I didn’t just appeal to the majority, I mentioned scientists’ opinions explicitly in the sentence previous to the one you are objecting to.
You mentioned scientists’ opinions not about the subjects that they study, but about the impact of intelligence on the quality of their work, which they are not likely to know more about than anyone else. If you had mentioned the opinions of psychologists who had studied the effects of intelligence on scientific productivity, that would be the sort of support you are claiming. Further, you weren’t even talking about a survey of scientists’ opinions, or other evidence about what they think; you just asserted what you think they think. Now, you could make the argument that the scientists would think that for the same reasons you do, or because you believe it is really true and they would notice, but in this case your beliefs about their opinions is not additional evidence.
You’ve argued that appealing to other peoples beliefs has few benefits (which I dispute) but unless I’m missing something you haven’t named a single cost. I’m sure there are some, but I’ll let you name them if you choose.
Well, I suppose I have not explicitly stated it, but the primary cost is that it displaces discussion of the more fundamental evidence about the issue that is supposedly informing the majority or expert opinion.
And you yourself argued elsewhere that in the political process of voting that attempts to aggregate opinions, “Voters are often uninformed about how policy affects their lives”.
Even with expert opinions, it can be hard to understand what the expert thinks. I have seen people go horribly wrong by applying an expert’s idea out of context. If you don’t understand an expert’s reasoning because it is too complicated, you probably don’t understand their position well enough to generalize it.
You don’t really want to stop people from discussing what other people believe.
What I object to is using a discussion of what other people believe to shut down discussion of an opposing belief.
You mentioned scientists’ opinions not about the subjects that they study, but about the impact of intelligence on the quality of their work, which they are not likely to know more about than anyone else. If you had mentioned the opinions of psychologists who had studied the effects of intelligence on scientific productivity, that would be the sort of support you are claiming. Further, you weren’t even talking about a survey of scientists’ opinions, or other evidence about what they think; you just asserted what you think they think. Now, you could make the argument that the scientists would think that for the same reasons you do, or because you believe it is really true and they would notice, but in this case your beliefs about their opinions is not additional evidence.
Well, I suppose I have not explicitly stated it, but the primary cost is that it displaces discussion of the more fundamental evidence about the issue that is supposedly informing the majority or expert opinion.
And you yourself argued elsewhere that in the political process of voting that attempts to aggregate opinions, “Voters are often uninformed about how policy affects their lives”.
Even with expert opinions, it can be hard to understand what the expert thinks. I have seen people go horribly wrong by applying an expert’s idea out of context. If you don’t understand an expert’s reasoning because it is too complicated, you probably don’t understand their position well enough to generalize it.
What I object to is using a discussion of what other people believe to shut down discussion of an opposing belief.