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?
In many cases, yes—I do consider myself equal to or better than the opposing experts. I also think long and hard about being the one who’s wrong, and I have changed my mind on many topics as a result.
In a number of cases which are not particularly political, I can attribute the mistakes of my of my counterparts to lack of understanding in the field.
However, in the other cases, I can also point at a deeper, more troubling concern: an unwillingness to use computable functions, a willingness to use ‘incomparables’ or infinite value weightings. Risk to human life from nuclear waste can be computed in dollar terms, yet activists refuse to do so. Similarly, value of a fetus can also be computed in dollar terms, but such is never done. In my eyes, this is a clear and obvious mistake.
Do you rely on the majority of experts?
In many cases, yes. By looking at the bulk of a field, neighboring related fields, advocates and detractors, you can get a good feel for a topic:
Human-induced climate change has the vast bulk of experts advocating for it, with a rather small minority of detractors, most of whom are below average for the expert pool.
Anti-evolution creationists have effectively no experts in their corner.
The vast majority of expert economists look at economic crashes through the lens of ‘this is the most complicated construct mankind has ever created’. The minorities of economists who loudly advocate for singular failure cases and singular fixes are not only in the minority, but often conflict with each other in dramatic ways.
In cases where it appears that the majority is wrong, I’ve generally found that it’s because the majority doesn’t actually consist of experts on the specific topic. (See below in regard to doctors and molecular biology.) There are also situations where the pool of experts is quite small indeed, for example medical doctors with physics/nanotechnology backgrounds, where a more general pool would produce the wrong consensus.
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?
Sometimes, yes. An excellent example is that the vast majority of doctors do not believe that aging is reversible and the diseases of old age are curable. This largely appears to be because most doctors are not molecular biologists, and do not really have the skills to evaluate what is actually possible in molecular biology (and what is expected to become possible in the next few decades.)
In this case, the ‘experts’ are from related fields, but are not as expert on the specific topic as would be expected.
Do you just remain more or less an agnostic on every controversial subject?
For all the subjects I have fairly strong opinions on, there are a lot which I don’t because I lack the expertise. Even in some areas where I would be expected to have an opinion, I don’t—I am a software engineer, yet I am divided on hard versus soft takeoff of AI. I lean toward soft takeoff for various reasons, but hard takeoff is definitely in the ‘plausible’ category.
Or do you perhaps admit that ultimately your beliefs are at least partially founded on non-rational reasons?
Absolutely. One of our goals should be to clean up instances of this as they are discovered, and attempt to change protocols to limit it in the future.
In many cases, yes—I do consider myself equal to or better than the opposing experts. I also think long and hard about being the one who’s wrong, and I have changed my mind on many topics as a result.
In a number of cases which are not particularly political, I can attribute the mistakes of my of my counterparts to lack of understanding in the field.
However, in the other cases, I can also point at a deeper, more troubling concern: an unwillingness to use computable functions, a willingness to use ‘incomparables’ or infinite value weightings. Risk to human life from nuclear waste can be computed in dollar terms, yet activists refuse to do so. Similarly, value of a fetus can also be computed in dollar terms, but such is never done. In my eyes, this is a clear and obvious mistake.
In many cases, yes. By looking at the bulk of a field, neighboring related fields, advocates and detractors, you can get a good feel for a topic:
Human-induced climate change has the vast bulk of experts advocating for it, with a rather small minority of detractors, most of whom are below average for the expert pool.
Anti-evolution creationists have effectively no experts in their corner.
The vast majority of expert economists look at economic crashes through the lens of ‘this is the most complicated construct mankind has ever created’. The minorities of economists who loudly advocate for singular failure cases and singular fixes are not only in the minority, but often conflict with each other in dramatic ways.
In cases where it appears that the majority is wrong, I’ve generally found that it’s because the majority doesn’t actually consist of experts on the specific topic. (See below in regard to doctors and molecular biology.) There are also situations where the pool of experts is quite small indeed, for example medical doctors with physics/nanotechnology backgrounds, where a more general pool would produce the wrong consensus.
Sometimes, yes. An excellent example is that the vast majority of doctors do not believe that aging is reversible and the diseases of old age are curable. This largely appears to be because most doctors are not molecular biologists, and do not really have the skills to evaluate what is actually possible in molecular biology (and what is expected to become possible in the next few decades.)
In this case, the ‘experts’ are from related fields, but are not as expert on the specific topic as would be expected.
For all the subjects I have fairly strong opinions on, there are a lot which I don’t because I lack the expertise. Even in some areas where I would be expected to have an opinion, I don’t—I am a software engineer, yet I am divided on hard versus soft takeoff of AI. I lean toward soft takeoff for various reasons, but hard takeoff is definitely in the ‘plausible’ category.
Absolutely. One of our goals should be to clean up instances of this as they are discovered, and attempt to change protocols to limit it in the future.