Want a nerdy online forum

April 24, 2011 6:15 PM

Are there any online forums that are more intellectually oriented?

I am thinking of something like City Data Forum in format (sorry not a techie, that's my best description) but filled more like with the type of people that come here? That may not be coming out sounding exactly as I'm intending - point is, is there an all around multi topic, fairly heavily populated forum that is more intellectually oriented than city data forum, which I keep mentioning because I like the format, the topics, and the size, but its not quite my kind of crowd mostly. At the same time, I am not looking for a very particular place or something too artsy, techie, or blog-y (wow thats a stretch of the English language). Anyone who knows what I am talking about? I love Metafilter, but its not a forum. I need a metafilter forum. Thank you.

posted by cerebral to computers & internet (14 answers total)

THINQon. (Formerly Pandalous.)

Fluther? (It's trying to be AskMetafilter but more of an open-ended "forum." I'll leave it up to you to decide how "intellectual" it is.)

Previously. Previously. Previously.
posted by John Cohen at 6:20 PM on April 24, 2011 [6 favorites]

Thanks very much!
posted by cerebral at 6:24 PM on April 24, 2011

XKCD forums may be what you're looking for. Some of the forums there are very tech-y but others a lot less so, and the discourse quality is IMHO high.
posted by bsdfish at 9:37 PM on April 24, 2011

Something Awful Forums, and its evil twin The New Effort. Both are full of smart people, sometimes telling rude jokes to each other, sometimes talking about their lives, sometimes discussing big issues of the day (SA's Debate & Discussion forum has been noted for this). SA is left-leaning, TNE is right-leaning.

Some especially smart subreddits: AskScience, foodforthought, DepthHub
posted by shii at 9:39 PM on April 24, 2011 [4 favorites]

I'll second THINQon. Mostly very high quality discussions and community.
posted by Socratess at 3:08 AM on April 25, 2011 [1 favorite]

I will check these out. It's amazing to me how the internet is so huge yet I cant find something. Thank you!
posted by cerebral at 7:46 AM on April 25, 2011

The Straight Dope message board. Based on Cecil Adam's columns, the crowd tends to be a bit older and more well educated than most internet forums I've come across.
posted by avagoyle at 8:07 AM on April 25, 2011 [1 favorite]

Not the format you are looking for but depthhub is a good place to start. Branches off quite nicely to your right.
posted by penguinkeys at 2:15 PM on April 25, 2011 [1 favorite]

The Chronicle of Higher Education forums. I have been browsing it recently because I'm interested in entering academia, but there are some general open sections of the forum. Considering the demographics of the forum should lean towards PhD students and faculty members, the populous should be educated and intellectuals (the opposite of anti-intellectuals, not a synonym of educated).
posted by SollosQ at 2:48 PM on April 25, 2011 [1 favorite]

Thank you again everyone.
posted by cerebral at 5:49 PM on April 25, 2011

Personally, I find that most people on the Straight Dope forum are articulate but surprisingly stupid/obnoxious. Finding MeFi was a serious breath of fresh air.
posted by threeants at 8:45 PM on April 25, 2011 [1 favorite]

thats the thing, I just want a plain old forum with the kind of people I find here. Sorry I dont know how innapropriate this sounds but its true. A person can be articulate and an egomaniacal own-horn-tooting dipshit.
posted by cerebral at 5:48 PM on April 26, 2011

Wow, The New Effort is really... something else. Seemed to be pretty "Look how racist I'm not". And apparently includes murderers?

As far as a constructive contribution, I like the XKCD forum. PhysicsForums is pretty good too.
posted by Earl the Polliwog at 6:03 AM on April 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Wow, The New Effort is really... something else. Seemed to be pretty "Look how racist I'm not". And apparently includes murderers?

holy shit!!!
posted by cerebral at 7:42 PM on April 29, 2011