Why do you really believe what you believe regarding controversial subjects?

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14 Why do you really believe what you believe regarding controversial subjects?

4th Jan 2015

4 min read

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For every controversial subject I've heard of, there are always numerous very smart experts on either side. So I'm curious how it is that rational non-experts come to believe one side or the other.

So, what are your meta-arguments for going with one side or the other for any given controversial subject on which you have an opinion?

Have you researched both sides so thoroughly that you consider yourself equal to or better than the opposing experts? If so, to what do you attribute the mistakes of your counterparts? Have you carefully considered the possibility that you are the one who's mistaken?
Do you think that one side is more biased the other? Why?
Do you think that one side is more expert than the other? Why?
Do you rely on the majority of experts? (I haven't worked out for myself if going with a majority makes sense, so if you have arguments for / against this meta-argument then please elaborate.)
Do you think that there are powerful arguments that simply haven't been addressed by the other side? To what do you attribute the fact that these arguments haven't been addressed?
Do you have other heuristics or meta-arguments for going with one side or the other?
Do you just remain more or less an agnostic on every controversial subject?
Or do you perhaps admit that ultimately your beliefs are at least partially founded on non-rational reasons?
Do you think that this whole discussion is misguided? If so, why?

I know I don't have to list controversial subjects, but here are some to perhaps stimulate some thinking: Politics, religion (theism OR atheism), dangers from AI / x-risks, Bayesianism vs. alternatives, ethics & metaethics, pretty much everything in philosophy (at least that's what it often seems like!), social justice issues, policy proposals of all types. (If you have a particular controversy for which you'd like people to list their meta-arguments, just mention it in the comments.)

ETA: For myself, I generally try not to have an opinion on almost any controversial issue. So for example, on the recent LW survey I deliberately left most of the controversial issue questions blank. On the few issues that I do have some opinion, it's generally because I attribute a higher likelihood of bias to one side or the other, and/or I judge one side or the other to be greater experts, and/or there's a very large majority on one side, and/or there are powerful arguments on one side plus I have a good explanation for why the other side hasn't addressed those arguments. And even after all that I usually don't assign a high confidence to my judgement.

There's an interesting question that might follow from this approach: Other than curiosity, what is the use of researching a given subject if I'll never really be an expert and ultimately I'm going to need to fall back on the above types of meta-arguments? However, I've found that actually researching the subject is useful for a number of reasons:

Often after research it turns out that there are a surprising number of important points on which both sides actually agree.
It often turns out that one or both sides are not as confident about their positions as it might initially seem.
Often there are a number of sub-issues for which some of the above meta-arguments apply even if they might not apply to the broader issues. For example, perhaps there is a vast majority of experts who agree on a certain sub-issue even while debating the broader subject.
Occasionally the arguments ultimately boil down to things that fall outside the domain of rational debate.
Sometimes on the surface it may seem that someone is an expert, but on further research it turns out that they are relying on arguments outside their field of expertise. For example, many studies are faulty due to subtle statistics issues. The authors may be expert scientists / researchers, but subtle statistics falls outside their domain of expertise.
Occasionally I've come up with an argument (usually a domain-specific meta-argument of some sort) that I'm pretty sure even the experts on the other side would agree with, and for which I can give a good argument why they haven't addressed this particular argument before. Of course, I need to take my own arguments with a large grain of "I'm not really an expert on this" salt. But I've also in the past simply contacted one of the experts and asked him what he thought of my argument - and he agreed. In that particular instance the expert didn't change his mind, but the reason he gave for not changing his mind made me strongly suspect him of bias.
For a few issues, especially some of the really small sub-issues, it's actually not all that hard to become an expert. You take out a few books from your local university library, read the latest half dozen articles published on the topic, and that's about it. Of course, even after you're an expert you should still probably take the outside view and ask why you think your expert opinion is better than the other guy's. But it's still something, and perhaps you'll even be able to contribute to the field in a meaningful way and change some others' opinions. At the very least you'll likely be in a better position to judge other experts' biases and levels of expertise.

Relevant: posts listed on the bottom of the LW wiki page on disagreement

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