Many years ago I lurked on LessWrong, making a very occasional comment but finding the ideas and discussion fascinating and appealing. I believe I am not as smart as the average commenter here, and I am certainly less formally educated. I eventually drifted away to follow other of my interests and did not put in the work to learn enough to feel like I could contribute meaningfully. I specifically recall Said Achmiz as being a commenter I was afraid of and did not want to engage with. I didn't leave entirely because of Said, it was more about the effort of learning all the concepts, but maybe 1/8 of my decision was based on him. I imagine his attitude towards this will be, if I'm too much of a coward to risk an unknown internet commenter saying possibly bad things about my own comments, then I really don't belong here anyway. Which, maybe it's true. I don't know if I will try again in the upcoming 3 years, but I'm more likely to than before Said was banned.
Context: I much more recently gravitated to the Duncansphere, as it were, and am kinda on the fringes of that these days (I missed the Duncan/Said thing, and only know about it from comments on this post). I was encouraged there to come here and post this anecdote.
Many years ago I lurked on LessWrong, making a very occasional comment but finding the ideas and discussion fascinating and appealing. I believe I am not as smart as the average commenter here, and I am certainly less formally educated. I eventually drifted away to follow other of my interests and did not put in the work to learn enough to feel like I could contribute meaningfully. I specifically recall Said Achmiz as being a commenter I was afraid of and did not want to engage with. I didn't leave entirely because of Said, it was more about the effort of learning all the concepts, but maybe 1/8 of my decision was based on him. I imagine his attitude towards this will be, if I'm too much of a coward to risk an unknown internet commenter saying possibly bad things about my own comments, then I really don't belong here anyway. Which, maybe it's true. I don't know if I will try again in the upcoming 3 years, but I'm more likely to than before Said was banned.
Context: I much more recently gravitated to the Duncansphere, as it were, and am kinda on the fringes of that these days (I missed the Duncan/Said thing, and only know about it from comments on this post). I was encouraged there to come here and post this anecdote.