# Daniel Filan

## Even if you're right, you're wrong

Epistemic status: I noticed a commonality between a set of rhetorical moves that I sometimes find irritating and sometimes think is valid.

You claim P? OK. But even if you’re right about P…

• … if I assume P, then I can prove not P. So, by contradiction, P is false. So you’re wrong.
• … if you really believed P, then you would have a certain appropriate mood. But it doesn’t seem like you have that mood. So you’re wrong.
• … with 99% probability, as long as there’s a 1% chance that P is wrong, according to expected value, we should act like P is wrong. So you’re wrong.
• … accepting P would mean that you should do this weird action A. But you don’t do A, as far as I can tell. So you’re wrong.
• … yesterday, you said Q, and Q implies not P. So you were wrong yesterday or today. So you’re wrong.
• … somebody might infer Q from P. But Q is false! So you’re wrong.
• … someone might infer from your expression of P that you believe Q. But Q is false! So you’re wrong.