That’s quite the journey! You’ve come a long way under your own sailing power it seems, and trust me, you aren’t alone here. You’ll find plenty of others who’ve made similar trips out of unquestioning dogma into exploration and experimentation. We each have a different life and learning, certainly. But many here share similar backgrounds (religious cultures, advanced at a young age, high intelligence compared to their peers) and many share similar resources (Internet as a connection tool, HPMoR as a gate way to the community). We are certainly glad to have you join and add your unique view to the conversation.
Glad to see you’ve already dove head first into some the resources. I usually try to make suggestions of the Sequences for new peoples, but I see you’ve beaten me to the punch! Yes, it’s not uncommon to come away from some of the posts thinking “I KNEW that. I just didn’t know how to frame it.” That intuitiveness helps with introducing some of the harder concepts that get discussed here… and can encourage people to experiment with ideas and expand on them. After all, we aren’t here to talk about how smart Yudkowsky or Yvain or Alicorn were when they wrote this or that. We’re here to do better.
This is certainly a place where questions are welcomed! Living forever, gender, boredom, we’ll discuss it all. Politics, of course, tends to be handled like an unexploded ordinance, but as long as the conversation is well reasoned and beneficial, we welcome it. You probably already know the site lay out, but if you’d like to start contributing to the conversation with your own posts, visit the latest Open Thread. It’s a good place to start posting because it will let you get a feel for the standards and norms of the community and the types of conversations we have. Also, posting comments on other posts is a good start as well. Once you get settled into the milieu, you can start branching out, posting articles of your own, starting larger discussions, contributing more if you desire.
Oh, and, depending on where you live, you may want to look for a local LessWrong meetup group. These are great places to meet fellow LWers, talk shop, engage in rationality workshops, heated discussions, or just fun activities. If you live in a place without a meetup group and you’re feeling particularly driven, you can also start up one of your own. Starting up a new group’s a fun, exciting activity and, who knows, could be the start of a big movement in your own community.
Anyway, enough spiel from me. Definitely glad to have you join the community, and thanks a lot for sharing your story. I hope to hear some of your questions (and answers) very soon.
Hello and welcome to Lesswrong!
That’s quite the journey! You’ve come a long way under your own sailing power it seems, and trust me, you aren’t alone here. You’ll find plenty of others who’ve made similar trips out of unquestioning dogma into exploration and experimentation. We each have a different life and learning, certainly. But many here share similar backgrounds (religious cultures, advanced at a young age, high intelligence compared to their peers) and many share similar resources (Internet as a connection tool, HPMoR as a gate way to the community). We are certainly glad to have you join and add your unique view to the conversation.
Glad to see you’ve already dove head first into some the resources. I usually try to make suggestions of the Sequences for new peoples, but I see you’ve beaten me to the punch! Yes, it’s not uncommon to come away from some of the posts thinking “I KNEW that. I just didn’t know how to frame it.” That intuitiveness helps with introducing some of the harder concepts that get discussed here… and can encourage people to experiment with ideas and expand on them. After all, we aren’t here to talk about how smart Yudkowsky or Yvain or Alicorn were when they wrote this or that. We’re here to do better.
This is certainly a place where questions are welcomed! Living forever, gender, boredom, we’ll discuss it all. Politics, of course, tends to be handled like an unexploded ordinance, but as long as the conversation is well reasoned and beneficial, we welcome it. You probably already know the site lay out, but if you’d like to start contributing to the conversation with your own posts, visit the latest Open Thread. It’s a good place to start posting because it will let you get a feel for the standards and norms of the community and the types of conversations we have. Also, posting comments on other posts is a good start as well. Once you get settled into the milieu, you can start branching out, posting articles of your own, starting larger discussions, contributing more if you desire.
Oh, and, depending on where you live, you may want to look for a local LessWrong meetup group. These are great places to meet fellow LWers, talk shop, engage in rationality workshops, heated discussions, or just fun activities. If you live in a place without a meetup group and you’re feeling particularly driven, you can also start up one of your own. Starting up a new group’s a fun, exciting activity and, who knows, could be the start of a big movement in your own community.
Anyway, enough spiel from me. Definitely glad to have you join the community, and thanks a lot for sharing your story. I hope to hear some of your questions (and answers) very soon.
Glad to have you with us!