“People in my experience lose points for bad arguments, not for weird conclusions.”
I just want to note that in my experience this only happens if you’re challenging something that’s mainstream in EA. If I tell an EA “I’m a utilitarian,” that’s fine. If I say, “I’m not a utilitarian,” I need to provide arguments for why. That’s scary, because I’ve never studied philosophy, and I’m often being stared down by a room full of people with philosophy degrees.
So basically, some of us are not smart enough to make good arguments for everything we believe—and we’ll only lose social points for that if we mention that we have weird beliefs.
“People in my experience lose points for bad arguments, not for weird conclusions.”
I just want to note that in my experience this only happens if you’re challenging something that’s mainstream in EA. If I tell an EA “I’m a utilitarian,” that’s fine. If I say, “I’m not a utilitarian,” I need to provide arguments for why. That’s scary, because I’ve never studied philosophy, and I’m often being stared down by a room full of people with philosophy degrees.
So basically, some of us are not smart enough to make good arguments for everything we believe—and we’ll only lose social points for that if we mention that we have weird beliefs.