I agree that knowing someoneâs personal motives can help you judge the likelihood of unproven claims they make, and should make you suspicious of any chance they have to e.g. selectively quote someone. But some of the language Iâve seen used around Torres seems to imply âif he said it, we should just ignore itâ, even in cases where he actually links to sources, cites published literature, etc.
Of course, itâs much more difficult to evaluate someoneâs arguments when theyâve proven untrustworthy, so Iâd give an evaluation of Philâs claims lower priority than I would evaluations of other critics who donât share his background (all else being equal). But I donât want them to be thrown out entirely.
I think the critiques would be mystifying unless you knew the background on what is actually driving him to write this stuff.
When Phil shares this material, I often see comments (on Twitter, Aeon, etc.) from people saying things like âyes, this is also how I feelâ or âthis experience you said someone had is similar to the experience I hadâ. You could argue that these people probably have false beliefs or biases of their own, but they donât seem mystified, and they probably donât share Philâs personal background. He seems to represent a particular viewpoint/âworldview that others also hold for non-vengeful reasons.
I agree that knowing someoneâs personal motives can help you judge the likelihood of unproven claims they make, and should make you suspicious of any chance they have to e.g. selectively quote someone. But some of the language Iâve seen used around Torres seems to imply âif he said it, we should just ignore itâ, even in cases where he actually links to sources, cites published literature, etc.
Of course, itâs much more difficult to evaluate someoneâs arguments when theyâve proven untrustworthy, so Iâd give an evaluation of Philâs claims lower priority than I would evaluations of other critics who donât share his background (all else being equal). But I donât want them to be thrown out entirely.
When Phil shares this material, I often see comments (on Twitter, Aeon, etc.) from people saying things like âyes, this is also how I feelâ or âthis experience you said someone had is similar to the experience I hadâ. You could argue that these people probably have false beliefs or biases of their own, but they donât seem mystified, and they probably donât share Philâs personal background. He seems to represent a particular viewpoint/âworldview that others also hold for non-vengeful reasons.