Comment by Moddyfire on Taboo Your Words · 2024-06-13T04:49:14.378Z · LW · GW

I came to lesswrong because of a The Noncentral Fallacy, and have been reading eagerly. I had similar thoughts, maybe from different angles, for 20 years or so, but I never managed to write them clearly and eloquently.

My take was that words have connotations, i.e. some emotional baggage that comes whenever they are uttered. E.g. "Democracy" is Good, and when arguing about changes to some policies, each side says their suggestion is more democratic, and in order to prove it they go at length to define what democracy is, and the argument turns to be about the definition of a word rather than whether the suggested policy is good.

And I therwfore challange people I argue with to make their point without using the word "democracy". They usually fail.