I feel like your title for this short-form post is unreasonably aggressive, given what you’re saying here.
I found your articulation of the structure of the book’s argument helpful and clarifying.
I’m planning to write something more about this at some point: I think a key issue here is that we aren’t making the kind of arguments where “local validity” is a reliable concept. No-one is trying to make proofs, they’re trying to make defeasible heuristic arguments. Suppose the book makes an argument of the form “Because of argument A, I believe conclusion X. You might have thought that B is a counterargument to A. But actually, because of argument C, B doesn’t work.” If Will thinks that argument C doesn’t work, I think it’s fine for him to summarize this as: “they make an argument mostly around A, and which I don’t think suffices to establish X”.
I feel like your title for this short-form post is unreasonably aggressive, given what you’re saying here.
I found your articulation of the structure of the book’s argument helpful and clarifying.
I’m planning to write something more about this at some point: I think a key issue here is that we aren’t making the kind of arguments where “local validity” is a reliable concept. No-one is trying to make proofs, they’re trying to make defeasible heuristic arguments. Suppose the book makes an argument of the form “Because of argument A, I believe conclusion X. You might have thought that B is a counterargument to A. But actually, because of argument C, B doesn’t work.” If Will thinks that argument C doesn’t work, I think it’s fine for him to summarize this as: “they make an argument mostly around A, and which I don’t think suffices to establish X”.
You’re right, I edited it.
That makes sense about local validity.