Caledonian2 comments on Against Devil's Advocacy - Less Wrong

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

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Comment author: Caledonian2 10 June 2008 01:15:10AM 2 points [-]

Given available data, there's only one valid set of conclusions we can reach. Being a 'devil's advocate' is worthwhile if you need to make sure you're accurately considering all of the points against a thesis as well as for, but if you're reasoning correctly there's no point to taking an opposing position for argument's sake.

In order to take a position other than the one supported by the data, we need to ignore the points that make that position invalid. That's a dangerous thing to do, when human minds have a natural tendency to ignore contradictory information. It's like pointing a gun at someone even though you believe it's unloaded - it's extremely irresponsible even if it happens to be true.