There’s this fundamental irony I’ve observed in that people in the rationalist community seem to be averse to self-awareness and actually applying any of the things they learn about related to critical thinking on themselves, in a critical, real way. As someone here in this subreddit pointed out, they’re completely incapable of understanding subtext if it’s not explicitly laid out. There’s this systematic failure in reasoning that is just a massive blindspot.
How many of the rationalists’ lives have actually been substantially benefitted? Aren’t they just basically reading insight porn and intellectually masturbating over regurgitated neologisms that their in group has come up with?
These random STEMlords are just becoming more and more socially inept absorbing the shittiest takes possible on social issues and not realizing that their contrarianism does not in fact make them more correct.
I wonder perhaps, if this subreddit is a representation of a sort of the amalgamation of those who have become self-aware enough to realize that a lot of the behaviors of the rationalist community are those of a cult that has deluded themselves into thinking they’ve done something interesting with rationality, rather than practice the behaviors of actual critical thinkers.
I wonder what it would be like to see a timelapse of the radicalization of some of these people. As we can see from the clear white supremacist/racialist tanglings in some of these communities that’s become evermore obvious over the years. Just have a look at some of the commenters on the original slatestarcodex site or what one finds for ‘discussion’ in the culture war archives.
Let’s do an analysis of this subreddit to explore some more of these musings empirically using subredditstats. https://subredditstats.com/r/sneerclub https://subredditstats.com/r/slatestarcodex
Here are the most frequently used words in this subreddit compared to baseline frequencies across reddit.com
rationality (458.6) neoliberalism (191.1) doxxing (191.1) insufferable (163.8) dystopia (137.6) neoliberal (114.7) economists (114.7) ssc (98.3) malaria (91.7) earnestly (91.7) reproducing (91.7) bourgeois (91.7) meritocracy (91.7) courtroom (91.7) debunking (86) hysteria (86) intellectually (83.4) worldview (76.4) self-awareness (76.4) pinker (76.4) impeachment (76.4) benevolent (76.4) gracefully (76.4) ’it (76.4) racists (76.4) geniuses (76.4) contrarian (76.4) dox (76.4) philosopher (71.7) libertarians (70.6) rational (69.2) feminists (68.8) fascists (68.8) centrist (68.8) revolutions (68.8) economist (65.5) minuscule (65.5) hijacked (65.5) neverending (65.5) skepticism (65.5) misogynist (65.5) thinkers (62.5) empirical (62.5) amirite (62.5) reactionary (61.2) right-wing (60.3) but: (57.3) argues (57.3) ecological (57.3) supremacist (54.6) atheism (54) abusers (52.9) profoundly (51) empowering (51) context=3 (51) philosophers (49.1) merits (49.1) singularity (49.1) fascist (47.4) politicalcompassmemes (45.9) 2015: (45.9) ’free (45.9) insistence (45.9) debunked (45.9) 294 (45.9) associating (45.9) indictment (45.9) storied (45.9) illusory (45.9) snowballs (45.9) mockery (45.9) masquerading (45.9) groups: (45.9) underpants (45.9) imgflip (45.9) averse (45.9) darkweb (45.9) sicko (45.9) marketwatch (45.9) self-reflection (45.9) racially (45.9) unherd (45.9) brags (45.9) sterilization (45.9) cummings (45.9) harrowing (45.9) scissor (45.9) disproportionate (45.9) endorses (45.9) fact-checking (45.9) overhyped (45.9) upper-middle (45.9) autist (45.9) heinous (45.9) alt-right (45.9) disprove (45.9) probabilities (45.9) slays (45.9) supplementing (45.9) nonchalantly (45.9)
And here are the top keywords in r/slatestarcodex
pseudonym (1155.8) doxx (990.7) substack (704.3) hypotheses (433.4) doxing (361.2) 22: (346.8) salient (337.1) bloggers (289) doxxing (282.1) epub (260.1) nootropics (260.1) inoculation (260.1) experiential (260.1) spearheaded (260.1) diplomatically (260.1) subcultures (260.1) 17: (260.1) 25: (260.1) kerfuffle (216.7) reorganization (216.7) blogging (202.3) priors (202.3) journalistic (185.8) tradeoffs (185.8) blogger (180.6) altruism (177.3) purported (173.4) university’s (173.4) inhibited (173.4) blog: (173.4) permissive (173.4) dampened (173.4) tantalizing (173.4) crossword (173.4) defectors (173.4) dissident (173.4) disinfecting (173.4) heyday (173.4) completeness (173.4) 594 (173.4) deepfakes (173.4) text-based (173.4) irreversibly (173.4) internet: (173.4) history’s (173.4) harmonious (173.4) disruptions (162.5) oversaw (162.5) en_us (157.6) plausibly (153) comparably (144.5) ’real (144.5) columnist (144.5) 21: (144.5) low-hanging (144.5) refrained (144.5) axioms (144.5) deposition (144.5) chastised (144.5) admittance (144.5) deservedly (144.5) novelist (144.5) pre-emptively (144.5) deliberation (144.5) confounding (144.5) formulating (144.5) circadian (144.5) monetizing (135.5) paywalled (133.4) newsletters (130) taboos (130) rigor (127.5) affirms (123.8) possibilities: (123.8) all-out (123.8) scotts (123.8) illusory (123.8) dissemination (123.8) violinist (123.8) predictability (123.8) mask-wearing (123.8) able-bodied (123.8) levies (123.8) low-risk (123.8) 16: (123.8) externalities (123.8) nitpicks (123.8) ushered (123.8) lot: (123.8) rest: (123.8) hand-in-hand (123.8) crucially (123.8) brevity (118.2) analytic (118.2) typography (118.2) survey: (115.6) rationality (114.4) publishes (113.1) halve (108.4) vocational (108.4)
And here r/TheMotte:
roundup (98) rhetoric (89) viewpoint (86.1) conformity (71.3) imply (67.8) tribal (65.6) broadly (65.6) praising (60.2) sarcasm (59.1) refrain (59.1) proposals (56.9) precise (54.3) encouraging (53.4) welfare (50.8) highlighting (45.3) post: (43.8) represented (43.8) motivating (42.2) divide (41.9) selecting (41.3) explicitly (40.5) criticize (39.7) widely (39.1) compile (33.8) enforce (33.4) dynamics (33.3) consistency (33.3) vaguely (32.9) readings (31.5) justify (31.3) tendency (31.1) directed (29.9) ethnic (29.2) opposing (29) titled (28.8) tens (28) defined (27.1) territory (26.3) controversial (25.6) principles (25.3) 02 (24.9) infrastructure (24.8) 03 (24.7) journalists (24.5) mortality (24.5) societies (24.1) 09 (23.9) consensus (23.2) aims (23) authorities (22.8) parallels (22.8) containment (22.8) contributor (21.9) corporations (21.9) highlight (21.1) technological (21) discussions (20.8) cooperation (20.4) epidemic (20.4) nytimes (20.4) engaging (20.1) on: (20) country’s (20) cultural (20) ought (19.9) democracy (19.7) conclusions (19.7) wikipedia (19.3) populations (19) sacrifices (19) terrorism (19) immigration (18.8) migration (18.8) institutions (18.7) include: (17.8) arguments (17.7) provides (17.5) journalist (17.5) notably (17.5) secular (17.5) richer (17.5) 2010s (17.5) elected (17.5) plausible (17.5) radically (17.5) perceive (17.5) liberals (16.8) newspaper (16.3) casualties (16.3) precisely (16.3) -– (16) discusses (16) discourage (16) generate (16) cynical (15.8) cavalry (15.8) occupy (15.8) favorable (15.8) scrutiny (15.8) principle (15.8)
Perhaps the most fascinating thing, is the accelerated vehicle for ideation that the internet has allowed. What will come of this experiment from another 20 years? I predict more and more radicalization as we are thrust into more and more niche idealogue groupings. But who knows?
In any way, these specific few communities are relatively inconsequential in the greater scheme of things, so I would not take it too seriously.
“Hey dude who wrote this… go outside” I would like to, but there is a plague, unfortunately.
I am curious as to all of your thoughts on this, fellow random strangers on the internet, I don’t really even know where to begin with the sheer bruh-ness of it.
Pretty much, yeah. It appeals strongly to people who want to feel superior and who figure their best basis for pulling that self-deception off is on intellectual grounds. It also attracts people who just innocently want to practice not fooling themselves, which might be the most amazing contradiction I’m aware of in internet culture. The community is dominated by people marketing themselves as smart because of how they think, while masking the reality that they’re actually starting from the axiom that They Are Smart and then building a facade to prop up that image. Lots of people get fooled by that until they either fall into the same trap or realize they’re in a circlejerk and become disaffected.
Their ability to repeat good advice on how to not be irrational while utterly failing to apply it where it really matters - to themselves - is incredible. And yet it’s fairly easy to explain: pure ego.
Back when I was a more anxious person, my approach to philosophy was heavily inspired by mathematical models. I’d look at human interactions as economic models and conduct cost/benefit analysis on relationships. It certainly seemed helpful at the time, and definitely led me to break up with my very self-centred ex, which was a good thing in that at that time me being a worthy person deserving of better was hard, but me looking at the value of a social contract of mutual benefit was doable. Definitely a place I was glad to have grown from, but definitely a kind of functional at the time.
The whole rationalist ethos strikes me as coming from that kind of place. They get lost in metrics because if the numbers appear to add up then it must be true. They stroll towards fascism and they don’t have access to the reflexive horror that should come from looking at oppression, they just look at a giant imaginary column of numbers and come to the conclusion that, say, breeding out stupidity through enforced sterilisation is a net positive in the long run so let’s support eugenics.
If you can’t identify your own humanity and the humanity of others then it’s all just playing with numbers. Similarly, if potential and actual can be played with in the same way, you end up with dumb ideas like the Basilisk. For the D&D nerds it’s very much a high int low wis situation. Give or take the high int.
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There’s an occasional genre of LessWrong post where someone posts saying “this is achieving nothing, I’m leaving” or a dying wizard details at length how hilariously failed the whole subculture is at achieving anything.
Dont worry, Scott noticed
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first thing that comes to mind is that “rationalists” is not a new thing, right, they didn’t come up with that general “mindset”: since the dawn of… idk, at least engineering; it was noticed that some people have engineer-brains , they can be very smart when it comes at tinkering with things but are a bit awkward in social interactions/don’t have profundity as readers of poetry etc . in recent years the concept of autism spectrum popped up and explained engineers somewhat… hm. yea, so i guess some “rationalists” for some reason put a lot of effort to divert from their cognitive “dead angle”… they feel there are some forces at play outside their grasp , try to address it but can’t, maybe its not out of deceitfulness , maybe its more like they are 2d figures operating in a 3d world and don’t have the tools to get the big picture. they want to be intellectually honest, transparent, generous etc … but don’t have what it take to understand a crucial part of the human experience and living in a society , let alone solve complex problems that get generated by all that.
it’s a very specific kind of “insight porn” too. the insight is never about music. it’s never about poetry or theater or an actual spiritual conviction someone felt. It’s never about a work of great literature or visual art. when these dunces barf out “insights” about art they sound like sniveling teens who are mad their mom made them come to the art museum instead of staying in the car and playing match-3 games on their phone.
We all know who’s the real culprit.
As a person who was an aspiring rationalist many years ago, yes.
I’m a bit too underinformed/lazy to get what I’m supposed to take away from those tag clouds; could you help a brother out?
Honestly, you see a lot of this in a lot of communities nominally aimed at self improvement, although I’ll admit that usually whatever harm is caused tends to be more localized.
In the more traditional group therapy context, you’ll regularly see situations where people have breakthroughs about past traumas and experiences. Sometimes these are legitimate, and I don’t want to dismiss that, but you’ll also notice cases where someone seems to have the same breakthrough repeatedly. At a certain point you have to ask: is this actually helping you? Are you learning, or are you just having “breakthroughs” (scare quotes purposeful) for positive group reinforcement?
Back to the rationalists, I think that a lot of this is faux continual self improvement for the sake of group approval, which is why they tend to regurgitate the same stuff. For most people under most circumstances, the level of consistent self improvement they talk about is simply not sustainable. It’s not that improvement, even in the area of bias self-awareness, isn’t possible; it’s that it comes in random bits and spurts around life availability and experience. You can’t just sit down to a blog every week and magically get the same percentage better in any metric week over week; life does not actually work that way.
“Unfortunately, the only way to find out is to experiment and take risks, that is to say, to live life, rather than to adhere to any normative measure of what constitutes a healthy, rational psychology’ of the individual.” -Otto Rank, ‘Beyond Psychology’ (I paraphrased it myself, but please read it for yourself as well)
vgr’s take on the RationalGate: Venkatesh Rao on Twitter: “Le sigh at level 4 on level 4 violence. It’s what happens when people feel they have to artificially hide dissonance in intellectual journeys to present as integrated self-authoring subjects. Might expand on vaguetweet after dust settles but @Meaningness basically called it.” / Twitter
Re: Scott’s exploration of nrx-adj stuff