “The Diary Entries”?
I like the sound of it more if it doesnt include ‘sequences’ or anything like that at all. For example instead of:
Just have it as Becoming Less Wrong or Becoming Less Wrong: Something Catchier.
Becoming Less Wrong: The Art of Debugging Yourself
Becoming Less Wrong seems to be the best option so far.
Just so it’s near the top:
‘The Methods of Rationality’ ties in with HPMoR, and sounds amazing. To me.
‘Methods of Rationality’ hadn’t been proposed at the time. I agree, it’s pretty good. Perhaps:
Title: The Methods of Rationality
Subtitle: How to Become Less Wrong/Becoming Less Wrong
The Title:Subtitle format seems to be popular.
(However, as noted elsewhere, confusion with HPMOR may be a a bug rather than a feature )
I think the increased publicity of both would outweigh any bugs. Showing all HPMoR readers a book on how to be Harry? Showing all MoR:BLW readers a fiction about magic, using everything they’ve now learned!
These won’t work for the same reason “Winning” wouldn’t be used.
They rely on the idea that people are actively hunting for ways to be more rational, but this just isn’t true, which means that the “Wrong” isn’t going to mean what you’re hoping it’ll mean. Odds are the people who pick this book up are in middle of a relationship, or something interesting happened at work, or they’re thinking about how to do a school assignment. In other words, everything they know about life is telling them that they’re doing alright, or rather, that they personally aren’t doing wrongly. They’ll decide “This book must be for somebody else, I’ve got all my things together”, or possibly “Things are going bad right now, but I’m working to fix it, so I don’t need a book telling me to change my attitude” and set it down. The point of the book was improve their decision making thinking, not fix their attitude, but the title didn’t convey that properly, so misunderstandings were had.
“Wrong”, like “Winning”, has a completely different context outside the Less Wrong community. It’s more closely associated with vitriol, bad guys and good guys, guilt, righteous resentment, arguments. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that those feelings are the real concept of “Wrongness”, and it’s only in this community that an exotic sort of quale became substituted.
And this is why market research on non-LWers is important. I don’t think that popular usage of ‘wrong’ is so totally divorced from the usage here, although it may not be the only usage of the word. Ultimately, however, the best way to determine that is to ask some people.
Don’t know if this is where it comes from, but I always thought of “sequences” as an elaboration on the idea of rationality as a martial art; the term has some significance in theatrical swordplay, and it could also be compared to the Japanese kata.
If they’re editing this so much it’s a single cohesive work, that’s a huge amount of work. If they’re not, then the subtitle should be something like “Essays 2006-2009” or “Blog posts 2006-2009″ to make it clear that it’s not.
I suspect the name Sequences came from Levels of Organization In General Intelligence, where “sequiturs”, “belief consequents”, and “thought sequences” are used to describe high level, serial ordered thoughts in human brains (like an internal spoken narrative or train of thought) and how those thought sequences are generated in support of goal-directed behavior.