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Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu

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Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#71

Post by diordiderot »

Traster wrote: post #59

Honestly I see "steelmanning" as an emergent property of a completely broken discourse in the first place. The whole concept derives from the idea that we need specific terminology for when we're going to actually discuss things in a reasonable manner. It's basically a response to a group of public intellectuals who have emerged on the internet that spend more time building their brand and dunking on their opponents…

> It also stems from a kind of silly idea that the things we disagree over boil down to finding logical errors in each others positions, rather than emerging from deep-rooted differences in values

I lived with the same roommate for 3 years in university who was across the isle from me. We had many long conversations and I would say that ~70% of our differences in opinion boiled down to having different values.

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#72

Post by jamesrom »

jwarden wrote: post #66

I find this paragraph in the article to be, ironically, a straw man. > But it’s not “extremely plausible” that there’s a vast conspiracy among medical researchers (many of whom stated open to the view that ivermectin has some benefit) and public health officials to perpetrate the most significant fraud in human history Because Alexander’s actual argument is the following. “Sometimes these people even have a specific…

Exactly this. Gelmann pulls a quote out of context and omits the core of the argument as to _why_ it is extremely plausible. Alexander doesn't just leave that statement hanging, he cites other instances where this exact thing has occurred. Including a first hand account dealing with this in a clinical setting https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/03/11/ketamine-now-by-prescr...

If Gelmann had decided to steelman Alexander here, it would have been a productive conversation! Instead it's a squabble over the definition of "extremely plausible".

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#73

Post by andrewclunn »

Trying to "steelman" a position you don't know the real arguments for is to "strawman" it with good intentions. How about asking people who actually hold the position who the best advocates for it are, and listen to them? This pretending at fairly representing an idea you disagree with is more about signaling, feigning objectivity, and ego stroking than an earnest attempt to grapple with the idea.

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#74

Post by adhesive_wombat »

dredmorbius wrote: post #32

An argument in favour of steelmanning is that it is efficient . Using Paul Graham's hierarchy of disagreement[1][2], one reason steelmanning is efficient is because if your counterparty's best or most central argument is wrong then all of it is wrong. It's also highly likely that numerous arguments hinge on that same point. After all, creationists continue to pull out Pangloss's "noses are for eyeglasses" argument de…

> It's also worth considering that reason and debate are not an especially useful method for arriving at truth.

And this is why all those "XYZ is good/bad: debate me" arguments that make up so much of politics, religion and philosophy are so, so tedious. They do nothing to advance anything or find anything new.

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#75

Post by jamesrom »

andrewclunn wrote: post #73

Trying to "steelman" a position you don't know the real arguments for is to "strawman" it with good intentions. How about asking people who actually hold the position who the best advocates for it are, and listen to them? This pretending at fairly representing an idea you disagree with is more about signaling, feigning objectivity, and ego stroking than an earnest attempt to grapple with the idea.

To better understand your point, I'd like to know what you think steelmanning is. Can I ask, why do you think steelmanning doesn't involve asking and listening?

(see how easy it can be)

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#76

Post by heresie-dabord »

blablablerg wrote: post #19

Steelmanning is not the same as agreeing with an argument. According to the article, there can be situations that if you are steelmanning position X, you can be 'strawmanning' position Y. This however is not true. You can always steelman both positions (take the most charitable interpretation of both or multiple sides of the argument even if they contradict each other). Don't confuse agreement with interpretation. As…

On my mind of late is the degree to which human social trust cannot be replaced by money and rank in social media.

A well-established method in discussion is of course to state agreement or some degree of agreement (if possible) with the opposing view, then to ask questions about it.[1]

However, the commitment to having a discussion depends on a) trust, b) honesty, c) mutual goodwill, and d) the suitability of the medium of discussion.

The values of a) and d) cannot be substituted. But they can be gamed and monetised.

> distrustful word fight

Social media is a monetisable distrustful word fight.

= = =

[1] https://iep.utm.edu/socrates/#SH3b _ Socrates thought of himself as a "midwife" for lucid thought. Of course, he was put to death.

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#77

Post by kryogen1c »

On the whole, the popularizing of "logical fallacies" has been a net negative for debate. instead of recognizing a strawman and saying "youre not accurately representing my position, heres clear evidence why", the conversation devolves into a juvenille meta-argument that adds no value.

i wonder how much more our societal attention span can shorten.

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#78

Post by mannykannot »

jwarden wrote: post #66

I find this paragraph in the article to be, ironically, a straw man. > But it’s not “extremely plausible” that there’s a vast conspiracy among medical researchers (many of whom stated open to the view that ivermectin has some benefit) and public health officials to perpetrate the most significant fraud in human history Because Alexander’s actual argument is the following. “Sometimes these people even have a specific…

One way to steelmanning Alexander's argument is to assume that what he is calling extremely plausible is only the general claim "pharma companies want you to use more expensive patented drugs instead [of alternatives]", and not the whole passage. This leaves plenty of room to argue that this does not make the specific claim plausible.

I am not so sure the author's response here can be steelmanned. He says "Alexander was 'steelmanning'... but in doing so he was swallowing whole a 'strawman' about pharmaceutical companies and public health officials." It is not clear, from the author's quote, that Alexander accepts the straw man. More generally, steelmanning may sometimes be done via a tacit or explicit "even assuming, for the sake of argument,..."

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#79

Post by elb2020 »

LudwigNagasena wrote: post #65

I am impressed that a professor of polisci and stats could write a whole article about strawmanning and steelmanning without realizing how badly he misunderstands what those things mean.

He could be autistic. Autists will have problems, severe problems, with grasping the concept that someone else can have different views, and they will struggle with seeing the virtues of trying to understand those views. They will, indeed, perceive it as if they're being asked to 'bend over backwards'. I'm not sure how common high functioning autism is within academia. But I don't see it as entirely implausible that a high functioning autist could also be a professor.

Re: Why I’m skeptical of “steelmanning”

#80

Post by jamesrom »

kryogen1c wrote: post #77

On the whole, the popularizing of "logical fallacies" has been a net negative for debate. instead of recognizing a strawman and saying "youre not accurately representing my position, heres clear evidence why", the conversation devolves into a juvenille meta-argument that adds no value. i wonder how much more our societal attention span can shorten.

I kind of disagree, if the argument devolves into a meta-argument about logical fallacies it was destined to fail at any rate.
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