A writer who cut a 25,000-word post by rationalist blogger Scott Alexander down to 2,700 words for their own Catholic miracle apologetics piece argues that rationalist blog posts are far too long. They note that Eliezer Yudkowsky's "sequences" run over one million words, and that most posts in the ecosystem are painfully long and tedious.
The author believes this community treats verbosity as a substitute for thoroughness. Bloggers tend to add layers of detail and nuance rather than question the one or two assumptions they make at the start, or broaden their philosophical background beyond texts popular within their own subculture. As an example, they cite Gwern's 9,000-word, 100-plus-reference piece claiming nicotine is not addictive and is good for you if not smoked, a claim the author says is wrong.
At the heart of the critique is a lack of wisdom, which the author defines as discretion: an intuition for which ideas deserve serious pursuit and knowing what needs to be said. The author argues the community undervalues common sense and inherited tradition, and shows a heavy bias toward unconventional, counterculture ideas, treating the volume of writing on heterodox views as evidence that they merit serious attention.
Source: Hacker News · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing