Increased focus on effortful exercises, on measuring usefulness, and on in-person meetups sounds fruitful. However, despite the desirability of those changes, many LW-ers seem to substantially improve their epistemic rationality through participating on LW even as it currently is, especially when they read Eliezer’s sequences. If people skip LW so as to focus exclusively on effortful exercises in other communities, or on increasing their earning power or doing other work, they may never obtain this level of thinking skill concerning their aims, their potential impact on the world, etc. Directed effort can speed our learning of epistemic rationality; but effort directed elsewhere won’t ever produce the requisite thinking skills.
(I made a more detailed comment here, but it seems worth repeatedly emphasizing LW’s aims as we consider how to step up energy levels and self-improvement power.)
Increased focus on effortful exercises, on measuring usefulness, and on in-person meetups sounds fruitful. However, despite the desirability of those changes, many LW-ers seem to substantially improve their epistemic rationality through participating on LW even as it currently is, especially when they read Eliezer’s sequences. If people skip LW so as to focus exclusively on effortful exercises in other communities, or on increasing their earning power or doing other work, they may never obtain this level of thinking skill concerning their aims, their potential impact on the world, etc. Directed effort can speed our learning of epistemic rationality; but effort directed elsewhere won’t ever produce the requisite thinking skills.
(I made a more detailed comment here, but it seems worth repeatedly emphasizing LW’s aims as we consider how to step up energy levels and self-improvement power.)