postrationality annotated bibliography
i recently ran a meetup on postrationality, and as it sometimes happens when i try to run a meetup on a very substantial topic, i ended up with a pretty extensive bibliography while i was trying to curate a small reading list for the attendees.
I don't consider myself a post-rationalist, for a few reasons. One, I'm generally in team "if it helps you win it is rationality". Two, I by-default get along with the median person who identifies as a rationalist, and by-default find the median person who identifies as post-rationalist to be... kind of annoying, and so this is a label that I don't think would be functionally useful for me. Three, people in the post-rat cluster who I genuinely admire seem to have some sort of understanding of the world that I don't, and until I get it, the label would feel somewhat like stolen valour?
That being said, off-twitter, the post-rats (and other people I uh, shove into that cluster but may not identify as post-rat themselves) do seem to write a lot of interesting and good work that I think is worth reading. I like the perspectives they have.
And to be clear, I've basically only engaged with their ideas via reading them over the internet; I haven't had substantive conversations with people who identify as post-rationalist (but I'm certainly open to it). And I expect that this bibliography is very idiosyncratic! I only read the people I read and don't read the people I don't. Probably it would be unusually helpful to rationalists who are postrat-curious but woo-shy and unusually annoying to actual people who identify as post-rationalists.
0. Invitations
Sometimes you need to give people a little push before they'll read something a little far-out.
The More the Merrier - John Nerst (2018)
- A short piece built around a really wonderful metaphor for why it's important to read broadly and understand many different perspectives. (Good for softening up the ardent anti-woo critics.)
In praise of fake frameworks - Valentine (2017)
- What it says on the tin.
1. David Chapman
Sort of like, the OG when it comes to the scene?
A bridge to meta-rationality vs. civilizational collapse (2016)
- The piece that most ~rationalists are familiar with, and lays out an argument for why the post-rationality project is important: ultimately, it says that rationality is very good, but its domain is limited, and in order to transcend the limits of rationality, one must learn to cultivate a greater set of frameworks for looking at the world ("meta-rationality").
- For civilization to survive, we must cultivate meta-rationality in a large number of its maintainers, but we have either lost or never had the actual infrastructure necessary for this to be true.
- Unfortunately, while it's sort of a really important read (acting almost like the thesis statement for the scene's raison d'etre), it doesn't really justify its beliefs. To do that, you'll have to read one of his books, probably meaningness or in the cells of the eggplant. These are really long, however!
- Sarah Constantin has a literature dive on if adult development stages are real (2017) if this is a thing you're curious about.
An Appetizer: Purpose (2010 )
- one-page teaser for his book meaningness, which is about how one should relate to meaning and meaningness.
Auxiliary:
- Starting in 2024, Chapman is publishing on Substack. I haven't taken a look at his new stuff, but a friend told me that a lot of it is oriented towards, like, software engineers, and is a rehashing of his more basic concepts.
- His Substack about page has a list of his major projects, near the bottom.
2. Scott Alexander
Probably not a post-rationalist, but he dabbled a bit in the mid-2010s, including doing a series of wonderful book reviews on books by people who are into meditation, consciousness, and enlightenment.
Some particularly interesting book reviews: the mind illuminated (2018), mastering the core teachings of the buddha (2017), the origin of consciousness in the breakdown of the bicameral mind (2020).
He's also written two short stories I really like about enlightenment: universal love, said the cactus person (2015) and samsara (2019).
I also think the last paragraph of this post (2018) is really funny, and it's also an iconic read bc the guy that the post is about shows up in the comments to fight everyone.
yes, we have noticed the skulls (2017), on the flipside, is a good defense of rationality.
For more of Scott's writings on this subject, try poking around here. Other key words that could be useful to search for: meditation, englightenment.
3. Conversion Stories
title is tongue-in-cheek. post-rationalists talk about how/why they realized that materialist rationality is insufficient. the stories are unique, but often they rhyme.
Sasha Chapin writes several posts, including:
- The Craziest Thing That Ever Happened to Me, or, Existential Kink and My Shadow (2021)
- My mind transformed completely, and there were some tradeoffs (2024)
- Last year my mind exploded and now I'm in spiritual puberty all over again (2025)
Kenshō (2018) - Valentine
Rationalists Should Meet Integral Theory (2021) - Elo
- I've met Elo a few times and he definitely knows something about the world that I don't
What it's like to suddenly start completely believing in god (2022) - Lydia Laurenson
- Lydia has also collected Modern Accounts of Sudden, Unexpected Spiritual Experiences (2022).
4. Standalone Posts
A few posts on the subjects that post-rationalists like talking about.
Sneaking Past the Gatekeeper (2014) - Yearly Cider
- About analytical thinking, why it's good, and why sometimes you have to subvert it a little by using ritual.
Focusing for Skeptics (2017) - Duncan Sabien
- On Eugene Gendlin's technique, "Focusing"
- "The “big idea” of Focusing (according to me) is that parts of your subconscious System 1 are storing up massive amounts of accurate, useful information that your conscious System 2 isn’t really able to access... Focusing is a technique for bringing some of that data up into conscious awareness, where you can roll it around and evaluate it and do something about it."
- I ran a meetup on this, and the meetup description has more precise instructions on how you can practice this.
Naturalism Sequence (2022) - Logan Strohl
- How to look at and experience the world deeply.
How to Like Everything More (2024) - Sasha Chapin
- Instructions for how to change some ways you can relate to the outside world
Mythic Mode (2018) - Valentine
- A fake framework
- If you think like you are in a story, narrative starts happening to you
- Probably the most woo piece that I can handle
The Intelligent Social Web (2018) - Valentine
- Best of LW 2018
- "The web of social relationships we’re embedded in helps define our roles as it forms and includes us. And that same web, as the distributed “director” of the “scene”, guides us in what we do."
- Genuinely a very useful and cogent framework for thinking about social dynamics
5. Some Currently Publishing Writers I Like Who Are Postrat. To Me
I have no idea whether or not they would identify as post-rationalist themselves! Sorry if you are finding yourself here and you don't :(
Sasha Chapin
- really good writer? good at words, unafraid of vulnerability, clear thinker even when mucking about with very unclear subjects
- archive
- good posts: the moat of low status (2021), 50 things i know (2024)
Aella
- doesn't write about "postrat" stuff often but her postrat posts are very good. i mean also a lot of her other posts! but we are here for the postrat stuff today.
- about page, substack archive, old blog archive
- good posts: you will forget, you have forgotten (2019), ten months of acid (2016), the trauma narrative (2018), learning the elite class (2022)
Lydia Laurenson
- good at taking complicated subjects by the horns and writing about the ways that that could both fuck you up and also be good for you
- about page, archive
- good posts: What Am I Looking At? (2025) , why it's hard to talk to scientific materialists about spirituality (2024), Why I Was Part Of The Neoreactionary or Dissident Right Movement In 2020 (2025)
6. Other People's Summaries
Rational Magic (2023) - Tara Isabella Burton
- The New Atlantis piece on why rats are wooifying. I think this is an outsider's perspective, with the benefits and drawbacks of such.
Post-Rationality: An Oral History (2025) - Gordon Seidoh Worley
- The opposite of the piece above; one of the guys who Got In On The Ground Floor recounts his perspective. Peep the comment section too, it's useful.
A Postrationalist Syllabus (2023) - Eigenrobot
- I heard you liked annotated bibliographies about post-rationality, so we put an annotated bibliography about post-rationality inside your annotated bibliography about p
- Probably not less biased than me, but certainly biased in another direction.