“I feel like my cognitive capacities are nowhere near the average in this forum.”
Why do you feel that? I like to push back against such framing of cognitive capacities or capabilities generally, and instead frame those things as “where on the pareto frontier for some combination of skills are my capabilities?” My view here is heavily influenced by johnswentworth’s excellent post on the topic and what I’ve read from the history of science, innovation, etc. (Jason Crawford’s Progress Studies works are great, check them out)
Besides my pushing back against your stated framing of cognitive capacities, my main point here is that multi-domain expertise may, even if one’s raw “g (or intelligence)” are not as high as some others, more than make up for any potential shortcomings in said raw g because of how the pareto frontier works and how many possible areas of expertise within human capacity configuration space.
“I would love to exchange ideas and try to improve my rationality with less “advanced” people, wondering if anyone would have recommendations.”
Commenting on posts, asking questions, and writing shortform pieces can be great practice for that! Same with attending meetups, virtual or in-person. Writing posts from your own experience about subjects where you try to understand things better through that writing, discussing self-improvement things, or commenting on how rationality relates to your particular expertises are good ones too.
Building a small group to discuss things you read (the Library, Concepts, and Tags pages are all great spots on this site to find things to read) and posting about your experiences is a great way to have fun and spark more discussion and deliberate improvement with yourself and others.
For more informal discussions and access to lots of rationalists or rationalist adjacent people, there are a smattering of relevant Discord servers (some found here. I’m a member of a bunch and can probably invite you if you send me a PM. I’m also a member of the Guild of the Rose which is an education startup pulling mostly from rationalist communities for members and has been an excellent learning experience and community for me (I recommend and endorse Rose).
Hope these things help! Happy to discuss more. Writing a bunch of shortforms that mostly amounted to personal blogging helped make me more comfortable just posting or commenting as I felt like. I always have an eye to quality and the overall “what do we want LessWrong to be about” ideas when making a post, but also...community curation of posts exists for a reason, so don’t feel overwhelming pressure when writing or expressing yourself here. Feel some pressure though :) but the good kind that comes from pushing for improvement! (i feel a bit odd about saying that for some reason, but I’ll leave it up for now)
You are correct Willa! I am probably the Pareto best in a couple of things. I have a pretty good life all things considered. This post is my attempt to take it further, and your perspective is appreciated.
I tried going to EA groups in person and felt uncomfortable, if only because everyone was half my age or less. Good thing the internet fixes this problem, hence me writing this post.
Will join the discord servers and send you a pm! Will check out Guild of the Rose.
Opened a blog as well and will be trying to write, which from what I’ve read a gazillion times, is the best way to improve your thinking.
I would love to exchange ideas and try to improve my rationality with less “advanced” people, wondering if anyone would have recommendations.
Same challenge here. The average level of the contributions on LW seems very high to me too. I struggle to find the right fit for me, the correct difficulty setting, half-way between the average “easy” and LW “god mode”, haha
Bonjour !
Been reading lesswrong for years but never posted: I feel like my cognitive capacities are nowhere near the average in this forum.
I would love to exchange ideas and try to improve my rationality with less “advanced” people, wondering if anyone would have recommendations.
Been thinking that something like the changemyview subreddit might be a good start?
Thanks
Bienvenue!
“I feel like my cognitive capacities are nowhere near the average in this forum.”
Why do you feel that? I like to push back against such framing of cognitive capacities or capabilities generally, and instead frame those things as “where on the pareto frontier for some combination of skills are my capabilities?” My view here is heavily influenced by johnswentworth’s excellent post on the topic and what I’ve read from the history of science, innovation, etc. (Jason Crawford’s Progress Studies works are great, check them out)
Besides my pushing back against your stated framing of cognitive capacities, my main point here is that multi-domain expertise may, even if one’s raw “g (or intelligence)” are not as high as some others, more than make up for any potential shortcomings in said raw g because of how the pareto frontier works and how many possible areas of expertise within human capacity configuration space.
“I would love to exchange ideas and try to improve my rationality with less “advanced” people, wondering if anyone would have recommendations.”
Commenting on posts, asking questions, and writing shortform pieces can be great practice for that! Same with attending meetups, virtual or in-person. Writing posts from your own experience about subjects where you try to understand things better through that writing, discussing self-improvement things, or commenting on how rationality relates to your particular expertises are good ones too.
Building a small group to discuss things you read (the Library, Concepts, and Tags pages are all great spots on this site to find things to read) and posting about your experiences is a great way to have fun and spark more discussion and deliberate improvement with yourself and others.
For more informal discussions and access to lots of rationalists or rationalist adjacent people, there are a smattering of relevant Discord servers (some found here. I’m a member of a bunch and can probably invite you if you send me a PM. I’m also a member of the Guild of the Rose which is an education startup pulling mostly from rationalist communities for members and has been an excellent learning experience and community for me (I recommend and endorse Rose).
Hope these things help! Happy to discuss more. Writing a bunch of shortforms that mostly amounted to personal blogging helped make me more comfortable just posting or commenting as I felt like. I always have an eye to quality and the overall “what do we want LessWrong to be about” ideas when making a post, but also...community curation of posts exists for a reason, so don’t feel overwhelming pressure when writing or expressing yourself here. Feel some pressure though :) but the good kind that comes from pushing for improvement! (i feel a bit odd about saying that for some reason, but I’ll leave it up for now)
Cheers,
Willa
You are correct Willa! I am probably the Pareto best in a couple of things. I have a pretty good life all things considered. This post is my attempt to take it further, and your perspective is appreciated.
I tried going to EA groups in person and felt uncomfortable, if only because everyone was half my age or less. Good thing the internet fixes this problem, hence me writing this post.
Will join the discord servers and send you a pm! Will check out Guild of the Rose.
Opened a blog as well and will be trying to write, which from what I’ve read a gazillion times, is the best way to improve your thinking.
Merci for your message!
Same challenge here. The average level of the contributions on LW seems very high to me too. I struggle to find the right fit for me, the correct difficulty setting, half-way between the average “easy” and LW “god mode”, haha
Sent you a pm!