Just read the OP. My primary response is OH GOD WHY.
I realize now that I have had several possibly-Imaginary Position misconceptions in the past, including the following:
I've repeatedly heard people say, "Well, it's not always smart to be rational, because other people aren't always reasonable." What rationalist said they were?
I've behaved in a manner consistent with my belief that other people would always be reasonable and rational. I updated that belief only slightly slower than I should have.
Today's post, Imaginary Positions was originally published on 23 December 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):
People who are not members of a minority group may somehow come to believe that members of this group possess certain traits which seem to "fit". These traits are not required to have any connection to the real traits of that group.
Discuss the post here (rather than in the comments to the original post).
This post is part of the Rerunning the Sequences series, where we'll be going through Eliezer Yudkowsky's old posts in order so that people who are interested can (re-)read and discuss them. The previous post was Living By Your Own Strength, and you can use the sequence_reruns tag or rss feed to follow the rest of the series.
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