site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   2269 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for January 17, 2025

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

2
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Sorry, I missed something. Why is MoR associated with SSC? I vaguely know something about LessWrong being the 'less racist' offshoot of the SSC culture war discussions, and Yudowsky is associated with LessWrong for (reasons???), but I don't know how that leads into MoR being a culture war flashpoint or even signpost.

In the beginning, there was Robin Hanson's Overcoming Bias. Yud started Less Wrong as an offshoot of that. Scott posted there and was a big fan of Yud. Yud brought his ideas greater prominence with Methods of Rationality. Scott later branched away with SSC. At about that time there were a bunch of people on lesswrong dumping Yud's Enlightenment/rationality/AI-alarmism ethos for neo-reaction. That was basically the origin of the culture war thread, one of Scott's earliest big posts was about an anti-neoreactionary FAQ, that's where conventional politics came into play. Then of course there was 2016 and lots of people got more political...

So MoR is a sibling or uncle of SSC.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats