You're right that it's not as simple as that - if you set out to talk to idiots, you may well find that you can demolish all of them - but if you search for the strongest arguments from the best qualified and most intelligent proponents, and they're rubbish? But they still persistently get cited as the best arguments, in the face of all criticism? That's fairly strong evidence that the field might be bogus.
(Obvious example: intelligent design creationism. It's weaksauce religion and incompetent science.)
(Obvious example: intelligent design creationism. It's weaksauce religion and incompetent science.)
But why does dealing with intelligent design increase your probability in the alternative? Why were you assigning weight to intelligent design?
This isn't meant to be nitpicky. I suppose the question behind the question is this: When dividing up probability mass for X, how do you allot P(~X)? Do you try divvying it up amongst competing theories or do you simply assign it to ~X?
For some reason I thought that divvying it up amongst competing theories was Wrong. Was this foolish of me?
Followup to: The Most Important Thing You Learned
What's the most frequently useful thing you've learned on OB - not the most memorable or most valuable, but the thing you use most often? What influences your behavior, factors in more than one decision? Please give a concrete example if you can. This isn't limited to archetypally "mundane" activities: if your daily life involves difficult research or arguing with philosophers, go ahead and describe that too.