I think the distillation function is better served by new posts, as opposed to extensive revisions of old posts. The repeated attempts to re-explain simulacra are a good example of this.
Part of why I think this is because I believe editing old posts, especially extensive editing, loses some “aliveness” from the post which lets me get in touch with the author’s thought process as they write. Let the rough off the cuff posts stay rough.
Another reason is that textbooks and high quality survey papers are not edited versions of old papers.
“Radical Probabilism” was in many ways a more mature version of “toward a new technical explanation of technical explanation”, but could never be produced by editing the old post.
I think the distillation function is better served by new posts, as opposed to extensive revisions of old posts. The repeated attempts to re-explain simulacra are a good example of this.
Part of why I think this is because I believe editing old posts, especially extensive editing, loses some “aliveness” from the post which lets me get in touch with the author’s thought process as they write. Let the rough off the cuff posts stay rough.
Another reason is that textbooks and high quality survey papers are not edited versions of old papers.
“Radical Probabilism” was in many ways a more mature version of “toward a new technical explanation of technical explanation”, but could never be produced by editing the old post.