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Notes -
What are the limits of the weak man?
Note: Although this post cites specific real-life examples, the intent of the discussion is intended to be entirely at the meta level.
Scott Alexander's definition is apt to cite:
Also instructive is Bryan Caplan's gradation:
What Caplan is describing as "collective straw manning" seems to be a good scale for weakmanning's range. And lastly, consider also Julian Sanchez's disclaimer:
At least in theory, I think weakmanning should be avoided, but I struggle with how to draw the line exactly. If your goal is to avoid weakmanning, there's at least two axes that you must consider:
All the possible arguments for position X, ranked on a spectrum from least to most defensible.
All the possible arguments for position X, ranked on a spectrum from least to most *representative *of believers in X.
Weakmanning is not much of an issue if you're arguing against a single individual, because they either endorse the particular arguments or not. You can't showcase the error of one's ways by refuting arguments they never held.
But generally we tend to argue over positions endorsed by many different people, where each person may differ with regard to which argument they either advance or prioritize, so what should count as "representative"?
For example, many people believe in the theory of evolution, but some believers do so under the erroneous belief that evolutionary change occurs within an individual organism's lifespan. [I know some smartass in the comments will pipe up about some endangered tropical beetle or whatever does demonstrate "change-within-lifespan" evolutionary changes. Just remember that this is not an object-level discussion.] If you use a crude heuristic and only poll relevant experts (e.g. biology professors) you're not likely to encounter many adherents of the "change-within-lifespan" argument, so this could be a decent filter to narrow your focus on what should count as "representative" for a given position. This is generally an effective tactic, since it helps you avoid prematurely declaring victory at Wrestlemania just because you trounced some toddlers at the playground.
But sometimes you get a crazy position believed by crazy people based on crazy arguments, with a relatively tiny minority within/adjacent to the community of believers aware of the problems and doing the Lord's work coming up with better arguments. InverseFlorida coined the term "sanewashing" to describe how the meaning of "defund the police" (DTP) shifted [TracingWoodgrains described the same dynamic with the gentrification of /r/antiwork. Credit also to him for most of the arborist-themed metaphor in this post.] to something much more neutered and, correspondingly, much more defensible:
Keep in mind that this is not an object-level discussion on the merits of DTP. Assume arguendo that the "sanewashed" arguments are much more defensible than the "crazy" ones they replaced. If someone were to take a position against DTP by arguing against the now obsolete arguments, one of the sanewashers would be technically correct accusing you of weakmanning for daring to bring up that old story again. This fits the literal definition of weakmanning after all.
As Sanchez noted above, for most people for most positions, intuition predates rationality. They stumble around in the dark looking for any sort of foothold, then work backwards to fill in any necessary arguments. Both the sanewashers and the crazies are reliant on the other. Without the sanitization from the hygiene-minded sanewashers, the position would lack the fortification required to avoid erosion; and without the crazy masses delivering the bodies and zeal, the position would fade into irrelevance. The specific ratio may vary, but this dynamic is present in some amount on any given position. You very likely have already experienced the embarrassment that comes from a compatriot, purportedly on your side, making an ass of both of youse with their nonsensical arguments.
If your ultimate goal is truth-seeking, weakmanning will distract you into hacking away at worthless twigs rather than striking at the core. But sometimes the goal isn't seeking truth on the specific position (either because it's irrelevant or otherwise already beyond reasonable dispute) and instead the relevant topic is the collective epistemological dynamics [I dare you to use this phrase at a dinner party without getting kicked out.]. InverseFlorida's insightful analysis would not have been possible without shining a spotlight on the putative crazies — the very definition of weakmanning in other words.
Here's the point, at last. Normally someone holding a belief for the wrong reasons is not enough to negate that belief. But wherever a sanewasher faction appears to be spending considerable efforts cleaning up the mess their crazy neighbors keep leaving behind, it should instigate some suspicion about the belief, at least as a heuristic. Any honest and rational believer needs to grapple for an explanation for how the crazies managed to all be accidentally right despite outfitted — by definition — with erroneous arguments. Such a scenario is so implausible that it commands a curious inquiry about its origin.
It's possible that this inquiry unearths just another fun episode in the collective epistemological dynamics saga; it's also possible the probe ends up exposing a structural flaw with the belief itself. In either circumstances, a weakmanning objection is made in bad faith and intended to obfuscate. Its only purpose is to get you to ignore the inconvenient, the annoying. You should pay no heed to this protest and continue deploying the magnifying glass; don't be afraid to focus the sun's infernal rays into a burning pyre of illumination. Can you think of any reasons not to?
I sort of lean towards weak-manning not being a thing, and any view that anyone holds is fair game. But treating every member of a group as if they have to defend every weak position of their side is a form of waging the culture war. It commonly happens in the real world, but I'd hope to avoid it here.
One specific reason why I find weak-manning ok, is that the arguments themselves don't play fair, and so I'm not gonna play fair in trying to tear them down.
Consider something like humor and comedy. A funny thing does not have to be true. So false and true ideas can both be supported by comedy. Humor can work as a an argument for something because people like laughing, they might be laughing at a viewpoint, or laughing with the presenter. But ultimately its just an association of a happy emotion with a certain political viewpoint. It is one of the purest examples of "arguments as soldiers".
Arguments that might be "weak" around here, because they are objectively foolish or devoid of logic/evidence, could actually be some of the strongest arguments out in 'the wild'. Religion is a good example to bring up. One of the reasons I've seen people start to believe in the Christian faith is because they are fundamentally broken people, and being convinced that someone loves and cares about them is a salve to their wounded minds. That there is no evidence the sky-god exists and actually loves them is not something that they appreciate people pointing out. They aren't seeking truth. They are seeking medicine. And you are ruining their placebo. However, when they try to shove the religion down my throat the kid-gloves that I'd normally use come off.
Similar things with politics. Some of the people I know that support one of the major parties seem to do it out of the same tribal part of their brain that supports sports teams. Evidence and reason don't actually matter very much to them. I don't go to sports games and point out that many of the athletes are probably using steroids. Because sports games don't come after me or my bank account. Politicians do come after me. So again, the kid gloves are off. All the stupid arguments are getting called out. What I once did, and no longer bother to ever do, is to seek out the strongest arguments for a position and try to knock those down.
There are a complex set of economic arguments for why minimum wage might be good. It has to do with elasticities of prices, monopsony, and some complex models. But luckily ~100% of people arguing for minimum wage don't know any of those arguments. If you brought out those arguments to try and knock them down they'd just get annoyed and angry at you. "No, I support a higher minimum wage because people should be paid enough to survive!"
I'd like everyone here to consider that what they think are "weak-man" arguments might actually be the strong arguments for a thing. We are coincidentally in a place where logic and evidence have some advantages as argumentative techniques. But that is by design, and something that has to be enforced.
I think they are more thinking along the lines of why is it that some of the other employees of the firm they work for earn manyfold as much as they do and that they are thinking about minimum wage increases for them being funded by decreases in the wages of the higher earners, but in reality that scenario requires the government to regulate all wages not just the minimum.
Basic math should be used to address those concerns. A million dollar salary can only be split twenty times to pay 50k salaries
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I think weak man is sort of a strange way to put it. I would give as a principle that a good representation of the position of your opponent is one that a reasonably studied adherent would argue for himself.
It would be disingenuous to argue that Christianity is true because Constantine saw a vision of a cross. No one who’s studied the issues would hold that position. As such refuting Christianity on the basis of debunking the conversion of Constantine isn’t a good faith argument. It’s irrelevant to the issues at hand. Better would be arguing from history or Jewish scriptures or something along those lines. The argument being that the scripture doesn’t actually say what you think it says, or that history doesn’t record what you think it records.
Well sure. Because he saw a chi-ro. =P
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