A libertarian who is also a fan of Moldbug and PUAs is in my estimation almost certain to be some way out on the non-religious branch of the right. Obviously my views are not unbiased, and I hope I have not claimed them to be. Your last paragraph is good snark, but I think it’s pretty close to how a fair portion of those on the political left would see it. Anyone who identifies as liberal is likely to see Peter Thiel and Robin Hanson as far-right nutcases (assuming they’ve heard of them). Yudkowsky, as I see it, is libertarian by upbringing but generally indifferent to politics, so he can only be far-right by association. All of his really far-out opinions are elsewhere.
Our sister site Overcoming Bias does directly link to Heartiste’s blog (under its old name of Roissy in DC) so maybe he is overrepresented in PUA discussions, but I’d argue a larger part of why he is overrepresented is that he makes a good target to straw man PUA.
He is a good target to straw man PUAs! I’m glad we found something we can agree on! Naming himself Heartiste was the greatest gift any man could give to snarky enemies of the PUA movement. But he also writes some truly messed up stuff (no links because I don’t want to vomit right now), and he is linked to by Hanson, so I don’t think criticizing him is unfair.
But yes I’m fully aware people really do think like that. Check out the link I put in “evil knows no bounds”. I’ve seen hysterical diatribes elsewhere online of how utterly vile and wicked it is of Thiel to pay exceptional young people not to go to college since it RUINS THEIR FUTURE FOREVER. Contrary to all the data we have on what education actually does, which shows they will likely be fine since college is probably mostly signaling.
What I think you will have to admit, is that people like Thiel are also the kind of people who are more likely than average to take things like encouraging social or technological innovation, curing ageing, cryonic and existential risk seriously. Just inspecting the sources of funding of such efforts should give you overwhelming of evidence of this.
If you take away Robin Hanson and other people from that cluster away, cease to tolerate them, preciously little original synthesis and though beyond what academia already did would remain. I would go as far as to say that applied rationality and self-improvement that actually works is indeed a strong attractor in the context of their memeplex. One could argue that they where and still are the intellectually and socially invested backbone of the community that formed around Overcoming Bias and LessWrong!
Anyone who identifies as liberal is likely to see Peter Thiel and Robin Hanson as far-right nutcases (assuming they’ve heard of them).
They will just have to get over that though.
And those that can’t… “And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.”
I’m sure many conservatives can’t get over what kind of people the atheism filter tends to select either and don’t join us because of it. And unlike conservatives, “liberals” and “socialists” hold a supermajority here, is it really so terrible they make up just 60%+ of the site rather than 95%+?
Looking at the history of the important issues and positions I mentioned hold in society it seems pretty clear that It isn’t that this particular cluster of “far right” people is wickedly hogging them, clutching them with their slimy low status tentacles from the reach of what would otherwise be an enthusiastic mainstream.
It is precisely the traits that attracted them to their cluster that make them more likely to endorse and build upon LW-style rationality.
One could argue that they where and still are the intellectually and socially invested backbone of the community that formed around Overcoming Bias and LessWrong!
That’s the argument I wanted to make, so I think I’ll steal it. The intellectually and socially invested backbone of the community was and is distinctly right-leaning. Hence, the site is in many ways unwelcoming to people on the political left, much as was earlier claimed that the site is unwelcoming to some on the right.
They will just have to get over that though.
Right. And I think this applies equally to the right-wing readers and commenters who feel the site isn’t sufficiently sympathetic to their political views. Obviously I do not think that the political right deserves special treatment on account of somehow being innately more rational than the other tribes.
A libertarian who is also a fan of Moldbug and PUAs is in my estimation almost certain to be some way out on the non-religious branch of the right. Obviously my views are not unbiased, and I hope I have not claimed them to be. Your last paragraph is good snark, but I think it’s pretty close to how a fair portion of those on the political left would see it. Anyone who identifies as liberal is likely to see Peter Thiel and Robin Hanson as far-right nutcases (assuming they’ve heard of them). Yudkowsky, as I see it, is libertarian by upbringing but generally indifferent to politics, so he can only be far-right by association. All of his really far-out opinions are elsewhere.
He is a good target to straw man PUAs! I’m glad we found something we can agree on! Naming himself Heartiste was the greatest gift any man could give to snarky enemies of the PUA movement. But he also writes some truly messed up stuff (no links because I don’t want to vomit right now), and he is linked to by Hanson, so I don’t think criticizing him is unfair.
Good, I was aiming for snark.
But yes I’m fully aware people really do think like that. Check out the link I put in “evil knows no bounds”. I’ve seen hysterical diatribes elsewhere online of how utterly vile and wicked it is of Thiel to pay exceptional young people not to go to college since it RUINS THEIR FUTURE FOREVER. Contrary to all the data we have on what education actually does, which shows they will likely be fine since college is probably mostly signaling.
What I think you will have to admit, is that people like Thiel are also the kind of people who are more likely than average to take things like encouraging social or technological innovation, curing ageing, cryonic and existential risk seriously. Just inspecting the sources of funding of such efforts should give you overwhelming of evidence of this.
If you take away Robin Hanson and other people from that cluster away, cease to tolerate them, preciously little original synthesis and though beyond what academia already did would remain. I would go as far as to say that applied rationality and self-improvement that actually works is indeed a strong attractor in the context of their memeplex. One could argue that they where and still are the intellectually and socially invested backbone of the community that formed around Overcoming Bias and LessWrong!
They will just have to get over that though.
And those that can’t… “And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.”
I’m sure many conservatives can’t get over what kind of people the atheism filter tends to select either and don’t join us because of it. And unlike conservatives, “liberals” and “socialists” hold a supermajority here, is it really so terrible they make up just 60%+ of the site rather than 95%+?
Looking at the history of the important issues and positions I mentioned hold in society it seems pretty clear that It isn’t that this particular cluster of “far right” people is wickedly hogging them, clutching them with their slimy low status tentacles from the reach of what would otherwise be an enthusiastic mainstream.
It is precisely the traits that attracted them to their cluster that make them more likely to endorse and build upon LW-style rationality.
That’s the argument I wanted to make, so I think I’ll steal it. The intellectually and socially invested backbone of the community was and is distinctly right-leaning. Hence, the site is in many ways unwelcoming to people on the political left, much as was earlier claimed that the site is unwelcoming to some on the right.
Right. And I think this applies equally to the right-wing readers and commenters who feel the site isn’t sufficiently sympathetic to their political views. Obviously I do not think that the political right deserves special treatment on account of somehow being innately more rational than the other tribes.
I hope I didn’t imply this.