I agree, if only because Taubes’ arguments are probably more widely known by a large margin than the steelman arguments.
If your goal in reading these posts is to (possibly) come away with the best possible argument against the Taubes-esque position on nutrition, then a steelmanning is what you should desire.
If your goal in reading these posts is to help others understand why they should or shouldn’t listen to Taubes’ advice, than a critique of Taubes’ specific arguments will likely be helpful.
Of course, this probably depends on how close Taubes’ arguments are to a steelmanned version...
I definitely think it is interesting criticised as it is, without steelmanning.
I agree, if only because Taubes’ arguments are probably more widely known by a large margin than the steelman arguments.
If your goal in reading these posts is to (possibly) come away with the best possible argument against the Taubes-esque position on nutrition, then a steelmanning is what you should desire.
If your goal in reading these posts is to help others understand why they should or shouldn’t listen to Taubes’ advice, than a critique of Taubes’ specific arguments will likely be helpful.
Of course, this probably depends on how close Taubes’ arguments are to a steelmanned version...
Right, there are two interesting questions that steelmanning would obscure:
What faith should we have in an assertion from Taubes that we haven’t fully checked out?
Is this a learning moment for someone who has set great store by Taubes’s arguments?