Some scattered thoughts on this article (which I enjoyed): 1. I often find myself purposely presenting caricatured arguments for different (often extreme) view

Some scattered thoughts on this article (which I enjoyed): 1. I often find myself purposely presenting caricatured arguments for different (often extreme) viewpoints. This is useful since it works with human nature to bring out objections. This is especially useful when you're presenting views to people who might feel uncomfortable disagreeing with you. If you present a caricatured argument, people will feel more comfortable bringing up objections, and you can get closer to the truth faster (esp. in management contexts). 2. I often find perfectly hedged essays (with every minor caveat and edge case identified and handled) really boring and tedious to read. E.g., it is more concise and to the point to sometimes just write "I believe that X", as opposed to spending several more paragraphs to explain more fully, "I believe that X, but of course in cases Y, Z, and W, there might be exceptions" (assuming Y, Z, and W are actually obvious). This is why academic papers can sometimes be really boring to read: writers are forced by convention to explore tedious caveats and to signal their epistemic humility for pages and pages, but it doesn't really add any value to the readers.[1][2] [1] Of course, sometimes it's useful to explore the nuances of an argument, and to double-check that even "obvious" objections really don't hold water. But often this leads to boring essays, and you should avoid doing this in a lot of circumstances just to avoid negative comments. [2] But do you see that [1] is an example of what I mean above? =] It's arguably an obvious hedge that doesn't really add anything to my point.