In fact “Roissy in DC” (a blog written by an openly misogynistic male “pick-up artist”) has a much larger percentage of female commenters than Less Wrong
Yes but they’re probably not the kind of intelligent women we are after.
There obviously are lots of very intelligent women in the world who could be great rationalists. But I don’t think that the strategy of censoring certain forms of speech every time the gender issue comes up would necessarily help to attract them. Many intelligent women would probably be rather pissed off with what Alicorn is saying and consider censoring uses of language that are perfectly standard within the world at large, and censoring forms of thought that produce accurate models because they hurt people’s feelings to be a mockery of rationality. Rationality is basically the art of not censoring thought because it hurts your feelings.
Roko, I’ve read through a lot of your comments and we agree on a lot. I think you’re bringing very important ideas to the table, including your politics comment down the page, which I upvoted.
I would never advocate the censorship of language, but I think that a lot of what is potentially offensive to females results from careless thinking about gender that could be corrected with the appropriate information. I don’t care about my feelings being hurt, I care because I think that their current perceptions about females that are showing through in the posts result from a lack of information which I have, and that they would probably appreciate receiving.
Anyways… no one is actually censoring anyone because no one is keeping anyone from saying anything, right? Someone is just calling to attention what I think most gender sensitive people (which would probably be the majority of the people here!) would avoid anyway if they considered it for a moment.
I would like to say again, that I can see why you would be concerned. We should continue to promote things based on scientific or rational merit and not take the easy way out using political-like appeals.
Yes but they’re probably not the kind of intelligent women we are after.
There obviously are lots of very intelligent women in the world who could be great rationalists. But I don’t think that the strategy of censoring certain forms of speech every time the gender issue comes up would necessarily help to attract them. Many intelligent women would probably be rather pissed off with what Alicorn is saying and consider censoring uses of language that are perfectly standard within the world at large, and censoring forms of thought that produce accurate models because they hurt people’s feelings to be a mockery of rationality. Rationality is basically the art of not censoring thought because it hurts your feelings.
“Rationality is basically the art of not censoring thought because it hurts your feelings.”
And driving is basically the art of turning a wheel back and forth.
Roko, I’ve read through a lot of your comments and we agree on a lot. I think you’re bringing very important ideas to the table, including your politics comment down the page, which I upvoted.
I would never advocate the censorship of language, but I think that a lot of what is potentially offensive to females results from careless thinking about gender that could be corrected with the appropriate information. I don’t care about my feelings being hurt, I care because I think that their current perceptions about females that are showing through in the posts result from a lack of information which I have, and that they would probably appreciate receiving.
Anyways… no one is actually censoring anyone because no one is keeping anyone from saying anything, right? Someone is just calling to attention what I think most gender sensitive people (which would probably be the majority of the people here!) would avoid anyway if they considered it for a moment.
I would like to say again, that I can see why you would be concerned. We should continue to promote things based on scientific or rational merit and not take the easy way out using political-like appeals.