#steelmanning

"We probably know best which arguments are most difficult for our position, because we know our belief’s real weak points and what kind of evidence we tend to find compelling … use that information to look for ways to make their arguments better, more difficult for you to counter.

This is the highest form of disagreement. If you know of a better counter to your own argument, say so. If you know of evidence that supports their side, bring it up. If their argument rests on an untrue piece of evidence, talk about the hypothetical case in which they were right...

...Because if you can’t respond to that better version, you’ve got some thinking to do, even if you are more right than the person you’re arguing with...

...First, people like having their arguments approached with care and serious consideration. Steelmanning requires that we think deeply about what’s being presented to us and find ways to improve it.

By addressing the improved version, we show respect and honest engagement to our interlocutor. People who like the way you approach their arguments are much more likely to care about what you have to say about those arguments…

Second, people are more convinced by arguments which address the real reason they reject your ideas rather than those which address those aspects less important to their beliefs."

Ah! It's pretty simple, it's the opposite of strawmanning.

Which, to elaborate, means that instead of setting up your opponents' weakest arguments to easily rhetorically knock down, you set up what you deem to be their strongest ones to push against.

This is specifically so you can be sure you have the best arguments possible, because if you can knock down their strongest arguments, you're coming at things from a position of strength.

Note: this is an attempt at elucidating, and forming arguments to defend, a particular view which I do not entirely hold, but do find to contain much truth and insight.

Are you familiar with the origin of the term “pecking order”? How chickens determine and maintain status? Lost feathers, bloody wounds? Bullying away from food, water, etc.? How the lowest-status birds can end up pecked to death? In short, “status” in chickens is all about who can “get away with” hurting whom.

Now, it’s frequently discussed in particularly nerd-heavy areas about how that old piece of frequently repeated “wisdom” about bullies having low self-esteem is nonsense. And “anti-bullying” rules and measures consistently end up used not against the bullies, but against their victims. Teachers and authority figures consistently side with the bullies and punish the “aggression” of the bullies’ victims. And if a victim ever breaks and either self-destructs or lashes out, we see everyone involved jump in to explain how said victim totally had it coming, and if they lashed out in particular, that this constitutes proof of such justification. (Do I really have to name the salient recent example?)

Why is this so, if not “status”? Paraphrasing someone else from memory, suppose we have Adam and Billy. Adam (our bully) has just punched Billy in the face and then shoved him headfirst into a garbage can, and a teacher, Ms. Carrol, has just seen the tail end of this conflict. What happens?

Well, Adam immediately gives some spiel to Ms. Carrol about how Billy had it coming. In the 50′s, it might have been “Billy tried to grab my wiener, I think he’s a faggot!”; nowadays, more like “Billy called me a faggot and said Trump was gonna deport my parents!” Either way, Ms. Carrol immedately agrees that Adam’s words must be the truth, and drags Billy off to be punished for attacking and “bullying” poor, poor Adam like that.

What is this power Adam has? What do we call his ability to have his patent, self-serving lies trump visible reality, his ability to have people automatically take his side and excuse, even praise, his hurting other people for the sake of hurting them? Well, someone who has lots of people automatically take their side, wouldn’t a good word be “popular”?

And why does Adam bully Billy? Because he can. For the same reason a higher-status bird pecks bloody wound into a lower-status one: for no other reason than his victim is too weak, too low-status, too unpopular to stop him.

In the words of 1984′s O’Brien:

We shall abolish the orgasm. Our neurologists are at work upon it now. There will be no loyalty, except loyalty towards the Party. There will be no love, except the love of Big Brother. There will be no laughter, except the laugh of triumph over a defeated enemy. There will be no art, no literature, no science. When we are omnipotent there will be no need of science. There will be no distinction between beauty and ugliness. There will be no curiosity, no enjoyment of the process of life. All competing pleasures will be destroyed. But always—do not forget this Winston—always there will be the intoxication of power, constantly increasing and constantly growing subtler. Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—forever.

Yes, people hurting others physically is relatively rare outside select areas like “the schoolyard.” But that’s because most of our “pecking” is done via inflicting emotional harm (or via attacks on property, particularly with female bullies). Mockery, rumor, aspersions, we have plenty of ways of inflicting real pain without resorting to physical harm. And people use it. Because “trampling on an enemy who is helpless” is a pleasure. And there’s plenty to show that it’s not uncommon behavior outside the schoolyard, in the workplace, in the world as a whole (and social media has only made it worse).

Bullies are not aberrant, low-status outliers; they are more popular and well-liked and higher status than their victims. Because their behavior is not an outlier, any more than pecking is in chickens, but because it’s what people do. It’s what status and popularity are: the ability to “get away with” inflicting pain on those who cannot stop you from doing so for the joy of doing so, and the ability to have others side with you and praise your hurting of others.

(Again, don’t totally agree, but making the argument)

I suspect (but cannot back up) that such a system really would be worse for some people. I don't have the details that would let me reason about that beyond "and that's bad". I believe (but cannot back up) that such a system would be better for most people. I believe (but cannot back up) that such a system would also be cheaper overall.

"We probably know best which arguments are most difficult for our position, because we know our belief’s real weak points and what kind of evidence we tend to find compelling…use that information to look for ways to make their arguments better, more difficult for you to counter. This is the highest form of disagreement.

If you know of a better counter to your own argument, say so. If you know of evidence that supports their side, bring it up. If their argument rests on an untrue piece of evidence, talk about the hypothetical case in which they were right...

...Because if you can’t respond to that better version, you’ve got some thinking to do, even if you are more right than the person you’re arguing with...

...First, people like having their arguments approached with care and serious consideration. Steelmanning requires that we think deeply about what’s being presented to us and find ways to improve it.

By addressing the improved version, we show respect and honest engagement to our interlocutor. People who like the way you approach their arguments are much more likely to care about what you have to say about those argument.

Second, people are more convinced by arguments which address the real reason they reject your ideas rather than those which address those aspects less important to their beliefs."

Which is something that I’d agree with (in that I’d agree with statements that mean essentially the same thing, but that I wouldn’t frame it that way). But when people respond to Pinker by talking about tail risks and existential risks, they’re not arguing against what Pinker thinks (or at least feels) is his core point. They’re saying that the world is becoming more dangerous, while Pinker is saying (or trying to say) that people are becoming more virtuous.