There are precious few, if any, arguments of the form “But here’s a logical reason why we’re doomed!” that can distinguish between these two worlds.
Feels like that’s a Motte and Bailey?
Sure, if you believe that the claimed psychological effects are very, very strong, then that’s the case.
However, let’s suppose you don’t believe they’re quite that strong. Even if you believe that these effects are pretty strong, then sufficiently strong arguments may still provide decent evidence.
In terms of why the evidence I provided is strong:
There’s a well known phenomenon of “cranks” where non-experts end up believing in arguments that sound super persuasive to them, but which are obviously false to experts. The CAIS letter ruled that out.
It’s well-known that it’s easy to construct theoretical arguments that sound extremely persuasive, but bear no relation to how things work in practise. Having a degree of empirical evidence of some of the core claims greatly weakens these arguments.
So it’s not just that these are strong arguments. It’s that these are arguments that you might expect to provide some signal even if you thought the claimed effect was strong, but not overwhelmingly so.
I really don’t think so, but I’m not sure why you’re saying so, so maybe I’m missing something. If I keep doing something that looks to you like a motte-and-bailey, could you point out specifically the structure? Like, what looks my motte and what looks like my bailey?
So it’s not just that these are strong arguments. It’s that these are arguments that you might expect to provide some signal even if you thought the claimed effect was strong, but not overwhelmingly so.
Sure, but arguing that doom is real does nothing to say what proportion of the doom models’ spread is due to something akin to the trauma model. And that matters because… well, there’s a different motte-and-bailey structure that can go “OMG it’s SO BAD… but look, here’s the very reasonable argument for how it’s going to be this particular shape of challenging for us… SO IT’S SUPER BAD!!!” It’ll tend to warp how we see those otherwise reasonable arguments, and which ones get emphasized, and how.
Listing more such arguments, or illustrating how compelling they are, doesn’t do anything to suggest how much this warping phenomenon is or isn’t happening.
I mean, by analogy: someone can have a panic attack due to being trapped in a burning building. They’re going to have a hard time doing anything about their situation while having a panic attack. Arguments that they really truly are in a burning building don’t affect the truth of that point, regardless of how compelling those arguments that the building really is on fire are.
Feels like that’s a Motte and Bailey?
Sure, if you believe that the claimed psychological effects are very, very strong, then that’s the case.
However, let’s suppose you don’t believe they’re quite that strong. Even if you believe that these effects are pretty strong, then sufficiently strong arguments may still provide decent evidence.
In terms of why the evidence I provided is strong:
There’s a well known phenomenon of “cranks” where non-experts end up believing in arguments that sound super persuasive to them, but which are obviously false to experts. The CAIS letter ruled that out.
It’s well-known that it’s easy to construct theoretical arguments that sound extremely persuasive, but bear no relation to how things work in practise. Having a degree of empirical evidence of some of the core claims greatly weakens these arguments.
So it’s not just that these are strong arguments. It’s that these are arguments that you might expect to provide some signal even if you thought the claimed effect was strong, but not overwhelmingly so.
I really don’t think so, but I’m not sure why you’re saying so, so maybe I’m missing something. If I keep doing something that looks to you like a motte-and-bailey, could you point out specifically the structure? Like, what looks my motte and what looks like my bailey?
Sure, but arguing that doom is real does nothing to say what proportion of the doom models’ spread is due to something akin to the trauma model. And that matters because… well, there’s a different motte-and-bailey structure that can go “OMG it’s SO BAD… but look, here’s the very reasonable argument for how it’s going to be this particular shape of challenging for us… SO IT’S SUPER BAD!!!” It’ll tend to warp how we see those otherwise reasonable arguments, and which ones get emphasized, and how.
Listing more such arguments, or illustrating how compelling they are, doesn’t do anything to suggest how much this warping phenomenon is or isn’t happening.
I mean, by analogy: someone can have a panic attack due to being trapped in a burning building. They’re going to have a hard time doing anything about their situation while having a panic attack. Arguments that they really truly are in a burning building don’t affect the truth of that point, regardless of how compelling those arguments that the building really is on fire are.
Between an overwhelmingly strong effect and a pretty strong effect.