Asking “who do you defer to?” feels like a simplification
Agreed! I’m not going to make any changes to the survey at this stage, but I like the suggestion and if I had more time I’d try to clarify things along these lines.
I like the distinction between deference to people/groups and deference to processes.
deference to good ideas
[This is a bit of a semantic point, but seems important enough to mention] I think “deference to good ideas” wouldn’t count as “deference”, in the way that this community has ended up using it. As per the forum topic entry on epistemic deference:
Epistemic deference is the process of updating one’s beliefs in response to what others appear to believe, even if one ignores the reasons for those beliefs or do not find those reasons persuasive. (emphasis mine)
If you find an argument persuasive and incorporate it into your views, I think that doesn’t qualify as “deference”. Your independent impressions don’t (and in most cases won’t) be the views you formed in isolation. When forming your independent impressions, you can and should take other people’s arguments into account, to the extent that you find them convincing. Deference occurs when you take into account knowledge about what other people believe, and how trustworthy you find them, without engaging with their object level arguments.
non-defensible original ideas
A similar point applies to this one, I think.
(All of the above makes me think that the concept of deference is even less clear in the community than I thought it was—thanks for making me aware of this!)
Thanks for your comment!
Agreed! I’m not going to make any changes to the survey at this stage, but I like the suggestion and if I had more time I’d try to clarify things along these lines.
I like the distinction between deference to people/groups and deference to processes.
[This is a bit of a semantic point, but seems important enough to mention] I think “deference to good ideas” wouldn’t count as “deference”, in the way that this community has ended up using it. As per the forum topic entry on epistemic deference:
If you find an argument persuasive and incorporate it into your views, I think that doesn’t qualify as “deference”. Your independent impressions don’t (and in most cases won’t) be the views you formed in isolation. When forming your independent impressions, you can and should take other people’s arguments into account, to the extent that you find them convincing. Deference occurs when you take into account knowledge about what other people believe, and how trustworthy you find them, without engaging with their object level arguments.
A similar point applies to this one, I think.
(All of the above makes me think that the concept of deference is even less clear in the community than I thought it was—thanks for making me aware of this!)