nshepperd comments on Proofs, Implications, and Models - Less Wrong

58 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 30 October 2012 01:02PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (209)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: nshepperd 29 October 2012 10:30:35AM *  0 points [-]

Robin Hanson sometimes complains that when he tries to argue that conclusion X follows from reasonable-sounding premises Y, his colleagues disagree with X while declining to say which premise Y they think is false, or pointing out which step of the reasoning seems like an invalid implication.

I parsed this as "...his colleagues disagree with X while declining ... or while pointing out which step of the reasoning seems like an invalid implication", which is the opposite of what you meant.

I think the correct syntax here is "...his colleagues disagree with X while declining to say which premise..., or to point out which step...", which links the two infinitives "to say" and "to point out" to the verb "declining". ETA: The current edit works too.