Probably true for most of the public, but I bet pretty strongly against “there are zero important/influential people who read LessWrong, or who read papers or essays that mirror LessWrong terminology, who will end up being confused about this in a way that matters.”
Meanwhile, I see almost zero reason to keep using fast/slow – I think it will continue to confuse newcomers to the debate on LessWrong, and I think if you swap in either smooth/sharp or soft/hard there will approximately no confusion. I agree there is some annoyance/friction in remembering to use the new terms, but I don’t think this adds up to much – I think the amount of downstream confusion and wasted time from any given LW post or paper using the term will already outweigh the cost to the author.
(fyi I’m going to try to write some subtantive thoughts on your actual point, and suggest moving this discussion to this post if you are moved to argue more about it)
I think you are dramatically overestimating the general public’s interest in how things are named on random LessWrong blog posts.
Probably true for most of the public, but I bet pretty strongly against “there are zero important/influential people who read LessWrong, or who read papers or essays that mirror LessWrong terminology, who will end up being confused about this in a way that matters.”
Meanwhile, I see almost zero reason to keep using fast/slow – I think it will continue to confuse newcomers to the debate on LessWrong, and I think if you swap in either smooth/sharp or soft/hard there will approximately no confusion. I agree there is some annoyance/friction in remembering to use the new terms, but I don’t think this adds up to much – I think the amount of downstream confusion and wasted time from any given LW post or paper using the term will already outweigh the cost to the author.
(fyi I’m going to try to write some subtantive thoughts on your actual point, and suggest moving this discussion to this post if you are moved to argue more about it)