Steelman It

Steelman Before You Strike

Before you argue against a view, state it in its strongest form (the version its smartest defender would accept and applaud. That's steelmanning, the opposite of the strawman. It's how you earn the right to disagree: if you can't beat the best version, you haven't beaten it at all. In each of these, pick the STRONGEST form of the opposing view) not the easiest to knock down.

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”

Where this sits in the course

“Steelman It” is lesson 1 of 3 in Think for Yourself, a course about finish by using philosophy as a skill: steelman, critique, and apply.. The lessons are sequenced rather than a menu, so this one assumes what came before it.

Think for Yourself is itself one of 18 courses in thinkr. The set opens with what philosophy is, moves through the Stoics and the Eastern traditions, then into what can be known, what exists, how to act and how power works — closing on practical reasoning you can use in an argument this week.

More from Aristotle

“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.”

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”

“Happiness depends upon ourselves.”

In the app this lesson is followed by 5 exercises that check whether the idea actually landed — and every answer, right or wrong, is explained rather than scored. That is the part a written page cannot reproduce.