I’d hope that LessWrong is a community in which having in the past been willing to support controversial opinions would increase your repute, not decrease it.
Giving respect to controversy for the sake of controversy is just inviting more trolling and flamewars.
I have respect for true ideas, whether they are outmoded or fashionable or before their time. I don’t care whether an idea is original or creative or daring or shocking or boring, I want to know if it’s sound.
The fact that you seem to expect increased respect because of controversial opinions makes me think that you when you wrote about your support for infanticide, you were motivated more by the fact that many people disagreed with you, than by the fact that it’s actually a good idea that would make the world a better place.
Libertarians are a contentious lot, in many cases delighting in staking ground and refusing to move on the farthest frontiers of applying the principles of noncoercion and nonaggression; resolutely finding the most outrageous and obnoxious position you could take that is theoretically compatible with libertarianism and challenging anyone to disagree. If they are not of the movement, then you can enjoy having shocked them with your purism and dedication to principle; if they are of the movement, you can gleefully read them out of it.
...whereas my positions on Newcomb’s paradox… are not
two-box
Let’s not go off on that tangent in here, but two-boxing is hardly uncontroversial on LW: lots of one-boxers here, including Yudkowsky. I’m one too. Also, didn’t you say you “want to win”?
Giving respect to controversy for the sake of controversy is just inviting more trolling and flamewars.
I have respect for true ideas, whether they are outmoded or fashionable or before their time. I don’t care whether an idea is original or creative or daring or shocking or boring, I want to know if it’s sound.
The fact that you seem to expect increased respect because of controversial opinions makes me think that you when you wrote about your support for infanticide, you were motivated more by the fact that many people disagreed with you, than by the fact that it’s actually a good idea that would make the world a better place.
You remind me of Hanson (well, Doherty actually) on Libertarian Purity Duels
Let’s not go off on that tangent in here, but two-boxing is hardly uncontroversial on LW: lots of one-boxers here, including Yudkowsky. I’m one too. Also, didn’t you say you “want to win”?