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The saying goes: \u201cNever offend people with style when you can offend them with substance\u201d. This is the same idea as\xa0\u201cweirdness points\u201d: you can only bother people a certain amount before they go away. So if you have something important to bother them about, don\u2019t also bother them in random ways that don\u2019t matter.

In writing about science or rationality, you already risk sounding too nerdy or out-of-touch with real life. This doesn\u2019t matter much if you\u2019re writing about black holes or something. But if you\u2019re writing about social signaling, or game theory, or anything else where the failure mode is sounding like an evil robot trying to reduce all of life to numbers, you should avoid anything that makes you sound even more like that evil robot.

(yes, people on the subreddit, I\u2019m talking about you)

I\u2019m not always great at this, but I\u2019m improving, and here\u2019s the lowest-hanging fruit: if there are two terms for the same thing, a science term and an everyday life term, and you\u2019re talking about everyday life,\xa0use the everyday life term. The rest of this post is just commentary on this basic idea.

1. IQ -> intelligence. Don\u2019t use \u201cIQ\u201d unless you\u2019re talking about the result of an IQ test, talking about science derived from these results, or estimating IQ at a specific number. Otherwise, say \u201cintelligence\u201d (as a noun) or \u201csmart\u201d as an adjective.

Wrong: \u201cJohn is a very high-IQ person\u201d
Right: \u201cJohn is a very smart person\u201d.

Wrong: \u201cWhat can I do if I feel like my low IQ is holding me back?\u201d
Right: \u201cWhat do I do if I feel like my low intelligence is holding me back?\u201d

Acceptable: \u201cThe average IQ of a Nobel-winning physicist is 155\u201d.
Acceptable: \u201cBecause poor childhood nutrition lowers IQ, we should make sure all children have enough to eat.\u201d

2. Humans -> people. This will instantly make you sound 20% less like an evil robot. Use \u201chumans\u201d only when specifically contrasting with another animal:

Wrong: \u201cI\u2019ve been wondering why humans celebrate holidays.\u201d
Right: \u201cI\u2019ve been wondering why people celebrate holidays.\u201d

Acceptable: \u201cChimpanzees are much stronger than humans.\u201d

3. Males -> men, females -> women. You can still use \u201cmale\u201d and \u201cfemale\u201d as adjectives if you really want.

Wrong: \u201cWhy do so many males like sports?\u201d
Right: \u201cWhy do so many men like sports?\u201d

Acceptable, I guess: \u201cWhy do male sports fans drink so much?\u201d

Use \u201cmales\u201d and \u201cfemales\u201d as nouns only if you\u2019re making a point that applies across animal species, trying overly hard to sound scientifically credible, or arguing some kind of complicated Gender Studies point that uses \u201cman\u201d and \u201cmale\u201d differently.

Acceptable: \u201cIn both rats and humans, males have higher testosterone than females.\u201d

4. Rational -> good, best, reasonable, etc.\xa0See eg\xa0here. Use \u201crational\u201d when describing adherence to a good cognitive strategy; use \u201cgood\u201d etc for things that have good results.

Wrong: \u201cWhat is the most rational diet?\u201d
Right: \u201cWhat is the best diet?\u201d

Wrong: \u201cIs it rational to invest in bonds?\u201d
Right: \u201cIs it a good idea to invest in bonds?\u201d

Acceptable: \u201cAre more rational people more likely to succeed in politics?\u201d (if asking whether people who follow certain cognitive rules like basing their decisions on evidence will succeed more than those who don\u2019t. Notice that you\xa0cannot\xa0sensibly replace this with \u201cgood\u201d or \u201cbest\u201d \u2013 \u201cAre better people more likely to succeed in politics?\u201d is meaningless (unless you switch to the moral value of \u201cbetter\u201d)

5. Optimal -> best. I feel kind of hypocritical for this one because the link above says to replace \u201crational\u201d with \u201coptimal\u201d. But if you really want to go all the way, replace \u201coptimal\u201d with \u201cbest\u201d, unless you have a specific reason for preferring the longer word.

Wrong: \u201cWhat\u2019s the optimal way to learn this material?\u201d
Right: \u201cWhat\u2019s the best way to learn this material?\u201d

6. Utility -> happiness, goodness. Use utility only when talking about utilitarian philosophy.

Wrong: \u201cWill getting more exercise raise my utility?\u201d
Right: \u201cWill getting more exercise make me better off?\u201d

Wrong: \u201cWhat is the highest-utility charity?\u201d
Right: \u201cWhat is the best charity?\u201d or \u201cWhich charity helps people the most?\u201d

The same applies to \u201cutility function\u201d.

Wrong: \u201cMy utility function contains a term for animal suffering.\u201d
Right: \u201cI care about animal suffering.\u201d

7. Autistic -> nerdy. Use autistic when referring to a psychiatric diagnosis or a complicated package of sensory and cognitive issues. Use \u201cnerdy\u201d when referring to people who are book-smart but lack social graces.

Wrong: \u201cHaha, my friends and I are so autistic, we talk about physics all the time.\u201d
Right: \u201cHaha, my friends and I are so nerdy, we talk about physics all the time.\u201d

8. Neoreactionary -> right-wing, far-right, reactionary. Use neoreactionary when talking specifically about the philosophy of Mencius Moldbug,\xa0if\xa0you think you\u2019ve looked into it and understand it. If you\u2019re just referring to far-right ideas, use far-right.