I don’t really hang out anywhere like PUA forums or racist blogs or anything like that, so maybe I only encounter the good stuff that has enough sensibleness to it to filter into the rest of the internet?
Like cracked.com and 4chan? Sensibleness is not the filter for popularity on the internet.
That article is fucking gold. Thanks for the link. Now unfortunately that was not the point you were trying to make...
Different people respond to different forms. Some are suckers for a man in a white coat intoning “studies have shown”. Some will lap up Deep Wisdom from anyone in Tibetan robes. Some will believe anyone who shouts at them loudly enough. (Makes for some interesting dynamics on PUA and NLP forums, where assertion is alpha, but both agreement and disagreement are beta.)
However, I don’t think it’s a good idea to dismiss an article because you can say the same thing without 99% of the article.
It’s more that you can write the same content with a completely different 99%, with many completely different 99%s. Ayn Rand, Thich Nhat Hanh, and Feynman could have written the same content, in different ways. How does one determine whether one is responding to the clothing of the message, rather than the content? The red pill idea is particularly attractive to anyone who thinks they’re smarter than those around them. And look where we are, LessWrong, where “contrarian” is a compliment, as if reversed consensus were intelligence.
I can believe that that article is not written in a way that works for everyone, but I think that for some people (the target audience, for example), it’s exactly what they need to hear, and anything nicer wouldn’t get the point across.
Skilful means, as the Buddhists put it. But of those who think they learned something from that article, how many would have learned whatever message the writer might have expressed in the same style?
And look where we are, LessWrong, where “contrarian” is a compliment, as if reversed consensus were intelligence.
Can you link to an example of someone using it as a compliment? I don’t think this is actually the case. It’s simply much less of an insult here than it is in most “skeptic” communities.
In the first link you quoted me describing Moldbug, I should clarify it was used as a put down. I’ve said quite explicitly in other posts that I strongly agree with Hanson on contrarianism.
In the second link the person continues:
The result is that I’m biased towards contrarian theses, which I think is useful for improving group rationality in most cases, but still isn’t rational.
The third is a good example but it is in an article talking about how weird LessWrong is for its love of contrarianism.
I did mean “and most of all contrarian” quite seriously, I just didn’t expect readers to take that as good. It was meant as a warning since I think Moldbug would be a better thinker if he was less contrarian but I’ll update on you reading of it when using the term in the future.
This apparent misunderstanding on second thought isn’t surprising since this community is self-selected for the kind of people who like enjoy contrarian arguments. Weird out there (not saying incorrect) beliefs such as buying cryonics being a good idea otherwise wouldn’t be popular here.
In addition to this if you visit a site where examples of human cognitive failure are investigate every day and individual debasing techniques discussed, but little ephasis is given on how to build communities that have good epistemology or avoid the biases one seems likely to find the story of “lone genius exposes establishment consensus as nonsense” more plausible than otherwise.
Like cracked.com and 4chan? Sensibleness is not the filter for popularity on the internet.
Different people respond to different forms. Some are suckers for a man in a white coat intoning “studies have shown”. Some will lap up Deep Wisdom from anyone in Tibetan robes. Some will believe anyone who shouts at them loudly enough. (Makes for some interesting dynamics on PUA and NLP forums, where assertion is alpha, but both agreement and disagreement are beta.)
It’s more that you can write the same content with a completely different 99%, with many completely different 99%s. Ayn Rand, Thich Nhat Hanh, and Feynman could have written the same content, in different ways. How does one determine whether one is responding to the clothing of the message, rather than the content? The red pill idea is particularly attractive to anyone who thinks they’re smarter than those around them. And look where we are, LessWrong, where “contrarian” is a compliment, as if reversed consensus were intelligence.
Skilful means, as the Buddhists put it. But of those who think they learned something from that article, how many would have learned whatever message the writer might have expressed in the same style?
Can you link to an example of someone using it as a compliment? I don’t think this is actually the case. It’s simply much less of an insult here than it is in most “skeptic” communities.
Yes:
Yes (a self-description rather than a compliment to someone else, but clearly intended to be read as a worthy attribute):
Here is someone excusing themselves for not being contrarian:
In the first link you quoted me describing Moldbug, I should clarify it was used as a put down. I’ve said quite explicitly in other posts that I strongly agree with Hanson on contrarianism.
In the second link the person continues:
The third is a good example but it is in an article talking about how weird LessWrong is for its love of contrarianism.
I’ll take your word for your intentions, but the article itself gives me no impression that it was intended anything other than seriously.
I did mean “and most of all contrarian” quite seriously, I just didn’t expect readers to take that as good. It was meant as a warning since I think Moldbug would be a better thinker if he was less contrarian but I’ll update on you reading of it when using the term in the future.
This apparent misunderstanding on second thought isn’t surprising since this community is self-selected for the kind of people who like enjoy contrarian arguments. Weird out there (not saying incorrect) beliefs such as buying cryonics being a good idea otherwise wouldn’t be popular here.
In addition to this if you visit a site where examples of human cognitive failure are investigate every day and individual debasing techniques discussed, but little ephasis is given on how to build communities that have good epistemology or avoid the biases one seems likely to find the story of “lone genius exposes establishment consensus as nonsense” more plausible than otherwise.