Secondly, to preserve the flow of writing, it’s important to use words/phrases that don’t need links to be understood. For example, the way you use ‘grok’ or ‘information asymmetry’ breaks the flow. It’s alright to use those words, and it’s alright to link them, but it’s important that you explain the words as you use them so that the reader doesn’t break focus.
I disagree with that. I really like this style and I’m happy it’s popular on LessWrong. It means that those who know what a term means can read through without interruption, and those that don’t are pointed to somewhere they can actually read and learn deeply about it instead of just explaining it in one line. It also allows to build upon ideas much more easily, some posts here are jargon heavy (in a good way), and it would be very difficult to write them if everyone had to explain every term from scratch. To be clear, It’s not that I have a problem with people explaining terms (though it can get excessive, you see that in journalism a lot), in some cases It’s good and It’s in large part a matter of style.
What formatting do you want? Generally if you want formatting options you select the text and a menu appears.
If you want to emphasize that power in your writing, I’d recommend that when you talk about these emotional movements you use ‘you’ pronouns or speak about a community.
This might make the writing more emotionally powerful or something, but I think it’d make the post less epistemically well-grounded. One can be more certain that they experienced an effect than they can be that others would experience it.
Exactly. And in particular, it would have me prioritizing impact on others over alignment with truth. That would be antithetical to both (a) my own devotion to truth and (b) skillfully communicating the point. The version of me that would be willing to use that manipulation tool would be less clear about the whole message overall.
If you want to emphasize that power in your writing, I’d recommend that when you talk about these emotional movements you use ‘you’ pronouns or speak about a community.
That’s actually how it came out of me in the first draft. I noticed it and cleaned it up. Some part of me wanted to pressure people to feel compelled, and wants to teach people and present profound visions rather than admit I’m just experiencing things and projecting on others. And its desire isn’t emanating from devotion to truth. It leads me toward confusion. So noticing this and cleaning it up was helpful for me because it highlights for me a piece of something to digest and let go of. And the result is that my writing is cleaner and more honest.
In terms of social dynamics, if someone needs that kind of power in my writing to hear my message, and I have to twist myself a little away from the truth in order to deliver that power to their liking, then I’m in service to them. Why? What if they don’t like my writing anyway? Ah, now I have to start pressuring them in order for me to get validation… and I go insane.
It’s hard for me to read what you are serving in offering this recommendation. I imagine the conscious thought is to be some kind of helpful. I like the spirit of connection there. I don’t plan on shaping my communications that way though.
Secondly, to preserve the flow of writing, it’s important to use words/phrases that don’t need links to be understood. For example, the way you use ‘grok’ or ‘information asymmetry’ breaks the flow.
As Yoav indicates, this is just a Less Wrong cultural norm. I would agree with you in other contexts. Here, I hyperlink (a) terms that I imagine most people here already know but some might need help with, and (b) references to other ideas in LW rationality space (like when I link to Mandatory Secret Identities in referring to how running a rationality dojo isn’t for everyone, because that Sequence post highlighted a similar idea). That’s the standard I sort of absorbed by example years ago.
If the standard of writing and linking here has changed, though, I’d be happy to learn about it. I mean no confusion or disrespect.
The mixture of emotional states with values is very powerful, especially when you share a common identity and goal with your audience. Good writing.
[Mod note] User “FinalFormal”, I recommend lurking longer and learning the site norms before trying to engage. Please do not engage in long threads where your comments have net negative karma scores as your first interaction with the site; I have banned your account.
Due to the large amount of activity on the site, the mods typically aren’t able to provide detailed feedback about your contributions or help new users learn the norms. If you wish, you are welcome to try again later by registering a new account, but I recommend lurking for a while and following the site for at least long enough to understand why you were turned away and what you could do to avoid it the next time. For general guidelines of what we hope to see, see the “What makes LessWrong different from other discussion forums?” and “I’m new. Where do I start?” sections of our FAQ.
Edit: I entirely re-wrote this comment, because my previous comment was unnecessarily unkind.
it’s alright to link them, but it’s important that you explain the words as you use them so that the reader doesn’t break focus.
Like having an explanation appear if you hover the link? (This does not work like that, but Wikipedia has something like that. Maybe there's plugins or stuff that does that more broadly?)
(When I tried adding four spaces, to show what hitting tab usually looks like in other applications, that triggered some stuff in the writing modes: to the left, and slightly above where it says ‘cancel’ and ‘save’ (or ‘post’:
MarkDown
DraftsJS
LessWrong Docs [Beta]
Eventually I was sort of able to get it to work. I left the...thing above in, because maybe something like that could be used for something readers who are familiar with a concept can skip over. Thought maybe this:
would be more standard to use for something like that.
I disagree with that. I really like this style and I’m happy it’s popular on LessWrong. It means that those who know what a term means can read through without interruption, and those that don’t are pointed to somewhere they can actually read and learn deeply about it instead of just explaining it in one line. It also allows to build upon ideas much more easily, some posts here are jargon heavy (in a good way), and it would be very difficult to write them if everyone had to explain every term from scratch. To be clear, It’s not that I have a problem with people explaining terms (though it can get excessive, you see that in journalism a lot), in some cases It’s good and It’s in large part a matter of style.
What formatting do you want? Generally if you want formatting options you select the text and a menu appears.
This might make the writing more emotionally powerful or something, but I think it’d make the post less epistemically well-grounded. One can be more certain that they experienced an effect than they can be that others would experience it.
Exactly. And in particular, it would have me prioritizing impact on others over alignment with truth. That would be antithetical to both (a) my own devotion to truth and (b) skillfully communicating the point. The version of me that would be willing to use that manipulation tool would be less clear about the whole message overall.
That’s actually how it came out of me in the first draft. I noticed it and cleaned it up. Some part of me wanted to pressure people to feel compelled, and wants to teach people and present profound visions rather than admit I’m just experiencing things and projecting on others. And its desire isn’t emanating from devotion to truth. It leads me toward confusion. So noticing this and cleaning it up was helpful for me because it highlights for me a piece of something to digest and let go of. And the result is that my writing is cleaner and more honest.
In terms of social dynamics, if someone needs that kind of power in my writing to hear my message, and I have to twist myself a little away from the truth in order to deliver that power to their liking, then I’m in service to them. Why? What if they don’t like my writing anyway? Ah, now I have to start pressuring them in order for me to get validation… and I go insane.
It’s hard for me to read what you are serving in offering this recommendation. I imagine the conscious thought is to be some kind of helpful. I like the spirit of connection there. I don’t plan on shaping my communications that way though.
As Yoav indicates, this is just a Less Wrong cultural norm. I would agree with you in other contexts. Here, I hyperlink (a) terms that I imagine most people here already know but some might need help with, and (b) references to other ideas in LW rationality space (like when I link to Mandatory Secret Identities in referring to how running a rationality dojo isn’t for everyone, because that Sequence post highlighted a similar idea). That’s the standard I sort of absorbed by example years ago.
If the standard of writing and linking here has changed, though, I’d be happy to learn about it. I mean no confusion or disrespect.
Thank you.
[Mod note] User “FinalFormal”, I recommend lurking longer and learning the site norms before trying to engage. Please do not engage in long threads where your comments have net negative karma scores as your first interaction with the site; I have banned your account.
Due to the large amount of activity on the site, the mods typically aren’t able to provide detailed feedback about your contributions or help new users learn the norms. If you wish, you are welcome to try again later by registering a new account, but I recommend lurking for a while and following the site for at least long enough to understand why you were turned away and what you could do to avoid it the next time. For general guidelines of what we hope to see, see the “What makes LessWrong different from other discussion forums?” and “I’m new. Where do I start?” sections of our FAQ.
Edit: I entirely re-wrote this comment, because my previous comment was unnecessarily unkind.
Do you mean formatting in:
Comments
Posts
Do you mean formatting like
this? At the start of paragraphs?Or double spacing?it’s alright to link them, but it’s important that you explain the words as you use them so that the reader doesn’t break focus.
(When I tried adding four spaces, to show what hitting tab usually looks like in other applications, that triggered some stuff in the writing modes: to the left, and slightly above where it says ‘cancel’ and ‘save’ (or ‘post’:
MarkDown
DraftsJS
LessWrong Docs [Beta]
Eventually I was sort of able to get it to work. I left the...thing above in, because maybe something like that could be used for something readers who are familiar with a concept can skip over. Thought maybe this:
would be more standard to use for something like that.