{"id":5407,"date":"2017-06-22T18:30:19","date_gmt":"2017-06-22T18:30:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/06\/22\/does-your-disagreement-give-me-good-reason-to-doubt-my-position\/"},"modified":"2017-06-22T18:30:19","modified_gmt":"2017-06-22T18:30:19","slug":"does-your-disagreement-give-me-good-reason-to-doubt-my-position","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/06\/22\/does-your-disagreement-give-me-good-reason-to-doubt-my-position\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Your Disagreement Give Me Good Reason to Question My Position?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In general, no. For you may be foolish or ignorant or otherwise incompetent with respect to the subject matter under discussion. Or you may be morally defective: a bully, a blowhard, a bullshitter, a quibbler, a sophist.  But suppose none of these predicates attach to you.  Suppose you are my moral and intellectual peer, and what's more, a competent practitioner in the discipline or subdiscipline which is home to the thesis we are disputing. Thus we are both competent, and we are equally<\/em> competent. And suppose I believe you to be<\/em> as intellectually honest and as competent as I am.<\/span><\/p>\n

Suppose further that I have given careful thought to my thesis and have advanced it in respectable, peer-reviewed journals.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you disagree with me, does this fact supply a good reason for me to question my thesis?  Ought I question it? Or would I be justified in ignoring your disagreement?<\/span><\/p>\n

We note that this is a meta-question that sires a meta-disagreement.  This meta-disagreement is between the Conciliationist and the Steadfaster.<\/span><\/p>\n

I am a Conciliationist. Thus I tend to think that your disagreement with me (given the stipulations above) ought to give me pause. It ought to cause me to re-examine my view and be open to the possibility of either rejecting it or withholding assent from it.  It ought to undermine my epistemic self-confidence. I tend to think I would be intellectually amiss, less than intellectually honest, were I simply to dismiss your disagreement. I tend to think I would be unjustifiably privileging my own point of view, preferring it over yours simply because is is mine. This seems wrong to me given that we are trying to arrive at the objective and impersonal truth.  Truth cannot be mine or yours.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Steadfaster stands fast in the face of disagreement. Whereas the Conciliationist allows the fact of disagreement to undermine his epistemic self-confidence, the Steadfaster takes the fact of disagreement to undermine his prior conviction that his interlocutor is as morally and intellectually capable as he initially thought he was. So when you disagree with me, I question whether I am right. But when I disagree with you, you question my competence, rationality, probity, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n

But now a puzzle arises. If I am a Conciliationist, then my position would seem to require that I question my Conciliationism due to the fact that the Steadfaster disagrees with me.  (Assume that the Steadfaster is as morally and intellectually well-endowed as I am and that I believe him to be such.)<\/span><\/p>\n

It seems that the consistent Conciliationist cannot be steadfast in his Conciliationism given that there are Steadfasters out there who are, and whom he believes to be, his moral and intellectual equals.  So what should our Conciliationist do? Should he:<\/span><\/p>\n