I agree that’s possible, but then I’d say something like “I would love to know additional true relevant facts, but I recognize there are real risks to this and only recommend people do this if they think the benefits are worth it”.
Analogy: it could be worth it for an employee to publicly talk about the flaws of their company / manager (e.g. because then others know not to look for jobs at that company), even though it might get them fired. In such a situation I would say something like “It would be particularly helpful to know about the flaws of company X, but I recognize there are substantial risks involved and only recommend people do this if they feel up to it”. I would not say “I hope people don’t refrain from speaking up about the flaws of company X out of fear that they might be fired”, unless I had good reason to believe they wouldn’t be fired, or good reason to believe that it would be worth it on their values (though in that case presumably they’d speak up anyway).
Thanks. I’m actually still not sure what you’re saying.
Hypothesis 1: you’re saying, stating “I hope person A does X” implies a non-dependence on person A’s information, which implies the speaker has a lot of hidden evidence (enough to make their hope unlikely to change given A’s evidence). And, people might infer that there’s this hidden evidence, and update on it, which might be a mistake.
Hypothesis 2: you’re pointing at something about how “do X, even if you have fear” is subtly coercive / gaslighty, in the sense of trying to insert an external judgement to override someone’s emotion / intuition / instinct. E.g. “out of fear” might subtly frame an aversion as a “mere emotion”.
(Just to state the obvious: it is clearly not as bad as the words “coercion” and “gaslighting” would usually imply. I am endorsing the mechanism, not the magnitude-of-badness.)
I agree that hypothesis 1 could be an underlying generator of why the effect in hypothesis 2 exists.
I think I am more confident in the prediction that these sorts of statements do influence people in ways-I-don’t-endorse, than in any specific mechanism by which that happens.
I agree that’s possible, but then I’d say something like “I would love to know additional true relevant facts, but I recognize there are real risks to this and only recommend people do this if they think the benefits are worth it”.
Analogy: it could be worth it for an employee to publicly talk about the flaws of their company / manager (e.g. because then others know not to look for jobs at that company), even though it might get them fired. In such a situation I would say something like “It would be particularly helpful to know about the flaws of company X, but I recognize there are substantial risks involved and only recommend people do this if they feel up to it”. I would not say “I hope people don’t refrain from speaking up about the flaws of company X out of fear that they might be fired”, unless I had good reason to believe they wouldn’t be fired, or good reason to believe that it would be worth it on their values (though in that case presumably they’d speak up anyway).
Thanks. I’m actually still not sure what you’re saying.
Hypothesis 1: you’re saying, stating “I hope person A does X” implies a non-dependence on person A’s information, which implies the speaker has a lot of hidden evidence (enough to make their hope unlikely to change given A’s evidence). And, people might infer that there’s this hidden evidence, and update on it, which might be a mistake.
Hypothesis 2: you’re pointing at something about how “do X, even if you have fear” is subtly coercive / gaslighty, in the sense of trying to insert an external judgement to override someone’s emotion / intuition / instinct. E.g. “out of fear” might subtly frame an aversion as a “mere emotion”.
(Maybe these are the same...)
Hypothesis 2 feels truer than hypothesis 1.
(Just to state the obvious: it is clearly not as bad as the words “coercion” and “gaslighting” would usually imply. I am endorsing the mechanism, not the magnitude-of-badness.)
I agree that hypothesis 1 could be an underlying generator of why the effect in hypothesis 2 exists.
I think I am more confident in the prediction that these sorts of statements do influence people in ways-I-don’t-endorse, than in any specific mechanism by which that happens.
Okay.