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ChrisHallquist comments on Open Thread for February 11 - 17 - Less Wrong Discussion
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But what if you steelman devil's advocacy to exclude fallacious but convincing arguments?
Then the main problem is that it produces (and exercises the skill of producing) arguments that are filtered evidence in the direction of the predefined conclusion, instead of well-calibrated consideration of the question on which the conclusion is one position.
So I'm still not sure what the difference with steelmanning is supposed to be, unless it's that with steelmanning you limit yourself to fixing flaws in your opponents' arguments that can be fixed without essentially changing their arguments, as opposed just trying to find the best arguments you can for their conclusion (the latter being a way of filtering evidence?)
That would seem to imply that steelmanning isn't a universal duty. If you think an argument can't be fixed without essentially steelmanning it, you'll just be forced to say it can't be steelmanned.