And the thing is, I would go as far as to say many people in the rationality community experience this same frustration. They found a group that they feel like should be their tribe, but they really don’t feel a close connection to most people in it, and feel alienated as a result.
As someone who has considered making the Pilgrimmage To The Bay for precisely that reason and as someone who decided against it partly due to that particular concern, I thank you for giving me a data-point on it.
Being a rationalist in the real worldtm can be hard. The set of people who actually worry about saving the world, understanding their own minds and connecting with others is pretty low. In my bubble at least, picking a random hobby and incidentally becoming friends with someone at it and then incidentally getting slammed and incidentally an impromptu conversation has been the best performing strategy so far in terms of success per opportunity-cost. As a result, looking from the outside at a rationalist community that cares about all these things looks like a fantastical life-changing ideal.
But, from the outside view, all the people I’ve seen who’ve aggressively targeted those ideals have gotten crushed. So I’ve adopted a strategy of Not Doing That.
(pssst: this doesn’t just apply to the rationalist community! it applies to any community oriented around values disproportionately held by individuals who have been disenfranchised by broader society in any way! there are a lot of implications here and they’re all mildly depressing!)
As someone who has considered making the Pilgrimmage To The Bay for precisely that reason and as someone who decided against it partly due to that particular concern, I thank you for giving me a data-point on it.
Being a rationalist in the real worldtm can be hard. The set of people who actually worry about saving the world, understanding their own minds and connecting with others is pretty low. In my bubble at least, picking a random hobby and incidentally becoming friends with someone at it and then incidentally getting slammed and incidentally an impromptu conversation has been the best performing strategy so far in terms of success per opportunity-cost. As a result, looking from the outside at a rationalist community that cares about all these things looks like a fantastical life-changing ideal.
But, from the outside view, all the people I’ve seen who’ve aggressively targeted those ideals have gotten crushed. So I’ve adopted a strategy of Not Doing That.
(pssst: this doesn’t just apply to the rationalist community! it applies to any community oriented around values disproportionately held by individuals who have been disenfranchised by broader society in any way! there are a lot of implications here and they’re all mildly depressing!)