If the cryptography example is too distracting, we could instead imagine a non-cryptographic means to the same end, e.g. printing the surveys on leaflets which the employees stuff into envelopes and drop into a raffle tumbler.
The point remains, however, because (just as with the blinded signatures) this method of conducting a survey is very much outside-the-norm, and it would be a drastic world-modeling failure to assume that the HR department actually considered the raffle-tumbler method but decided against it because they secretly do want to deanonymize the surveys. Much more likely is that they simply never considered the option.
But if employees did start adopting the rule “don’t trust the anonymity of surveys that aren’t conducted via raffle tumbler”, even though this is epistemically irrational at first, it would eventually compel HR departments to start using the tumbler method, whereupon the odd surveys that still are being conducted by email will stick out, and it would now be rational to mistrust them. In short, the Adversarial Argument is “irrational” but creates the conditions for its own rationality, which is why I describe it as an “acausal negotiation tactic”.
That sort of strategy only works if you can get everyone to coordinate around it, and if you can do that, you could probably just get them to coordinate on doing the right things. I don’t know if HR would listen to you if you brought your concerns directly to them, but they probably aren’t harder to persuade on that sort of thing than convincing the rest of your fellows to defy HR. (Which is just a guess.) In cases where you can’t get others to coordinate on it, you are just defecting against the group, to your own personal loss. This doesn’t seem like a good strategy.
In more limited settings, you might be able to convince your friends to debate things in your preferred style, though this depends on them in particular. As a boss, you might be able to set up a culture where people are expected to make strong arguments in formal settings. Beyond these, I don’t really think it is practical. (They don’t generalize -for instance, as a parent, your child will be incapable of making strong arguments for an extremely long time.)
If the cryptography example is too distracting, we could instead imagine a non-cryptographic means to the same end, e.g. printing the surveys on leaflets which the employees stuff into envelopes and drop into a raffle tumbler.
The point remains, however, because (just as with the blinded signatures) this method of conducting a survey is very much outside-the-norm, and it would be a drastic world-modeling failure to assume that the HR department actually considered the raffle-tumbler method but decided against it because they secretly do want to deanonymize the surveys. Much more likely is that they simply never considered the option.
But if employees did start adopting the rule “don’t trust the anonymity of surveys that aren’t conducted via raffle tumbler”, even though this is epistemically irrational at first, it would eventually compel HR departments to start using the tumbler method, whereupon the odd surveys that still are being conducted by email will stick out, and it would now be rational to mistrust them. In short, the Adversarial Argument is “irrational” but creates the conditions for its own rationality, which is why I describe it as an “acausal negotiation tactic”.
That sort of strategy only works if you can get everyone to coordinate around it, and if you can do that, you could probably just get them to coordinate on doing the right things. I don’t know if HR would listen to you if you brought your concerns directly to them, but they probably aren’t harder to persuade on that sort of thing than convincing the rest of your fellows to defy HR. (Which is just a guess.) In cases where you can’t get others to coordinate on it, you are just defecting against the group, to your own personal loss. This doesn’t seem like a good strategy.
In more limited settings, you might be able to convince your friends to debate things in your preferred style, though this depends on them in particular. As a boss, you might be able to set up a culture where people are expected to make strong arguments in formal settings. Beyond these, I don’t really think it is practical. (They don’t generalize -for instance, as a parent, your child will be incapable of making strong arguments for an extremely long time.)