scrape_r_rational/data/cache2/8vttm7.md

## [META] /r/rational “Characteristics of Rational Fiction” Sidebar Rewrite Discussion, Week 1: Problem Discussion

* Author: u/ketura  *Organizer**
* URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/8vttm7/meta_rrational_characteristics_of_rational/
* Score: 42

* Created: 2018-07-03T16:57:19

### Post:

###[Week 0: Meta Talk](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/8u1vzj/meta_rrational_characteristics_of_rational)

#####Week 1: Problem Discussion [You Are Here]

> Discuss the problem of classifying Rational Fiction in all its aspects.  This is the one where we let out the big guns and go full on debate, hashing out all of the issues with regard to rational vs rationalist, simulationist vs narrativist, munchkin vs plot, cat vs dog, and everything in between.  The one caveat is that, like good rationalists, there shall be NO SOLUTIONS POSTED. None. Nada. This is our time to discuss the problem in its entirety, from every angle we can think of (and then some). Any full solutions posted will be removed so as to not unfairly anchor ourselves.

######Week 2: Solution Brainstorming [2018-07-10]
> Having had time to truly attack the problem of classification, we now move on to solutions.  Have a framework that might work, but no bullet points? Have a well-worded bullet point but no framework to put it in?  This is the time to post all the bits and pieces of good starts in one place, where ideas can start to form and mutate as they interact with one another.


######Week 3: Solution Proposals [2018-07-17]

> With the grand marketplace of solution ideas brought to everyone’s attention the week before, we now have a chance to try our hand at composing a definite, authoritative update to the sidebar.  Top-level posts must all be full solution proposals, i.e. a replacement for the relevant section in the sidebar. 


######Week 4: Solution Voting [2018-07-24]
> Our grand journey come to an end, we now take all solution proposals from the last thread and create a contest mode vote-only thread (with a companion discussion thread) to run for a week or more.  Once the allotted time has run out, the winner is declared and the sidebar updated, to huzzahs and parades and, to be certain, an absolute and utter dearth of drama.



----

----


As we all know, when discussing a difficult problem [one should hold off on proposing solutions](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/uHYYA32CKgKT3FagE/hold-off-on-proposing-solutions) until the [problem has been thoroughly discussed](http://www.hpmor.com/chapter/25#Act_4).  This is the place for such a discussion.


So what *is* the problem?  There are rules that each of us internally are following when we decide if something is upvote-worthy for this subreddit, but they don’t actually seem to match the rules that we have on the sidebar.  So one problem is that we have an ill-defined set of rules to classify by.

But perhaps a bigger problem is that we might not even have the proper classifications to be assigning rules to!  Has our official designation of “rational”, “rationalist” and “other” fully encompassed a description of what is good to post here?  For many of us, the map does not follow this territory, so it’s time to draw a new map.


----


Potential facets of the problem to explore in this thread:

* Can rational fiction be reduced to a binary yes/no, or should it be a continuum?
* How large a role does munchkinry play?
* Is there utility in distinguishing between narrativist and simulationist rational fiction?
* Is there utility in distinguishing between ration*al* and rational*ist* fiction?
* What is the role that any solution itself should have?  Should it be a guideline, or a set of rules to delete posts by?


----


It is probably not the best use of this space to debate the merits of whether this or that media is or is not rational.  If you feel like there is something to be said on this matter, [please direct your attention to the companion thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/8vtsyb/meta_rrational_characteristics_of_rational) for all your specific classification debate needs.


----


#####To emphasize, *do not post solutions in this thread*.  Top-level solution proposals will be removed in an effort to prevent ourselves from getting prematurely anchored.  Discuss the *problem* in all its angles, facets, and forms, and leave solutions until the next thread.


----


So that we’re all on the same page, here are a number of resources to help any newcomers get up to speed (and any veterans to refresh dusty memories):


* [A (brief) history of rational fiction before /r/rational](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/4s4mez/rationally_writing_episode_0_history/d57g3z0/), as compiled by /u/AlexanderWales in preparation for the *Rationally Writing* podcast.  It should be emphasized that the sidebar definitions date from before the subreddit, as listed in that post. 

* [Original /r/HPMOR thread.](https://www.reddit.com/r/HPMOR/comments/1rkkam/in_light_of_the_recent_slew_of_recommendations/)


* [Most Fiction Isn't That Rational](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/2jmwwq/most_fiction_isnt_that_rational/)


* [The Definition of \[RT\]](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/6gd97l/meta_the_definition_of_rt/)


* [Is UNSONG Rational Fic?](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/4sv6te/meta_is_unsong_rational_fic/)


* [A Suggested Rewrite of the 'Characteristics of Rational Fiction' in the Sidebar](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/6s2cad/meta_a_suggested_rewrite_of_the_characteristics/)


* [Is Worth the Candle Truly an RT?](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/8t6lw4/rt_is_worth_the_candle_truly_an_rt/)

### Comments:

> **u/alexanderwales** [+18]  *Time flies like an arrow* (19 minutes later)
> 
> If you want the skinny on **Narrativism vs. Simulationism**, [this is my write-up](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1m9AfeqVGDHDY5ldctk444LNCt4V33ffl2DWCqQo7zLc/edit?usp=sharing). I don't actually think that this is important to the discussion at hand, since it's about the process that an author uses to construct a work, rather than the work itself, but you might disagree.
> 
> ----
> 
> In film theory, realism is about the showing of 'truth', attempting to display something that is objective and real. To this end, realist film-making will hide away as many aspects of unreality as possible, going so far as to maintain steady shots with few cuts and place the camera at eye-level, so that the viewer can better see the scene as it would be seen by a person actually in that world. There aren't many great examples of this in its more-pure form, but many films fall on the "more realist" side of the spectrum.
> 
> Contrasting that, formalism does away with attempts at objectivity, instead presenting the world as the filmmaker sees it, intending to make full use of the form rather than simply limiting themselves to reality per se. They use costumes and sets that are meant to evoke and delight rather than to be in any way realistic. Good examples would be the oeuvre of Wes Anderson, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Amelie, and many others.
> 
> (Sitting between the two is classicism, which we're going to ignore, because it's basically just the mid-point of the spectrum.)
> 
> By plain reading, you might think that RT is just another term for a prose version of realism. After all, isn't what RT authors are trying to do to make their worlds closer to how worlds actually are, even (or especially) if they include some speculative elements? I tend to hear this a lot.
> 
> My own opinion is that RT is really more of a parallel to formalism ... but the thing that it's usually trying to express is ***thought***, which ends up putting it in realist clothing. If the story is about thought, then the world can't be inconsistent, both because the reader will be primed for a higher awareness of the world and its workings, and because those workings will likely end up central to the plot.
> 
> To get at this distinction a bit, I would consider a story like Jason Shiga's [Fleep](http://www.shigabooks.com/fleep.php) to fall under the umbrella of RT, while still being highly formalist in not just style, but plot as well. (Fleep was [previously posted to the subreddit](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/2eld3m/fleep_a_man_wakes_in_a_strange_phone_booth/), to very positive response.)
> 
> If this axis of inspection is mostly correct, it would explain away a lot of intuitions people have about the RT tag. Competence is common, because you don't tend to get good demonstration of or expression of thought from incompetent people. Heightened intelligence is common for the same reason. Munchkinry *is* demonstration of thought - and I think that we can agree that munchkinry which skipped showing the work wouldn't qualify for RT.
> 
> I don't really know how this might add up to a solution for the sidebar, but it's sort of my starting point for thinking about the problem, as far as what the underpinning is.

>> **u/InfernoVulpix** [+12]  (an hour later)
>> 
>> In previous discussions like these, I've heard people talk about Yudkowsky's definition of [level 1 intelligent characters](http://yudkowsky.tumblr.com/writing/level1intelligent) as, while maybe not an underpinning foundation, almost ubiquitous in rational fiction.
>> 
>> I think that what you describe, of rational fiction being a type of story built to express and display thought, meshes well with this.  A level 1 intelligent character is one that we can imagine thinking from their own viewpoint with their own goals and fears and biases, and a story full of level 1 intelligent characters is one where you can, if you look, see thought behind every action.
>> 
>> To continue this and interlock with the noted fondness for worldbuilding here, a world with deep and thorough worldbuilding is one where you can see thought behind every detail, though in this case the thoughts of the author more than the thoughts of the people relevant to the detail in-setting.
>> 
>> It also helps to bridge the gap between 'traditional' ratfics and stories like UNSONG, which are enjoyed here despite, well, controversial opinions on its rational-ness.
>> 
>> The question I would ask to challenge this idea, I think, is whether or not it is too broad a definition to be meaningful.  It appears, to me, to do a good job encompassing a common thread between all rationalfics, but does it also include within its domain stories that are decidedly *not* rationalfics?  If so, what stipulations would we have to add to tighten the boundaries?

>>> **u/alexanderwales** [+7]  *Time flies like an arrow* (8 hours later)
>>> 
>>> > The question I would ask to challenge this idea, I think, is whether or not it is too broad a definition to be meaningful. It appears, to me, to do a good job encompassing a common thread between all rationalfics, but does it also include within its domain stories that are decidedly not rationalfics? If so, what stipulations would we have to add to tighten the boundaries?
>>> 
>>> I think that some amount of false positives and false negatives are inevitable, but it's going to depend a lot on wording, and interpretation of that wording, and interpretation of the works themselves.
>>> 
>>> So far as I'm concerned, here are the big categorical problem areas:
>>> 
>>> * Author tracts espousing a particular philosophy or issue position, especially when done Socratically
>>> * Historical (or other "realist") fiction
>>> * Sherlock Holmes
>>> * Works with good worldbuilding which mostly sits in the background of the actual plot and characters
>>> * Works with inconsistent levels of RT
>>> * [Fair-Play Whodunnits](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FairPlayWhodunnit)
>>> 
>>> (Note that these are just the areas I think are definitionally thorny.)
>>> 
>>> If we define RT as being (primarily) about form, rather than subject matter, plot, or characters directly, we can make a better sliding scale, I think. Most stuff in the mystery genre gets excluded, because most are about the accumulation of information and evidence, rather than the application of thought to the problem - though there's allowance for specific works which *are* about that. Intelligent characters who solve things with their intelligence without that intelligence actually being displayed or followed (Reed Richards, Iron Man, Sherlock Holmes) get cut out, regardless of how plausible or rule-following that off-camera intelligence might be.

>>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+3]  (19 hours later)
>>>> 
>>>> > * [Fair-Play Whodunnits](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FairPlayWhodunnit)
>>>> 
>>>> I don't have any comments on your main point, but I would consider Fair-Play Whodunnits to be rational fiction or at least close enough to it that we shouldn't bother trying to craft our definition to exclude them. 
>>>> 
>>>> The obvious caveat here is that I'm talking about a true Fair-Play Whodunnit, the TV-Tropes examples list is, as per usual, largely filled with things that are not examples of the trope.

>>>>> **u/alexanderwales** [+2]  *Time flies like an arrow* (2 days later)
>>>>> 
>>>>> I don't think that we should craft a definition that intentionally excludes them, but I think a True Definition will exclude most of them without actually having to try, because I don't think they're usually what we mean when we say "rational fiction", in the same way that I think "realist" works wouldn't be what we mean either.
>>>>> 
>>>>> I do enjoy Agatha Christie, but her books really don't seem to use the same part of the brain as other works that are definitively within the canon of accepted rational fiction. They don't produce the same feelings when read, I guess, at least for me. I'd be interested to know if other peoples' experience differs, beyond the categorical/definitional question.

>> **u/suyjuris** [+3]  (a day later)
>> 
>> I think this is an intriguing way to classify many common problems. I have difficulties coming up with problematic examples.
>> 
>> What about stories that focus not on individual characters but rather on entire societies? Say, a story that shows (through various protagonists) a society evolving (in a consistent, well thought-out fashion) towards a transhumanistic ideal? Not a lot of thinking to be had there (some key-decisions maybe, but I am thinking of the large-scale stuff being more central).

>>> **u/alexanderwales** [+4]  *Time flies like an arrow* (a day later)
>>> 
>>> I think my contention would be that classification gets problematic when you start talking about events or characters, rather than the prose itself.
>>> 
>>> Imagine a story about a detective that talks to a lot of people about a case he's trying to solve, but whose internal thoughts are almost entirely opaque to us, or only very vaguely guessable by the questions that he asks and the actions that he takes. When you get to the end of the work, the detective says "Ah ha! I've got it!" and then explains how he arrived at the solution.
>>> 
>>> Now imagine that *same* story, with all the same dialogue and plot beats, but we follow the detective's line of thinking the entire way through, and when he says "Ah ha! I've got it!", that's the product of all the thought that you've seen on display across the pages.
>>> 
>>> I don't think that I would put forth that the first example ought to be outright disqualified, but the second definitely seems like more what we mean when we use the RT tag.
>>> 
>>> (Obviously you could turn the second story into the first, but you couldn't necessarily turn the first story into the second, because it might be that the plot beats, characterization, etc. weren't written the way they were because of honest attempts at writing internal thoughts, and instead were more motivated by the author wanting to conceal things from the reader for that "Ah ha!" moment at the end. And there would be some obvious problems with pacing and narrative structure in moving between the two, so I'm not saying that it would be a good idea.)
>>> 
>>> As far as this goes toward answering your question ... I can imagine someone working really hard on a hard science fiction transhumanist setting, and then writing a novel set there which was nothing more than petty drama between characters. I can imagine that would go over with the audience on this subreddit fairly well, in part due to genre preferences, and in part due to the value placed on worldbuilding, but it's not what I would classify as rational fiction if the work and thought that went into the setting is all background to an actual text that has none of that thought on display, except, perhaps, by inference.

>> **u/derefr** [+2]  (3 days later)
>> 
>> Hypothesis: there’s a potential superstimulus that one could create for this “formalism of thought,” such that the resulting work would delight the members of this community, even though it was objectively bad by any other measure of fiction. Something that might be described as “ASMR video: the inside of someone’s head when working out a difficult problem.”
>> 
>> It might be important to distinguish whether the community cares “what’s good for it” (i.e. cares about its RT fiction being *good fiction*), or whether we’re just here to suck the thinky juices out of works, whatever their quality.
>> 
>> By analogy to non-fiction prose: the Sequences, SSC blog posts, etc. are “rationalist prose”—but what percentage of people here read them to grow/discuss/etc.; and what percentage just read them as a communally-anointed font of insight porn?
>> 
>> If there are large numbers of both groups, it might be better to serve their needs separately, rather than to ask what we all, collectively, want.

>> **u/RMcD94** [+1]  (6 hours later)
>> 
>> The start of enter the void seems like a good example of realism. You even blink with the character

> **u/Kinoite** [+13]  (2 hours later)
> 
> What do we do with professionally-published works?  Especially ones that are realistic or historical fiction?
> 
> Celia Grant's "[A Lady Awakened](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0553593838)" is a historical romance with a level-headed protagonist.  The characters seem about as [Level 1 intelligent](http://yudkowsky.tumblr.com/writing/level1intelligent) as the characters in the works that get frequently posted here.
> 
> Even though the characters are mostly rational, I wouldn't expect books like "A Lady Awakened" to be a particularly popular among the subreddit.  Maybe a romance novel would be interesting as a one-off.  But in practice, there's a big filter on genre (historical romance vs. fantasy deconstruction) and publication format (book vs web-serial).  
> 
> This leads to a disconnect.
> 
> If we add "... web-published serials about fantasy deconstructions" to the sidebar, we've lost a core idea.
> 
> If we don't add that, then we're not really filtering on "is rationalist" but "is interesting to the sub."  And, in the latter case, who cares about the precise definition we put on the right hand side?

>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+8]  (20 hours later)
>> 
>> I would not be against more talk about published works that happen to be rational on this subreddit (or even talking about what parts of such works are rational, as already occasionally happens). I would expect these sort of things to be eclipsed by talk about web serials, mostly because those stories receive updates much more often, but I don't see a reason to exclude them a-priori.
>> 
>> Different genres is a more interesting problem, because I agree with your assessment that historical romance novels are unlikely to be interesting to a majority of the people on this subreddit. I think it's probably still better to not exclude those a-priori either. Just leave it as a known distinction between theory and practice; stories from other genres are absolutely welcome, they'll just stand out a bit as a-typical against all the fantasy/sci-fi stories. 
>> 
>> And hey, maybe at some point /u/AlexanderWales writes a rational Pride and Prejudice fanfic that becomes so popular that in a year or two the entire subreddit is dedicated to rational historical romance novels. I'd be ok with that.

>>> **u/alexanderwales** [+3]  *Time flies like an arrow* (5 days later)
>>> 
>>> Pride and Prejudice wouldn't actually take all that much work to turn into rational fiction (per my own sense of the genre). The plot is more or less fine, the characters are more or less fine, all you'd really need to change is the internal narration, and then make tweaks to the characters to fit. It's already a book that's about social expectations, conflicts of values, updating based on new information, etc., I mostly think that it's the lens that would make most of us say "nope, not rational fiction", rather than the genre or plot.
>>> 
>>> (Granted, this subreddit definitely has its preferences in terms of genre and plot, but I don't at all think that love stories and regency dramas would be instantly discounted, so long as they took the right form.)

>> **u/gbear605** [+4]  *history’s greatest story* (10 hours later)
>> 
>> Perhaps it would be useful to distinguish between "rational" the genre (which "A Lady Awakened" could go in) and "rational" the subreddit, which is primarily web-published serials about fantasy deconstructions. In that case, it could still be good for us to define the genre, and then limit the subreddit to the intersection of the genre and "web-published serials about fantasy."

>> **u/None** [+3]  (a day later)
>> 
>> [removed]

>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+2]  (a day later)
>>> 
>>> Let's not go around promoting illegal (or questionably legal depending on where you live) practices.
>>> 
>>> Unless there are legal, author approved, ebook torrents going around, of course, but I don't think that is the case for most published works.

>>>> **u/None** [+1]  (a day later)
>>>> 
>>>> [removed]

>>>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+2]  (a day later)
>>>>> 
>>>>> > If someone who can't pay for it steals a book or someone steals a book but sends a donation to the author, stealing the book wouldn't be immoral. 
>>>>> 
>>>>> True, but I strongly suspect these two cases are not the most common ways ebook torrents get used, especially since ebooks aren't nearly as expensive as (for instance) video games.

>>>>>> **u/None** [+2]  (a day later)
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> [removed]

>>>>>>> **u/Nimelennar** [+6]  (a day later)
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> That's a very individualist moral perspective, and you're going to run into a lot of utilitarians here.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> Utilitarianism assigns moral weight to someone's actions not just on what they do or what consequences that they intend, but also upon unintended consequences that should have been foreseeable (and willful ignorance is generally not a valid defense, as a foreseeable consequence of that is unforeseen consequences to your actions).
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> For a utilitarian, posting a link ---knowing that, by doing so, you'll be enabling others, who would not have otherwise committed a moral failing, to do so --- can *absolutely* be a moral failing in itself.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> And, again, although I haven't conducted a survey, I'll make an educated guess and say there are probably more utilitarians than individualists here.

>>>>>>>> **u/melmonella** [+2]  *Tremble, o ye mighty, for a new age is upon you* (2 days later)
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> Wherever those utilitarians think torrenting is a moral failing is a different question, though.

>>>>>>>> **u/None** [+0]  (a day later)
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> [removed]

>>>>>>>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+3]  (a day later)
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>>> If there is no practical way to do so they don't. If the choice is between:
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>>> 1. A world in which both people that can't afford to pay for books and people that can afford to pay but don't want to have access to torrents. 
>>>>>>>>> 2. A world in which neither of those groups have access to torrents.
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>>> Then a good consequential does some reasoning and decides whether the gained utility from providing access to books to the people that can't pay for them is worth the lost utility from writers not getting paid for their work (and there thus being less full time writers and less high quality books). 
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>>> I think that the group of people that cannot afford to pay €5,- for an ebook is small enough that the balance tips in favor of having more full time writers.

>>>>>>> **u/Kishoto** [+6]  (a day later)
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> That's the old "I don't kill people; I just sell illegal guns to criminals." logic. Said gun dealer isn't morally exempt, though there's most likely debate over how much moral responsibility they hold.

>>>>>>>> **u/None** [+1]  (a day later)
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> [removed]

>>>>>>>>> **u/Kishoto** [+2]  (a day later)
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>>> Majority yes, but majority in a sense more along the lines of 65-35 as opposed to 90-10.

> **u/Gelifyal** [+16]  (an hour later)
> 
> Hello, author of *Aeromancer* here!
> 
> Let me tell you what brought me here and what nearly drove me away.
> 
> Two discussions stick out in my mind for what I consider positive, and then less so. There was a thread about a rational Wakanda, and within there was a brief discussion about how to rationalize it further. The topic was how the choosing of kings was irrational. I loved how someone asked to define why they thought it was irrational, and how it *could* be defined as rational (warring tribe, the strongest person becomes king & becomes panther simultaneously). The discussion ended in an agreement that the movie demonstrated the flaws of the ascension system, and that to be rational they should have changed it at the end. I liked this discussion a lot because it provided solutions and more meaty stuff (including an attempt to rationalize the opposing side), rather than a simple "it's that way because the plot demanded it!"
> 
> The other discussion was regarding Batman: The Dark Knight. If my memory serves me correctly, the statement was that the movie was irrational because the Joker was marked in the "evil for the sake of evil" category. I disliked this train of thought, and don't think a story is immediately irrational because of that. How characters respond to irrationality can make the story even more rational.
> 
> I made an account and came to this sub a few months ago because I enjoyed seeing the discussions around MoL and discovered WtC here. I liked how they told their stories. I decided to write my own and post it here.
> 
> After posting two chapters, I nearly left lol
> 
> I was told that my first chapter was irrational because a motive for a character wasn't expressed (the counselor), and that a magic style happened that wasn't defined earlier in the chapter. (Both of which were brought to attention the next chapter, or at a later chapter.)
> 
> For my second chapter, I was told my story was irrational because the characters didn't react to something in a realistic way. I asked to further define what the poster meant, and he simply wanted the character to be angrier or more scared. What's ironic about that is that I had recently come off of a post in r/askreddit regarding the Haiwain Missle Crisis that happened in January. The question? How did people react when they got the news a missile was inbound and could kill them.
> 
> The reactions were *so* different with each person.
> Some filled their tubs with water, others ran red lights. But then you have the grandma who was making toast, got the message, then asked the grandchild if they wanted jam on the bread. Another person was on the toilet and swiped the message away, thinking "oh well". A third was sleeping, saw the notification, and decided to keep sleeping.
> 
> The problem with defining a rational story is that everyone has their own subjective opinion on what it is. It might be better to think of a story along the lines of *how* rational is it, rather than *is it* rational. Some people may enjoy an 80% rational fiction and think it belongs here, but another would think otherwise.
> 
> (Granted, I don't have a definition on what is considered 80% rational, only that the number *does* exist in each person, but it varies greatly.)

>> **u/alexanderwales** [+7]  *Time flies like an arrow* (an hour later)
>> 
>> > The other discussion was regarding Batman: The Dark Knight. If my memory serves me correctly, the statement was that the movie was irrational because the Joker was marked in the "evil for the sake of evil" category. I disliked this train of thought, and don't think a story is immediately irrational because of that. How characters respond to irrationality can make the story even more rational.
>> 
>> I think this is one of the big weaknesses of the current sidebar definition; it's overspecific. You can *for sure* write a rational zombie story, as with any Man vs Nature story. You could write a rational story about engineers diagnosing an engine failure! So why, when an antagonist gets added in, do they need to not be just evil? Besides that, the current definitions don't even cut to the core of the problem, because "beliefs and values" can be pretty dumb, and also isomorphic to "evil for the sake of evil". A sadist values the suffering of others; does that make a horror story "more rational" than if the villain's motives are simply unexplained? 
>> 
>> Now, I would argue that it's generally good writing to have a well-thought-out antagonist, and if you're writing rational fiction, then the focus of your story probably shouldn't be on the motives of someone who's simply insane ... which cuts out a lot of space to work within. And even if the antagonist is "plain" evil, they need to be *consistent* in their goals, skills, and methods, as otherwise everything becomes arbitrary and immune from thought.

>>> **u/gbear605** [+5]  *history’s greatest story* (10 hours later)
>>> 
>>> I suspect that part of the reason for it to have been on the sidebar in the past is that it helps with the "if you give Frodo a lightsaber, you have to give Sauron a deathstar" thing. If you make Frodo rational, you have to make Sauron rational or else Frodo easily wins. Obviously, there are better ways to make it work besides making the antagonist evil, but it is a tool that many rational fics use (most notable, HPMOR).

>>>> **u/Roneitis** [+9]  (12 hours later)
>>>> 
>>>> This is a valid point, but only necessarily a problem with fanfiction, I think. 
>>>> 
>>>> When writing fanfiction, there already /exists/ a way that the main character can win. If you just buff the MC, (by making them rational) then the villain should, if they aren't buffed in some way, lose even more easily than in the original work, which sorta kills the conflict.
>>>> 
>>>> Naturally, this could be solved by buffing the antagonist in other ways, or adding other handicaps to the MC, but making the villain rational has a poetic symmetry to it, and I can see why this is done.
>>>> 
>>>> In a world created from scratch where the MC is designed with rational traits to begin with, you could just create a whole different power dynamic from the beginning, which could even more easily not entail rationality for everyone, if you so pleased.

>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+5]  (19 hours later)
>> 
>> Responding to two of your posts at the same time:
>> 
>> > How characters respond to irrationality can make the story even more rational.
>> 
>> and
>> 
>> > A veteran banker who knows the ins and out, have them hold the idiot ball, that is the irrational part that puts me off, not stupid characters.
>> 
>> I think there is a very important point here: the way we use the word rational when describing stories and the way we use it when describing people in the real world are different. (This is not unusual btw, just look at the Fantasy genre, if you take that name literally, _every_ story would fall into that genre). 
>> 
>> Real world people very often act irrational, but they act irrational in realistic ways, not in ways that are convenient for the plot. Of course a rational story can include irrational characters (and almost all of them do), it should just make clear to the reader why the actions of that character are completely reasonable and utterly normal _from the perspective and worldview of that character_.
>> 
>> I think I disagree with you about the Joker, though. The irrationality of the Joker is not the common irrationality that real world people exhibit. The sum total of the Jokers characterization in the movie is that he "just wants to see the world burn". The story does not evoke empathy for the Joker in the way that it does for Two-Face or Ra's Al-Gul (both of whom could, with a little steelmanning, be perfectly valid antagonists for a rational story), it does not allow you to see the world from his perspective and understand why he is doing the things he is doing. We're just supposed to accept that some people are just evil, period. 
>> 
>> That's what the current definition in the sidebar is (badly) arguing against and it is something that I think should be reflected in whatever new definition we come up with here.

>>> **u/Gelifyal** [+8]  (21 hours later)
>>> 
>>> >Real world people very often act irrational, but they act irrational in realistic ways...it should just make clear to the reader why the actions of that character are completely reasonable and utterly normal *from the perspective and worldview of that character.*
>>> 
>>> This is where our definitions start to get subjective. If something is realistic and is completely reasonable, then why would it ever be classified as irrational?
>>> 
>>> My veteran banker holding the idiot ball example would be something irrational to me. There was no reason for him to be idiotic. But add in a few things, like a recent wife's death, or lack of sleep, then suddenly his idiot ball moment has be *rationalized*, and therefore is no longer irrational. To me, having that plausible reason makes all the difference whether I consider something irrational or not, and whether it pulls me out of the story to say *seriously?*
>>> 
>>> >I think I disagree with you about the Joker...it does not allow you to see the world from his perspective and understand why he is doing the things he is doing
>>> 
>>> I believe he wanted to show people that they were as twisted as him (Batman said this during the climax). Even without knowing any other background or sob story, that line of thought intrigued me and never pulled me out of the story to say *really?*

>>>> **u/suyjuris** [+7]  (22 hours later)
>>>> 
>>>> > This is where our definitions start to get subjective. If something is realistic and is completely reasonable, then why would it ever be classified as irrational?
>>>> 
>>>> You touch on something that I think is quite important: For me, being rational and being realistic are very different things, and the latter should not be used as an indicator of the former. Instead, actions should *feel* realistic, whether or not that is actually the case. Would it be realistic for Voldemort to forget a rune and have his ritual blow up right before his final battle? Sure, mistakes happen and inconvenient timing is not actually that improbable. But it isn't rational, is it?
>>>> 
>>>> When I hear what a character is doing, I want to (eventually) think 'Yeah, that makes sense'. It does not really matter whether I can come up with a justification why they would do it (which is rarely difficult), if it does not make sense to me after I have read the whole thing I would not call it rational.

>>>>> **u/Gelifyal** [+3]  (22 hours later)
>>>>> 
>>>>> >Would it be realistic for Voldemort to forget a rune and have his ritual blow up right before his final battle? Sure, mistakes happen and inconvenient timing is not actually that improbable. But it isn't rational, is it?
>>>>> 
>>>>> That's in the category of simply bad writing at this stage. It's been said many times that coincidences shouldn't solve problems (but can start them). The final baddie getting nerfed without action from the main character (or previous characterizations) would feel cheap. This applies to all genres.
>>>>> 
>>>>> We may disagree on how we define rational fiction, but the thing we seem to both be saying is that we don't want to step away from a moment in a story and say, "Hmm...really?"
>>>>> 
>>>>> How quickly we disconnect from a story depends on our tolerance level with each piece of work. Hence my original post stating that some may accept an 80% rational novel, while someone else might disconnect even sooner.

>>>>>> **u/suyjuris** [+2]  (a day later)
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> > That's in the category of simply bad writing at this stage. It's been said many times that coincidences shouldn't solve problems (but can start them). The final baddie getting nerfed without action from the main character (or previous characterizations) would feel cheap. This applies to all genres.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> True. I do think that less extreme versions of my example appear more commonly in non-rational fiction than in the rational ones, but not because it *is* unlikely, but rather because it *feels* arbitrary.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Maybe a better example to show the disconnect would go in the other direction: The protagonist has a clever idea to solve a problem, using the resources that are available to them, with the writer setting up everything well in advance. I'm not talking about some crazy, convoluted scheme, but your good, old, two-step plan. However, a critical, unpredictable misfortune forces them to adapt.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I do not think that throwing obstacles in the form of 'bad luck' in front of the protagonist is necessarily bad writing. Also, it can certainly be realistic; things go wrong without good reason all the time. However, I believe it would not be rational.

>>>>>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+3]  (a day later)
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> > I do not think that throwing obstacles in the form of 'bad luck' in front of the protagonist is necessarily bad writing. Also, it can certainly be realistic; things go wrong without good reason all the time. However, I believe it would not be rational.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> The way I read this, you want victories for both the good guys and the bad guys to be earned (ie. be a direct consequence of their actions, rather than coming from a lucky break). Or conversely, all setbacks in a rational story, both for the good guys and the bad guys, are due to enemy action. Is this a fair summary of your position?
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> If so, how does that work for stories where the antagonist is non-anthropomorphic (like the rational zombie apocalypse story mentioned above), would those stories be disqualified by default?

>>>>>>>> **u/suyjuris** [+3]  (2 days later)
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> > The way I read this, you want victories for both the good guys and the bad guys to be earned [...]. Or conversely, all setbacks in a rational story, both for the good guys and the bad guys, are due to enemy action. Is this a fair summary of your position?
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> Yes, I do agree with that sentiment.
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> > If so, how does that work for stories where the antagonist is non-anthropomorphic [...], would those stories be disqualified by default?
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> I feel that I do not fully understand your question. In this example, the antagonist (e.g. the zombie horde) would not 'earn' their victories, but the story presumably does not focus on them. The protagonist is free to intelligently overcome the obstacles, which are not posed by an adversary, but rather the environment. So, I would say that earning your victories by beating out an intelligent, non-underpowered anthropomorphic adversary is certainly one way for a story to be rational, but winning against a dumb, overpowered world works fine as well: The solution has to be clever, the problem may be stupid.
>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>> If the author chooses to write long parts about the overwhelming force and easy victories of the zombie horde, than those parts would be disqualified.

>>>>>>>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+3]  (2 days later)
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>>> > The solution has to be clever, the problem may be stupid.
>>>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>>>> That's what I was asking for and I guess I fully agree with you. From your earlier post I kinda got the impression that you thought rational stories should only be about a battle of wits between smart protagonists and smart antagonists, but that didn't fully click, so I figured I'd ask (maybe I did so in too roundabout a way).

>> **u/gbear605** [+4]  *history’s greatest story* (10 hours later)
>> 
>> > How characters respond to irrationality can make the story even more rational.
>> 
>> Another example is the response to Lee's unwavering nationalism in Waves Arisen, when Naruto sees him just before the ending scene.

>> **u/icesharkk** [+2]  (10 hours later)
>> 
>> I have to deal with irrationality at work every day. Because stupid, be stupid. Having an irrational character should not strike you from the list of rationality. You're story needs to recover from it and the main character should still respond rationaly (I recommend loss of alcohol).

>>> **u/Gelifyal** [+5]  (11 hours later)
>>> 
>>> Unless my story is Batman, the irrational character doesn't belong to me!
>>> 
>>> But I found it interesting how you used the phrase "recover" when the idea of an irrational character is introduced. People being stupid isn't irrational if it fits their character. A farmer suddenly working at a bank will still be considered ignorant after a year's experience when compared to the veteran.  That is still in the realms of rationality.
>>> 
>>> A veteran banker who knows the ins and out, have them hold the idiot ball, *that* is the irrational part that puts me off, not stupid characters.

> **u/ketura** [+8]  *Organizer* (25 seconds later)
> 
> The most useful portion of the survey thrown together last week was the one-word description portion that asked for people to check as many boxes as they’d like to fill in what they thought should be on the subreddit.
> 
> [You can find a pretty graph here.](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/196309529850281984/463588696663261185/What_one-word_description_describes_the_sort_of_fiction_you_expect_to_find_on_the_subreddit__Select_.png)
> 
> (I didn’t put it in the OP due to botched methodology, but if you’d like to see the rest of the results of the survey you can find links [in the companion thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/8vtsyb/meta_rrational_characteristics_of_rational)).

> **u/AmeteurOpinions** [+7]  *Finally, everyone was working together.* (an hour later)
> 
> Damn it, I meant to prepare this post yesterday and just forgot. So we'll do it live! I think we can all agree that there is such a thing as a "rational story" which makes it stand out from other fiction, otherwise, why are we even here? Therefore, determining the best ways to determine this quality is a worthy goal of the community.
> 
> Anyway...
> 
> **A Hilariously Brief Overview**
> 
> There will be different ideologies present which must be accounted for, such as some users arguing for a definition which measures an idealized but nonexistent rationalfic and other users who desire a definition with specific results when used to measure existing popular stories. There may even be meta-level disagreement about the role of the sidebar and its utility in a subreddit, which I think should be avoided as besides the point. Here's a few ways it could go:
> 
> * **Narrow Defintion** argues for a set of definitions and traits, or a single definition, which stories pass or fail. The purpose is to efficiently judge whether or not a story fits according to obvious metric. I don't think this one will fly because it is, unsurprisingly, too  narrow in scope and inadequate the task considering the abundant stories available for catalog.
> 
> * **Checklist** format tries to give a list of traits which stories may or may not contain. The primary difference between the Narrow and the Checklist is that this are allows stories to seriously violate one or more of these traits and still be judged "rational" if the successfully pass the other tests. This is most similar to the current sidebar and I don't expect it significantly improve the situation. It inevitably leads to bickering over the exact traits and definitions so enshrined and leaves out qualities which were not articulated in those definitions. 
> 
> * **Whatever Is Most Upvoted**, aka Mob Rule. Not to disparage mobs, but I don't think this is what we are looking for to base the sidebar by sorting by top/all-time and just taking the top ten entries as the gold standard (no offense, MoL).
> 
> Notably, those who want the definitions to stay the same are excluded, and should be. As a matter of policy, there should be no option given for inaction, or else it is likely that option will result if the other groups do not come to some sort of compromise.
> 
> **II: My Personal Opinion**
> 
> [I was here before the sub was founded](https://www.reddit.com/r/HPMOR/comments/1rkkam/in_light_of_the_recent_slew_of_recommendations/), so I would like to think I have at least some amount of understanding. 
> 
> First, I am *not* sure that there is a major difference between **rational** and **rationalist** fiction. The existing divide is merely an artifact of insufficient data and would not remain if there were 10,000x times as many rationalfics to properly explore the spectrum. 
> However, [I wrote a long time ago](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/2txg42/metad_they_should_have_sent_a_poet/) about my opinion that what makes rational stories rational. It's kind of an alternate view that doesn't work particularly well with the usual traits and definitions, so I can't expect it to be shared by the other users. Essentially, a story, but certainly a rational story, *can have* and *should have* a thesis, even if it subtle, emotional, and never actually stated. If this thesis is upheld through the story, it is rational. This is, I think, one of the best ways to generalize the notion of rational fiction outside a tiny internet community with a very specific taste. This metric can works the community loves but doesn't count as rational such as *Worm* and group it with definitive works like *Methods*. I don't think I'll ever come to love a definiton which divides these two stories which outwardly have so little in common, because for me they certainly possess that "quality" which them stand out fro, the stories I've read. (this may have the side effect of including Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagaan/ I'm not a complaining). I'm sure I'm failing to describe what exactly I mean by this sort of "premis/thesis/conclusion", and I can only say that I have to give it more specifc thought and elaboration, but most of it is in the "They Should Have Sent A Poet" post linked above.
> 
> You may respond that "Isn't that just the fallacy of 'Rational Fiction is Good Fiction'?" To which the answer is clearly no. Countless beloved and excelletn stories don't try to stick to a premise and theme. 
> 
> You may respond that this definition has nothing really to do with the traits currently taken to describe rational fiction. I don't have a strong response to this, other than "I'm sure they will work together". I heard somewhere that the goal of fantasy is to engage you emotionally, while the goal of science fiction is to engage you intellectually. The best rational fiction can do both, but I have yet to be able to articulate how or why. Still working on that part.

>> **u/ArisKatsaris** [+3]  *Sidebar Contender* (6 hours later)
>> 
>> > Essentially, a story, but certainly a rational story, can have and should have a thesis, even if it subtle, emotional, and never actually stated
>> 
>> ... I don't see how this has anything to do with the rational genre. If, say, the consistent thesis of The Bible is "Have faith in God" and it sticks to it, I nonetheless don't think it qualities as belonging in the rational genre.

>> **u/abcd_z** [+1]  (8 hours later)
>> 
>> > [REDACTED]  
>> 
>> Can you remove this part?  Right now we're explicitly not supposed to be coming up with solutions.

>>> **u/AmeteurOpinions** [+2]  *Finally, everyone was working together.* (8 hours later)
>>> 
>>> Right, that part was from much earlier notes.

> **u/ArisKatsaris** [+7]  *Sidebar Contender* (6 hours later)
> 
> **Thoughts on the aspects of the problem:**
> 
> - By "rational fiction" most of us, we have a vague sense of what we mean, it being the type of story that shares many of the characteristics we liked in HPMOR and stories inspired by it.
> But we want a description that can clearly communicate what those sought-after characteristics are, for people who aren't already familiar with the corpus of this vague genre.
> 
> - For a newcomer, the description should serve to help them know whether this is the kind of genre they're interested in.
> 
> - For an author or possible poster, it should help them know whether the stories they'll be writing/recommending will find a possibly favorable audience here.
> 
> **Potential failure modes:**
> 
> - Being overly specific -- treating incidental aspects of the works in the genre as if they're crucial aspects of the entire genre. (e.g. does rational fiction even need have intelligent characters, even though all currently known examples thereof do have them?)
> 
> - Being overly vague -- having a description that could be said to apply to pretty much most stories.
> 
> - Mistargeting the set of characteristics we seek in rational fiction, so that we instead list the characteristics we would seek in *any* fiction, rather that the characteristics we seek in rational fiction. Unless you're the type of person that only ever enjoys one particular genre, you should be able to imagine a story that falls clearly outside the genre as described and which you nonetheless enjoy greatly. We don't seek to describe *good* fiction. We seek to describe the *genre* we like, in accordance with our tastes and preferences, but you should nonetheless be able to conceive examples of the genre you dislike (despite them being unquestionably part of the genre) and non-examples of the genre you love (despite them being unquestionably not parts of it).

> **u/haiku_fornification** [+10]  (2 hours later)
> 
> I think the definition of rational fiction should focus less on what it actually is and more on what it does, as the current approach is needlessly stiffing. To clarify what I mean, let's look at definition of sci-fi - a genre which still struggles with its own identity. Straight from wikipedia, we have:
> 
> > Science fiction often explores the potential consequences of scientific and other innovations, and has been called a "literature of ideas".
> 
> And a little bit further down,  
> 
> > Isaac Asimov said: "Science fiction can be defined as that branch of literature which deals with the reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology."
> 
> In both of the above, the answer doesn't tell you what sci-fi *is* but what it *does*. It gives you the key ideas and questions surrounding the genre. 
> 
> Looking at the sidebar now, my main problems is with how the definition is stated rather than their spirit. I'll illustrate using the following:
> 
>     The fictional world has consistent rules, and sticks to them.
> 
> This applies to probably 90% of all commercially successful fiction. What this is saying is that rational fiction isn't crap, i.e. it's internally consistent. More than that, it's incredibly cut and dry. It doesn't facilitate discussion at all - you can basically dismiss a story as not being rational simply because it isn't fully consistent on a couple of points.
> 
> This is a huge problem as when you look at other genre definitions they purposefully don't box themselves in too much. You want a lot of room so that creative people can come up with cool ideas and approaches that you haven't thought of yet, which I think the current systen doesn't provide.

>> **u/alexanderwales** [+7]  *Time flies like an arrow* (9 hours later)
>> 
>> I think this is one of the big weaknesses of the current sidebar definition; it's underspecific.
>> 
>> Many of these 'characteristics' are simply aspects of good writing, or broad statements about what values we place on stories without *actually* being statements about values (which they ought to be, if that's what we're talking about). It would be very easy to write fiction which fits those characteristics, but isn't rational fiction as it would be recognized by readers of this subreddit, which is a good clue that the characteristics are a significant underfit. As one example, a large amount of historical fiction would qualify as rational fiction if you went by the sidebar, with only the third point possibly being disqualifying.
>> 
>> Moreover, it's very easy to circumvent these characteristics, and I've seen people use the arguments a number of times. We say that factions have to be driven into conflict by their differing beliefs and values, but then we say nothing about the complexity of those values, how much they're inspected by the story or known to the reader, etc. You could write the most morally simplistic tale in the world and justify the conflict as being because of beliefs and values rather than "good" and "evil": the antagonist values the suffering of others, that's his character sorted.
>> 
>> From my perspective, the closest that the sidebar gets to actually working is the third point, the "intelligent use of knowledge and resources to solve problems". In other words, problems aren't primarily solved by luck, or by unintelligent use of knowledge and resources. This does the most work to disqualify stories that don't fit the mold ... and I still think that it's underspecific, because "intelligent use" is far too weaselly, especially if that characteristic is going to be doing the heavy lifting.

>>> **u/-main** [+2]  (a day later)
>>> 
>>> > Many of these 'characteristics' are simply aspects of good writing
>>> 
>>> They're selected aspects of good writing, not simply an attempt to redefine 'good'. Consider vivid and compelling imagery and poetic, gripping choice of words -- such things might be good, and no one will complain about them in their rationalfic. But they're not quite the specific kind of good that people here are focused on.

>> **u/None** [+3]  (a day later)
>> 
>> [removed]

>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+2]  (a day later)
>>> 
>>> Presumably that it would be a very empty subreddit, as being fully consistent on all points is an unrealistically high bar to clear.
>>> 
>>> Then again /u/haiku_fornification also implies that 90% of all commercially successful fiction is internally consistent (which does not match my observations btw), so those two statements seem to be contradicting each other.

>>>> **u/melmonella** [+4]  *Tremble, o ye mighty, for a new age is upon you* (2 days later)
>>>> 
>>>> In my opinion consistency can be viewed as a spectrum, based on how much thinking it takes for someone to find an inconsistency, on how big that inconsistency is when found, and on how complicated it would be to postulate a reason that explains the inconsistency away. Characters never using (and never even discussing the possibility of using) an Artifact Of Immortality they found in episode 2 even though they are constantly in mortal danger is one thing. Prices of beer in the local taverns being 1.5 times as high as expected after modeling the whole supply and production chain (over the course of three real life weeks) and accounting for all optimisations that usage of magic would allow for compared to real life is another.

>>>>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+1]  (2 days later)
>>>>> 
>>>>> I agree with all of that. I think the person you were to replying to was saying that with the current definition you can always argue that a work you don't like isn't rational because the price of beer was 1.5 times higher than it should be in the local tavern.
>>>>> 
>>>>> That's not necessarily a point I agree with, btw (finding a definition that is impossible to misuse is way outside the scope of what we're trying to do here and also quite likely impossible), I was just trying to clarify the argument.

>>>>>> **u/melmonella** [+1]  *Tremble, o ye mighty, for a new age is upon you* (2 days later)
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I don't think that argument holds well. You aren't omniscient with respect to what happens in the world of the story, and factors outside of your knowledge can account for whatever inconsistencies you see. In fact, they can account even for the largest imaginable inconsistencies - heroes in my Artifact of Immortality example might be mindcontrolled, or had their memories edited to forget the existence of the artifact, or something. In my opinion, the issue is similar to that of postulating more and more [epicycles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deferent_and_epicycle) as you get more and more accurate astronomic data - eventually your world model simply gets too darn complicated to consider seriously. At that point you either invent a simpler model, decide that evidence is a lie, or make peace with an overly complicated model. 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> In the context of stories, first would be inventing a single fan theory that in one fell swoop explains 50 inconsistencies across the board, like that Darth Jar Jar thing. If *author* does that, and shows some factor on-screen that explains all the previous seeming inconsistencies, it's a fairly thematic ratfic moment. 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Second, in the context of stories, would be deciding that author did not think the story through and it really is inconsistent. Finally, third option doesn't really exist, since you can argue with an author in a way you can't with Nature.

>>> **u/ianstlawrence** [+2]  (4 days later)
>>> 
>>> I think this line would be comparable to this:
>>> Let's say your favorite movie is The Machinist, for the sake of argument. Great movie, in your opinion. But someone else is like, "Well, at some point, he was wearing shoes, and then in the next scene, in the same place and time, he wasn't wearing shoes. So it is a bad movie."
>>> 
>>> I think that the "basically dismiss a story as not being rational simply because it isn't fully consistent on a couple of points." is referring to an example like that, but in literary form. 
>>> 
>>> At least that was how I saw it.

>>>> **u/None** [+1]  (5 days later)
>>>> 
>>>> [removed]

>>>>> **u/ianstlawrence** [+2]  (5 days later)
>>>>> 
>>>>> What I am saying is more like, we usually don't judge a movie on how good it is based on a small error like that. Which I think was the point of the previous poster's opinion.
>>>>> 
>>>>> I'm not saying things like that shouldn't be noted, but just that quality of work isn't usually directly tied to something like that.
>>>>> 
>>>>> However, it is a question of degrees, if a theoretical movie, like the Machinist, had 1000 such errors, well, that would probably drive someone mad and greatly detract from the quality of the movie and the enjoyment of it. 
>>>>> 
>>>>> But the original post did mention a few such errors, rather than some great quantity of them. Although I do recognize that for some people some small error like that could jump out at them very strongly and still ruin or greatly detract from a movie.

> **u/None** [+5]  (8 hours later)
> 
> [deleted]

>> **u/Silver_Swift** [+3]  (20 hours later)
>> 
>> > Can be used to guide new writing 
>> 
>> I think this is incredibly important if we want the community to grow, but it also raises an interesting question; should we try to get more posts on the subreddit that are about writing resources (like the [Optimize Literally Everything](http://yudkowsky.tumblr.com/writing) guide) and/or specifically talk about topics involving writing, rather than reading, rational stories (like the Wednesday worldbuilding threads)?
>> 
>> I don't have a good answer and it's more about what we want to see on this subreddit, rather than what a rational story is, but I think it's something we should consider if we are going to rewrite the sidebar. 
>> 
>> > Also, this description of an ideal definition is longer than I'd expect the definition to be.
>> 
>> This is not surprising, given that one of the things the definition needs to be optimized for is brevity.

> **u/Nimelennar** [+5]  (10 hours later)
> 
> It's almost a cliché that in order to find the right answers, you need to be asking the right questions.
> 
> Luckily, brainstorming questions is totally my jam.
> 
> I'm going to try to avoid asking closed questions, although I'm sure a couple of them will sneak in.  The reason I'm doing that is that closed-ended questions, by their very nature, limit how much thinking you put into the answer.  So, rather than ask, "Is it necessary for a rational story to have a rational antagonist?" it's better to ask questions like, "What does a rational antagonist contribute to the story?" or "How can you keep a story with a rational protagonist but a non-rational antagonist interesting?" or "How does making your antagonist rational change the character arc of your protagonist?"
> 
> The first of those four questions can only be answered "Yes" or "No"  
>  (plus or minus conditionals).  However, there's no limit to how the three open-ended questions can be answered, so you're likely to get better-thought-out answers to them.
> 
> I'll be answering all of these questions to my own satisfaction later (probably next week), but for now, just questions.
> 
> So, let's start:
> 
> **General rationality:**
> -----
> * What is rationality?
> * What is rationalism?
> * What is science?
> * To what extent can any human being be rational?
> * How rational is a [WEIRD](https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/WEIRD) person, compared to someone less educated?
> * How easy is it to learn rationality?
> 
> **Rational settings:**
> -----
> * To what extent is it useful or necessary to set a rational story in world whose physical rules are consistent?  To what extent is it harmful?
> * To what extent is it useful or necessary to set a rational story in world with real-world physics?  To what extent is it harmful?
> * To what extent is it useful or necessary to set a rational story in a nation whose laws were designed rationally?  To what extent is it harmful?
> * To what extent is it useful or necessary to set a rational story in a culture whose customs and values are based in rationality?  To what extent is it harmful?
> 
> **Rational characters:**
> -----
> * What makes a character rational?
> * What makes a character a rationalist?  How does that differ from simply being rational?
> * Why would you want to show a character becoming *more* rational as the story progresses?  How about becoming *less* rational?
> * "Perfectly rational" characters are, almost by definition, inhuman.  How are these characters useful in rational fiction?  How are they harmful?
> 
> *Protagonists:*
> 
> * To what extent is it necessary that the protagonist(s) be rational in a rational story?
> * To what extent is it necessary that the protagonist(s) become more rational as the story progresses?
> * How would perfect rationality from your protagonist affect how interesting your story is?  How relatable the character is?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your protagonist's value system is humanist?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your protagonist's value system is self-consistent?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your protagonist's goals are consistent with their stated system of values?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your protagonist's methods are a rational means to their goals?
> 
> *Antagonists:*
> 
> * To what extent is it necessary that the antagonist(s) be rational in a rational story?
> * To what extent is it necessary that the antagonist(s) become more (or less) rational as the story progresses?
> * How would perfect rationality from your antagonist affect how interesting your story is?  How relatable the character is?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your antagonist's value system is humanist?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your antagonist's value system is self-consistent?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your antagonist's goals are consistent with their stated system of values?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your antagonist's methods are a rational means to their goals?
> * To what extent does it matter whether your protagonist learns anything from your antagonist?  And vice versa?
> 
> *Secondary characters:*
> 
> * What proportion of the secondary characters should be rational?  If a large proportion, what makes the main character special?  If a small proportion, why is the main character more rational than their peers?
> * Should any characters be *more* rational than your -tagonists?
> 
> **Rational Plot:**
> -----
> * How much agency should the characters have (i.e. to what extent should the ending of the story depend on the characters' decisions)?
> * How predictable should the consequences of the characters' actions be?  How much do you sacrifice your ability to surprise your reader in the name of having the consequences follow logically from what your characters do?
> * If depicting a recurring event, how important is it to know why no one has put an end to the cycle before?
> * If depicting a unique event, how important is it to know why no one has done this before?
> * Either way, how important is it for your protagonists to have a good reason to be the ones to deal with the mess?
> 
> **Rational Themes**:
> -----
> * To what extent is "the benefits of rationality" a necessary theme when writing a rationalist story?
> * How important is it that the antagonist has a valid point?
> * How important is it for the antagonist's point to become part of the protagonist's solution/final point of view?
> 
> **Rational Technique:**
> -----
> * To what extent should the characters, when critiquing their own state of mind, cite real-world phenomena, events, studies, terminology, etc. in a rational story?  In a rationalist story?
> * To what extent do the examples above need to be accurate, as opposed to just getting their point across?
> 
> -----
> 
> If anyone can think of more questions to add, or expand upon, please, feel free.  I'll give it a night's further thought myself.

> **u/LieGroupE8** [+3]  ** (a day later)
> 
> To add my two cents: when I make posts, I never know if I'm overstepping the bounds of the subreddit. I [have](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/5v5f4i/i_feel_like_theres_a_lot_of_potential_for_a/?ref=share&ref_source=link) [a](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/7obnf7/fw_admin_message_from_god/?ref=share&ref_source=link) [history](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/8nmcqb/c_harry_potter_and_the_methods_of_ricktionality/?ref=share&ref_source=link) of posting crack fics here that use rationalist tropes for humor. Based on the upvotes and the comments, those posts were all well-received, and I haven't gotten any angry moderator messages yet. I hope to post more in the future. Yet the rules of this subreddit say "post links to or discussion of rational fiction only," and my crack fics are most definitely *not* rational according to any reasonable definition (they could be called "rational-adjacent"). I guess since I don't post too often, the moderators allow my posts by discretion. My question is: how do people feel about posts like mine that seriously bend or break the official rules of this subreddit? Are they okay as long as they don't take over? Should they be placed in a new weekly thread for rationalist-adjacent content? Once this meta-discussion of the definition of rationalist fiction is over, will there be a purge in which all posts like mine are instantly removed?

>> **u/alexanderwales** [+3]  *Time flies like an arrow* (a day later)
>> 
>> Moderators aren't really in the habit of policing posts based on whether something is or is not rational fiction, partly because that would require us to read all of the stuff posted to this subreddit, which we don't have the time for (especially given the popularity of megaword fiction here), and partly because of inherent disagreement on definitions. It happens, sometimes, but not terribly often. I don't anticipate that changing, because whatever the new definition in the sidebar is, there are still going to be disagreements.
>> 
>> (Of the ~35 posts removed in the past three months, 9 were fiction. Of those 9, 1 was removed by AutoMod for being a link to the mobile version (reposted shortly after with no issue), 4 were double posts, 3 were posts made before a chapter went up, and 1 was a short script-style bit of prose that was widely downvoted and then removed by AutoMod.)
>> 
>> I generally think there's a place for "rational adjacent" in the subreddit, so long as there's not too much of it, but if "rational fiction" is fuzzy, then "rational adjacent" is even more fuzzy, and yes, at moderator discretion, some of that might be removed, especially if it's just shitposting. But it's probably just going to be removed at the same rates that it's removed now, which is not much.
>> 
>> (We're much more likely to remove posts that aren't fiction, especially if there's already a weekly thread for them.)
>> 
>> (We're also three mods with different views on things, and I didn't consult before writing this response.)

>> **u/causalchain** [+2]  (5 days later)
>> 
>> I personally love this. I'm here for a good read and if others feel the same then I think it has a place here. The way I see it Methods of Ricktionality is an injoke for the community around this sub, which makes it relevant to post.

> **u/Croktopus** [+3]  (a day later)
> 
> I kinda wanna just explore those questions in the OP, since I have opinions!
> 
> * Can rational fiction be reduced to a binary yes/no, or should it be a continuum?
> 
> I think it's absolutely possible for it to be a binary yes/no, to a certain extent. I can easily imagine a rational fiction definition with archetypical titles that fit the definition perfectly. Especially if they are used as tools to define the genre. However, i think that a straight "no" gives a problem, where we are too easily excluding pieces of fiction that are almost rational, but not quite there (as examples, I'd give Zombie Knight and Ward, which are close enough to rational to trigger the same rational feelings when reading, but upon significant thought dont seem quite right)
> 
> * How large a role does munchkinry play?
> 
> I don't think munchkinry is essential to rational fiction, but i *do* think that munchkinry is an important staple. i know that restrictiveness of definition was a concern in the prior topic, and id argue that a question like "does a story have munchkinry" would be far too exclusionary. especially since i think a holistic approach should be taken to judging stories, and it is far too easy to imagine a non-rational story with elements of munchkinry (indeed, irrational munchkinry is almost as common as rational munchkinry 
> 
> * Is there utility in distinguishing between narrativist and simulationist rational fiction?
> 
> based on alexander wales's definition of these concepts in his write-up, the comparison seems almost perfectly analagous to rationality and rationalization. however, i dont think its impossible to do narrativism so well that it seems like simulationism, so just like with munchkinry it seems more like a staple than a core value.
> 
> * Is there utility in distinguishing between rational and rationalist fiction?
> 
> For this one, I think absolutely yes. rationalist fiction does just seem to be a completely different beast to rational fiction, and i think that a reader can feel the difference very easily. and i think that difference is important, since they almost function on different meta-levels. for me, rational fiction is generally stuff that i can zone out and enjoy without violating my suspension of disbelief, whereas ill intentionally engage with rationalist fiction, and i think that difference in attitude is enough for a distinction to be warranted.
> 
> * What is the role that any solution itself should have?  Should it be a guideline, or a set of rules to delete posts by?
> 
> I don't like the idea of using rules to delete posts. i think the rules should be used to moderate tags, and thats it. so something like pokemon origin of species gets the rationalist tag, worth the candle gets a rational tag, zombie knight gets some sort of close-enough tag, and something that doesnt twig any of the rational indicators (ive been reading too much ratfic, cant even think of any non-rational web fiction) gets a non-rational tag. i think non-rational posts on this sub are few and far enough between that its not a big deal if we leave them up with a NR tag, so long as they dont get spammed (which should of course be grounds to delete a post)
> 
> and fwiw i think those 4 are a great set of tags to categorize things by, but i think that might be getting too close to suggesting a solution...sorry!

> **u/Kinoite** [+3]  (2 days later)
> 
> Proposed Problem: The current definition is a bad at starting useful discussions.
> 
> In practice, asking "Is Work X Rational?" generates a bad thread.  The current sub-points don't help too much, either.  "There isn't an explicit good/evil faction," doesn't sound like a ringing endorsement.
> 
> * How should the definition come up when people are making / discussing recommendations?
> 
> And perhaps:
> 
> * Would an ideal discussion focus on (1) what the author tried to do, (2) what the author managed to do, or (3) what the author lampshaded?
> * What should we do about stories that are intended to be rational but fall short of the mark?

> **u/0Gitaxian0** [+2]  *Sidebar Contestant* (5 days later)
> 
> Obviously rational fiction can’t just be *good* fiction, because there’s be no point in making it a separate category otherwise. If we want to find an accurate definition of rational fiction, we need to not just look at good, rational stories - we need to look at good but irrational stories and bad but rational stories.

> **u/marveljew** [+2]  (6 days later)
> 
> What is the difference between a magic / superpower system found in rational fiction and non-rational fiction? I've read several rational fics involved magic and powers. However, it just seems like these systems are exactly the same as magic system in non-rational literature.

> **u/WalterTFD** [+2]  (6 days later)
> 
> *Can rational fiction be reduced to a binary yes/no, or should it be a continuum?
> 
> I feel like this question elides the actual answer, which is that rational fiction CAN be reduced to a binary/yes/no, but should be a continuum.
> 
> I don't see a lot of value in a binary yes/no check for what stories are considered 'rational'.  Rather I'd like to use it like we use 'noir' or 'cyberpunk' when we talk about fiction.  It is a tag, if you've liked other things with this tag you might like this (because it was written by folks who liked other things with that tag).
> 
> *How large a role does munchkinry play?
> 
> I think munchkinry (that is, a character and the readers are given the rules of the story, then uses technicalities in them to achieve something) is to rational stories as dames smoking cigarettes and gravelly voiced dudes with guns are to noir.
> 
> That is, it isn't necessary or sufficient, but is a beloved staple of the genre.
> 
> In passing, I'd mention that munchkinry can destroy rationalist fiction if used improperly.  The Hyperdrive Ram scene from Star Wars isn't bad as a scene, it is bad because it makes the setting (more) nonsensical.  If munchkinry makes everyone who didn't munchkin an idiot (that is, it doesn't require some component everyone else lacks) then it strips the rational component from a story, in my view.
> 
> *Is there utility in distinguishing between narrativist and simulationist rational fiction?
> 
> I tend to use those terms when considering RPGs in the old GNS model of rpgs, from wherever that was from.  Simulationist is the DM simulating the world, sandbox style, and letting the players run wild.  Narrativist is the DM telling a story, with some player input, while Gamist is the DM challenging the players mastery of the system.
> 
> It seems obvious to me that all rationalist fiction, indeed all fiction, is narrativist, according to the above.  You can't let the readers run around a sandbox, because they have no way to input to you what they want to do next.  You can't challenge them as Gamists for similar reasons.  The form of fiction (as opposed to RPGs) dictates a narrativist purpose.
> 
> *Is there utility in distinguishing between rational and rationalist fiction?
> 
> Maybe?  Like I said above, I tend to think of such descriptors as tags.  'Rationalist' seems to be fixed at HPMOR and Luminosity.  I could imagine adding another one to that set if I came upon another story where characters ruminated at length upon logical fallacies and pondered their own thoughts compulsively.
> 
> *What is the role that any solution itself should have?  Should it be a guideline, or a set of rules to delete posts by?
> 
> A guideline, I think.  The 'real' Rational Tag is the upvotes of the sub.  'Rational' fiction is stuff we upvote a lot (thus the overlap with 'Good' fiction.  
> 
> If someone writes an awesome fic, and I never see it because they didn't post it here because of the text on the side of the page, then I feel like we are losing sight of the main goal.
> 
> Everyone post, Upvote will know his own!

>> **u/thrawnca** [+2]  *Carbon-based biped* (11 days later)
>> 
>> I consider Pokemon: Origin of Species to be a candidate for rationalist, because it is very much designed to showcase and explore aspects of rational thinking.

>>> **u/WalterTFD** [+1]  (11 days later)
>>> 
>>> Good point, I agree with you!

>> **u/ketura** [+1]  *Organizer* (7 days later)
>> 
>> All good points. In particular I myself subscribe to the idea that "rational" is a tag rather than a genre that can stand on its own.
>> 
>> Sorry you got sniped; you posted this like a half hour before we replaced the sticky for this week's discussion, so you might not get any relies in here.

---