Three Ideas for Civil Criticism

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27 pointssoundsop2 comments

> The specific empirical concerns it raised are contradicted by evidence, logic, or both.

versus

> The rebuttal identifies individual examples that intuitively suggest my analyses were too conservative, but, on the one hand, closer examination shows the examples are not actually conservative, and on the other, the removal of those examples leaves the results unchanged.

What the first example lacks in detail, the second example lacks in clarity. Perhaps in context the second example could be understood, but it seems counterproductive to avoid using phrases like "contradicted by evidence", which at least let us know what the goal is for an argument that follows.

Again, perhaps context would make the second sample more clear, but it was provided as a writing sample free of context.

They are both lacking, because neither actually contains the guts of the argument. Presumably this sentence is in an introduction and the real argument will come later.

In that sense the the second is better because it actually serves as a teaser for the coming rational argument. The first is just claims.

Though the first has the great advantage of being shorter.

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