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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   3224 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.

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I'll admit right away that I'm late to the party - the Motte, SSC and the subculture around all of it seems to have pretty much died down and I'm not sure where to find everyone other than Twitter, which I refuse to use. But I think I want to catch up with all of the stuff that happened and was important to you all at the time. I'm aware of multiple SSC best-of compilations, but what about the others? Don't we have some legacy other than Scott?

So, to the survivors, I have two questions:

  • What do you think are the best articles/arguments/comments/posts of the past decade?
  • What's the book/article/comment that attracted you to the community in the first place?

What's the book/article/comment that attracted you to the community in the first place?

Well there's no way of talking about any of this without bringing up Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. People either love it or hate it but it is truly one of the stories of all time.

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.

Ranger has the details.

I just want to add that HPMoR is how I ended up in this orbit. Not sure about the exact jump, but it involved Worm, the general concept of rational fiction, and Eliezer’s other stories. At some point someone must have linked to a Scottpost.

It has to precede Rabbit Hole or Unsong, because I know I was insufferable in 2014.

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


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