I'm not sure I like the dichotomy between "the common man" and "us." (Surely some people on LW are "common" with reference to their income or their education level.)
The thing is, scientific knowledge, at least, used to be a lot more widespread. I once found my grandmother's 8th grade science workbook (she was a child in the 1930's) and it was shockingly advanced! And very practical: they were diagramming wells and septic tanks. And we're not talking about a child of privilege here. She was a small-town girl, the daughter of a seamstress. In those days the Army didn't have to contract so many engineering firms because ordinary soldiers, if they'd been to high school, knew a little engineering already.
Honestly I think science vs. religion, rationality as an ideology, is no way to communicate with people who aren't already attracted to that way of thinking. But you can educate people so that they grow up doing things where rationality is important. Math, science, engineering, and to some extent argumentative writing and speaking. If you know how to do that at a 1930s-era level, then in some sense it doesn't matter if your church teaches fundament...
As I see it, the problem there is that saying "we shouldn't be affected by this stuff" does not mean that we aren't affected by this stuff. Knowing your cognitive biases allows for workarounds - it doesn't cause them not to exist.
In particular, saying to others "you're smart people, you should not be affected by such nuances" and then not bothering to put them into place oneself is almost a cliched way to come across as an arsehole on the Internet and have people not want to bother listening to the speaker, no matter how right they may be. The message communicated is not "you should be affected less", but "I am inept." This reduces one's effectiveness.
Postel's law: "Be conservative in what you send; be liberal in what you accept."
If someone posts like a raging arsehole, they can be as right as they like, but people still won't welcome them or want to listen to them. It's not as effective a communication strategy as thinking before typing: your aim is to get the effect you want, not to win the conversation.
I speak here as a (hopefully) recovering arsehole. I have no plans to compromise the accuracy of what I'm saying, but it is useful to say it in a way that doesn't repel people from even reading.
Rationality is not the same as intelligence, and I'm hoping that one of the spin-offs from Less Wrong is finding less challenging ways to explain how to use the knowledge and the brains you've got.
Keeping an eye out for exceptions to what you think you know and considering what those exceptions might mean isn't a complicated idea.
Neither is the idea that everyone does things for reasons which make sense to them.
Internalizing such ideas may be emotionally challenging, but that's a different problem.
Perhaps the most successful example, Pick-up artists, are out of limits for this community because their terminals are deemed offensive.
"out of limits for this community"? Huh? PUA fans are a significant and vocal part of this community. Sure, they receive some criticism, but so do cryonics advocates, utilitarians, believers in the 'scary idea', and one-boxers. There is no consensus on terminal values here, nor even, beyond a vague Bayesianism, on the algorithms and methods of rationality. Only an agreement that such things are important ...
We all enjoy beating up on the silly evangelical Christians, but that is dangerous. Let's try to be just a bit more charitable.
What is the narrative that an evangelical Christian buys into regarding their own status? [...] They are taking part in a battle with absolute evil, that represents everything disgusting and despicable, which is manifested in the various difficulties they face in their lives. [...] This presents a black-white divide in which moral judgements are easy.
Christians view their status as sinful. There isn't (usually) some batt...
I see two routes here: ... We focus our recruiting efforts on the upper strata of intelligence and influence ... the common person can keep believing in creationism, and we'll save humanity for them anyway ...
On the other hand ... explore the open avenues that may lead to a more palatable narrative, including popularising many of the rationality themes
For a long time I have been thinking that both of these options are so awful that we should think very hard about third alternatives before we analyse a fixed set of solutions.
I agree with you that the "you must be this smart to ride" signs in LW comments are problematic. I'm not sure they're wrong, though. I've never taken an IQ test, but from other tests am at least 98th percentile (which is ~130). Most of the stuff I've read on LW I either agree with naturally or have thought out reasons why I disagree with it- but a lot of that comes from my reflectivity and speed of thought / reading. So LW can be a hobby for me, whereas it would be a massive time investment for someone else.
And, honestly, when I think about "...
Minor proofreading correction: Second to last para: People show interest(ed)
I can't help thinking that route 1 dooms us. Since the planet isn't run by the intellectual elite. Indeed I'm fairly sure I read a study recently which showed the intellectual elite shy away from politics - not becuase they want to get involved but because it is now more about who can make the mud stick than it is about issues. That would mean the world would be steered by the sub-90 IQs rather than the 130-plus IQs. So "popular" support is necessary, to ensure that rational solutions actually get to see the light of day!
Summary: I wonder how attractive rationality as a tribe and worldview is to the average person, when the competition is not constrained by verifiability or consistency and is therefore able optimize around offering imaginary status superstimuli to its adherents.
Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'
— Isaac Asimov
I've long been puzzled by the capability of people to reject obvious conclusions and opt for convoluted arguments that boil down to logical fallacies when it comes to defending a belief they have a stake in. When someone resists doing the math, despite an obvious capability to do so in other similar cases, we are right to suspect external factors at play. A framework that seems congruent with the evolutionary history of our species is that of beliefs as signals of loyalty to a tribe. Such a framework would explain the rejection of evolution and other scientific theories by large swathes of the world's population, especially religious population, despite access to a flood of evidence in support.
I will leave support of the tribal signalling framework to others, and examine the consequences for popular support of rationality and science if indeed such a framework successfully approximates reality. The best way I can do that is by examining one popular alternative: The Christian religion which I am most familiar with, in particular its evangelical protestant branch. I am fairly confident that this narrative can be ported to other branches of Christianity and abrahamic faiths fairly easily and the equivalents for other large religions can be constructed with some extra effort.
"Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth"
— The Bible (New International Version), Matthew 5:5
What is the narrative that an evangelical Christian buys into regarding their own status? They belong to the 'chosen people', worshipping a god that loves them, personally, created them with special care, and has a plan for their individual lives. They are taking part in a battle with absolute evil, that represents everything disgusting and despicable, which is manifested in the various difficulties they face in their lives. The end-game however is known. The believers, once their faith is tested in this world, are destined for an eternity of bliss with their brethren in the presence of their god, while the enemies will be thrown in the eternal fire for eternal torment. In this narrative, the disadvantaged in this life are very important. There exist propositions which can be held with absolute certainty. This presents a black-white divide in which moral judgements are easy, as long as corner cases can be swept under the rug. Each and every person, regardless of their social standing or capability, can be of utmost importance. Everyone can potentially save a soul for all eternity! In fact, the gospels place emphasis on the humble and the meek:
So those who are last now will be first then, and those who are first will be last.
— The Bible (New International Version), Matthew 20:16
What is the rational alternative to this battle-hardened, well-optimized worldview? That there is no grand narrative. If such a narrative exists, (pursuit of truth, combating existential risk, <insert yours here>), the stars of this narrative are those blessed with intelligence and education such that they can digest the background material and make these pursuits on the cutting edge. It turns out, your enemies are not innately evil, either. You may have just misunderstood each other. You have to constantly struggle to fight your own biases, to no certain outcome. In fact, we are to hold no proposition with 100% certainty. On the plus side, science and rationality offers, or at least aspires to offer, a consistent worldview free from cognitive dissonance for those that can detect the alternative's contradictions. On the status side, for those of high intelligence, it puts them at the top of the hierarchy, being in the line of the great heroes of thought that have gone before, uncovering all the knowledge we have so far. But this is not hard to perceive as elitism, especially since the barriers to entry are difficult, if not impossible, to overcome for the vast majority of humans. Rationality may have an edge if it can be shown to improve an individual's life prospects. I am not aware of such research, especially one that untangles rationality from intelligence. Perhaps the most successful example, Pick-up artists, are out of limits for this community because their terminals are deemed offensive. While we define rationality as the way to win, the win that we focus on in this community is a collective one, therefore unlikely to confer an individual with high status in the meantime if this individual does not belong to the intellectually gifted few.
So what does rationality have to offer to the common man to gain their support? The role of hard-working donor, whose contribution is in a replaceable commodity, e.g. money? The role of passive consumer of scientific products and documentaries? It seems to me that in the marketplace of worldview-tribes, rationality and science do not present themselves an attractive option for large swathes of the earth's population, and why would they? They were never developed as such. To make things worse, the alternatives have millennia of cultural evolution to better fit their targets, unconstrained by mundane burdens such as verifiability and consistency. I can perfectly see the attraction of the 'rational irrationality' point of view where someone would compartmentalises rationality into result-sensitive 'get things done' areas, while choosing to affirm unverifiable and/or incoherent propositions that nevertheless superstimulate one's feel-good status receptors.
I see two routes here: The one is that we decide that popular support is not necessary. We focus our recruiting efforts on the upper strata of intelligence and influence. If it's a narrative that they need, we can't help them. We're in the business of providing raw truth. Humans are barely on the brink of general intelligence, anyway. A recent post claimed that an IQ of 130+ was practically a prerequisite for appreciating and comprehending the sequences. The truths are hard to grasp and inconvenient, but ultimately it doesn't matter if a narrative can be developed for the common person. They can keep believing in creationism, and we'll save humanity for them anyway.
On the other hand, just because the scientific/rational worldview has not been fitted to the common man, it doesn't mean it can't be done. (But there is no guarantee that it can.) The alternative is to explore the open avenues that may lead to a more palatable narrative, including popularising many of the rationality themes that are articulated in this community. People show interest when I speak to them about cognitive biases but I have no accessible resources to give them that would start from there as a beachhead and progress into other more esoteric topics. And I don't find it incredible that rationality could provably aid in better individual outcomes, we just need solid research around the proposition. (The effects of various valleys of bad rationality or shifts in terminals due to rationality exposure may complicate that).
I am not taking a position on which course of action is superior, or that these are the only alternatives. But it does seem to me that, if my reasoning and assumptions are correct, we have to make up our mind on what exactly it is we want to do as the Less Wrong community.
Edit/Note: I initially planned for this to be posted as a normal article, but seeing how the voting is... equal in both directions, but that there is a lively discussion developing, I think this article is just fine in the discussion section.