Comment by bubblyworld
5 days ago
What is the base rate here? Hard to know the scope of the problem without knowing how many non-rationalists (is that even a coherent group of people?) end up forming weird cults, as a comparison. My impression is that crazy beliefs are common amongst everybody.
A much simpler theory is that rationalists are mostly normal people, and normal people tend to form cults.
I was wondering about this too. You could also say it's a sturgeon's law question.
They do note at the beginning of the article that many, if not most such groups have reasonably normal dynamics, for what it's worth. But I think there's a legitimate question of whether we ought to expect groups centered on rational thinking to be better able to escape group dynamics we associate with irrationality.