I strongly disagree with this interpretation. To the strength of your claims, the steelmanner is more engaging with themselves rather than the other person. Ima

I strongly disagree with this interpretation. To the strength of your claims, the steelmanner is more engaging with themselves rather than the other person. Imagine a chess player playing both sides. This of course isn't what steelmanning looks like. It's simply an extension of good faith. The other person needs to be there and needs to have their personal claims and beliefs represented in the steelman. The most common steelman tactic is, after your opponent finishes a point, saying something to the effect of "Just so we're on the level, I'm going to restate what I believe your argument is and you can correct me if I've misinterpreted something". Then you restate a summary of the argument in your own words and in good faith, bolstering it or lending structure where needed, or perhaps adding an obvious missing caveat. Then the person has a chance to correct you. They can kick out any supports they don't want you to add or recind any caveats. From there, you can progress. This is what steelmanning looks like. The form of an argument and the crux of it are not the same. It's good faith to interpret the form favourably. Even in the most poorly stated arguments the core concept can be derived. You can give the person a better path to this central idea so as to ignore time waste arguments about the route, and instead attack that core idea. You've ironically painted a hollow and one dimensional view of steelmanning.