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Benquo comments on Rationality Quotes: October 2009 - Less Wrong
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Does anyone know the origin of this notion (that being wrong is the best outcome of an argument?). It strikes me as basically a founding principle of rationality and I'd like to know the earliest public reference to/ discussion of it. Alternately, is this sentiment summarized in any good quotes? It is hugely important for Hegel but he isn't, you know, pithy.
This kind of sentiment pops up in Plato a lot, esp. in discussions of rhetoric, like here in Gorgias:
"For I count being refuted a greater good, insofar as it is a greater good to be rid of the greatest evil from oneself than to rid someone else of it. I don't suppose that any evil for a man is as great as false belief about the things we're discussing right now." (458a, Zeyl Translation)
Excellent point. This concept goes squarely with much of Socrates' philosophy: the wise men knew nothing, and he knew nothing, but he knew it and they didn't, thus, he was the wisest man alive, as the oracle had said.