You’re right, wnoise, “village idiot” is part of an idiom but one I don’t like at all and I don’t think I’m particular in this regard.
I should have put my objection as “‘Village idiot’ is gravely anachronistic unless you want to be insensitive by subsuming a plethora of medical conditions and social determinants under a dated, derogatory term for mentally disabled people.”
This may sound like nit-picking but obviously said intelligence graph is an important item in SIAI’s symbolic tool kit and therefore every detail should be right. When I see the graph, I’m always thinking: Please, “for the love of cute kittens”, change the “village idiot”!
For what it’s worth, I don’t find anything wrong with the term “village idiot”.
However, from previous discussions here, I think I might be on the low side of the community for my preference for “lengths to which Eliezer and the SIAI should go to accommodate the sensibilities of idiots”—there are more important things to do, and a never-ending supply of idiots.
Still, maybe it should be changed. It’s not because it doesn’t offend me that it won’t offend anybody reasonable.
You’re right, wnoise, “village idiot” is part of an idiom but one I don’t like at all and I don’t think I’m particular in this regard.
I should have put my objection as “‘Village idiot’ is gravely anachronistic unless you want to be insensitive by subsuming a plethora of medical conditions and social determinants under a dated, derogatory term for mentally disabled people.”
This may sound like nit-picking but obviously said intelligence graph is an important item in SIAI’s symbolic tool kit and therefore every detail should be right. When I see the graph, I’m always thinking: Please, “for the love of cute kittens”, change the “village idiot”!
For what it’s worth, I don’t find anything wrong with the term “village idiot”.
However, from previous discussions here, I think I might be on the low side of the community for my preference for “lengths to which Eliezer and the SIAI should go to accommodate the sensibilities of idiots”—there are more important things to do, and a never-ending supply of idiots.
Still, maybe it should be changed. It’s not because it doesn’t offend me that it won’t offend anybody reasonable.