Well, here we come to the gap between “the stated intention of Less Wrong” and “what people actually use it for”. This is surely a big part of the resolution of the gap I pointed out. If people are not using LW to increase their own rationality, then it should be clearer about that. Perhaps it’s my misreading of “refining the art of human rationality”—I assumed that the goal was “by making humans more rational”, but if the goal is just to sit around and have a delightful intellectual wankfest about the deep nature of rationality in isolation from people’s execution of their brains and use of their abilities in real life, then the site is being consistent :).
But this doesn’t seem consistent with Eliezer’s claim “Rationalists win”. I’ve seen enough of life to know that winners spend time building their many different kinds of muscles, not chatting on web forums.
Well, here we come to the gap between “the stated intention of Less Wrong” and “what people actually use it for”. This is surely a big part of the resolution of the gap I pointed out. If people are not using LW to increase their own rationality, then it should be clearer about that. Perhaps it’s my misreading of “refining the art of human rationality”—I assumed that the goal was “by making humans more rational”, but if the goal is just to sit around and have a delightful intellectual wankfest about the deep nature of rationality in isolation from people’s execution of their brains and use of their abilities in real life, then the site is being consistent :).
But this doesn’t seem consistent with Eliezer’s claim “Rationalists win”. I’ve seen enough of life to know that winners spend time building their many different kinds of muscles, not chatting on web forums.