Ben’s responses largely cover what I would have wanted to say. But on a meta note: I wrote specifically
I think a hypothesis that does have to be kept in mind is that some people don’t care.
I do also think the hypothesis is true (and it’s reasonable for this thread to discuss that claim, of course).
But the reason I said it that way, is that it’s a relatively hard hypothesis to evaluate. You’d probably have to have several long conversations with several different people, in which you successfully listen intensely to who they are / what they’re thinking / how they’re processing what you say. Probably only then could you even have a chance at reasonably concluding something like “they actually don’t care about X”, as distinct from “they know something that implies X isn’t so important here” or “they just don’t get that I’m talking about X” or “they do care about X but I wasn’t hearing how” or “they’re defensive in this moment, but will update later” or “they just hadn’t heard why X is important (but would be open to learning that)”, etc.
I agree that it’s a potentially mindkilly hypothesis. And because it’s hard to evaluate, the implicature of assertions about it is awkward—I wanted to acknowledge that it would be difficult to find a consensus belief state, and I wanted to avoid implying that the assertion is something we ought to be able to come to consensus about right now. And, more simply, it would take substantial work to explain the evidence for the hypothesis being true (in large part because I’d have to sort out my thoughts). For these reasons, my implied request is less like “let’s evaluate this hypothesis right now”, and more like “would you please file this hypothesis away in your head, and then if you’re in a long conversation, on the relevant topic with someone in the relevant category, maybe try holding up the hypothesis next to your observations and seeing if it explains things or not”.
In other words, it’s a request for more data and a request for someone to think through the hypothesis more. It’s far from perfectly neutral—if someone follows that request, they are spending their own computational resources and thereby extending some credit to me and/or to the hypothesis.
Ben’s responses largely cover what I would have wanted to say. But on a meta note: I wrote specifically
I do also think the hypothesis is true (and it’s reasonable for this thread to discuss that claim, of course).
But the reason I said it that way, is that it’s a relatively hard hypothesis to evaluate. You’d probably have to have several long conversations with several different people, in which you successfully listen intensely to who they are / what they’re thinking / how they’re processing what you say. Probably only then could you even have a chance at reasonably concluding something like “they actually don’t care about X”, as distinct from “they know something that implies X isn’t so important here” or “they just don’t get that I’m talking about X” or “they do care about X but I wasn’t hearing how” or “they’re defensive in this moment, but will update later” or “they just hadn’t heard why X is important (but would be open to learning that)”, etc.
I agree that it’s a potentially mindkilly hypothesis. And because it’s hard to evaluate, the implicature of assertions about it is awkward—I wanted to acknowledge that it would be difficult to find a consensus belief state, and I wanted to avoid implying that the assertion is something we ought to be able to come to consensus about right now. And, more simply, it would take substantial work to explain the evidence for the hypothesis being true (in large part because I’d have to sort out my thoughts). For these reasons, my implied request is less like “let’s evaluate this hypothesis right now”, and more like “would you please file this hypothesis away in your head, and then if you’re in a long conversation, on the relevant topic with someone in the relevant category, maybe try holding up the hypothesis next to your observations and seeing if it explains things or not”.
In other words, it’s a request for more data and a request for someone to think through the hypothesis more. It’s far from perfectly neutral—if someone follows that request, they are spending their own computational resources and thereby extending some credit to me and/or to the hypothesis.