It’s true that people who ask for “collaborative truth-seeking” are lying, but false that no one does it. Some things someone might do to try to collaborate on seeking the truth instead of pushing a thesis are:
Active listening (e.g. trying to restate someone’s claims and arguments in one’s own words, especially where they seem most unclear or surprising.)
Extending interpretive labor to try to infer the cause of a disagreement.
Offering various considerations for how to think about a question instead of pushing a party line—and clarifying the underlying model in general terms even when one does have a clear thesis.
IME people are perfectly able to distinguish this from less collaborative behavior, though some are more likely to respond strongly positively, and others are more likely to complain that the first two are “judgmental,” “accusatory,” or “mind-reading,” and that the third is “unclear” because it doesn’t include a command to endorse some particular conclusion. The second group seems like it overlaps a lot with the sorts of people who ask for the sort of “epistemic charity” you’re complaining about.
People who are engaged in collaborative truth-seeking are more likely to talk about or simply demonstrate specific ways to accomplish particular component truth-seeking tasks better together, which is collaborative, and less likely to complain vaguely about how you should be more “collaborative,” which is not.
It’s true that people who ask for “collaborative truth-seeking” are lying, but false that no one does it. Some things someone might do to try to collaborate on seeking the truth instead of pushing a thesis are:
Active listening (e.g. trying to restate someone’s claims and arguments in one’s own words, especially where they seem most unclear or surprising.)
Extending interpretive labor to try to infer the cause of a disagreement.
Offering various considerations for how to think about a question instead of pushing a party line—and clarifying the underlying model in general terms even when one does have a clear thesis.
IME people are perfectly able to distinguish this from less collaborative behavior, though some are more likely to respond strongly positively, and others are more likely to complain that the first two are “judgmental,” “accusatory,” or “mind-reading,” and that the third is “unclear” because it doesn’t include a command to endorse some particular conclusion. The second group seems like it overlaps a lot with the sorts of people who ask for the sort of “epistemic charity” you’re complaining about.
People who are engaged in collaborative truth-seeking are more likely to talk about or simply demonstrate specific ways to accomplish particular component truth-seeking tasks better together, which is collaborative, and less likely to complain vaguely about how you should be more “collaborative,” which is not.