GNZ comments on Against Devil's Advocacy - Less Wrong

28 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 09 June 2008 04:15AM

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Comment author: GNZ 09 June 2008 06:30:34AM 2 points [-]

I imagine two ideal debating agents each with a set of facts and tools with which to make logical connections between those facts. They start to debate over an issue and decide that they agree on whoch is the most plausible answer but also see a large number of flaws in the other side's argument. As ideal debaters they don't 'overlook' those flaws just because they imply the conclusion they want - they highlight them and ask for logical answers. In some cases one side will start to look like a devil's advocate as a result of how debates form and the nature of the alternate scenarios.

With us non ideal agents I instead see people intentionally suppressing arguments that they know are good because they don't further their side of the argument.

I'm inclined to think if you can't argue for the other sides position you probably don't fully understand it. If there position has 0 probability of being true that may be no issue at all, but there are not that many things I could ascribe that level of certainty to.