Critical thinking: the principle of charity

Simply put, the principle of charity tells you to treat other people as intelligent people. If you treat people as being intelligent, you will do a better job at evaluating their arguments.

To illustrate the principle of charity, suppose you’re given this argument:

Alex: “The human race has managed to land somebody on Mars and split the atom, therefore, we should be able to do something simpler, like redistributing the world’s substantial food supplies so that the poor get plenty.”

The human race has managed to land somebody on the Moon and split the atom, therefore, we should be able to do something simpler, like redistributing the world’s substantial food supplies so that the poor get plenty.

Quinn eats regularly at McDonald’s, so Quinn doesn’t care about the environment.

1. Use whatever evidence you can get about the arguer’s intentions from the stated premises, conclusion and context.
2. Apply the Principle of Charity:

(begin{array}{ll} text{P1} & text{Quinn eats regularly at McDonald’s.} text{P2} & text{[Anybody who eats regularly at McDonald’s} & text{doesn’t care about the environment.]} &text{Therefore,} text{C} & text{Quinn doesn’t care about the environment. } end{array})

(begin{array}{ll} text{P1} & text{Quinn eats regularly at McDonald’s.} text{P2} & text{[Most people who eat regularly at McDonald’s} & text{don’t care about the environment.]} &text{Therefore, probably} text{C} & text{Quinn doesn’t care about the environment. } end{array})

There are lots of known cases of discrimination against gay academics that are out in their work environment. Do you really think that it’s safe to be out?

(begin{array}{ll} text{P1} & text{There are lots of known cases of discrimination against} &text{gay academics that are out in their work environment.} &text{Therefore,} text{C} & text{It’s unsafe for all gay academics to be out in their} &text{work environment.} end{array})

(begin{array}{ll} text{P1} & text{There are lots of known cases of discrimination against} &text{gay academics that are out in their work environment.} &text{Therefore, probably} text{C} & text{It’s unsafe for most gay academics to be out in their} &text{work environment.} end{array})

Now, we treated the argument as being non-deductive, and we gave a conclusion that is less ambitious, but yet seems to reflect what was intended in the original argument. The argument might still be a bad argument, and again I leave this for you to make up your mind about it, but by being charitable, we have formulated the conclusion in a way that gives it a better chance, and that’s our job as critical thinkers.

Notice that the principle of charity has implications on whether we treat arguments as being deductive or non-deductive. As a rule of thumb, the principle of charity tells you to treat arguments as being non-deductive, unless the intention of the argument is clearly deductive.

In fact, most people do not know the distinction between deductive and non-deductive arguments, and you will give them a better chance of succeeding in giving good arguments if you treat them as non-deductive.

Maybe they can’t prove to you their claims beyond doubt, however, they may have reasons that provide strong support. Now that you know the distinction, be charitable and take arguments to be non-deductive when it benefits the arguer. You’ll have to work harder to show that their argument is bad, but you’ll do better work!

Why be so nice?

There’s got to be a limit to this, of course. You don’t want to turn some drongo into Einstein. So there’s a limit to what you’re prepared to put into their arguments. You’re trying to work out what their argument is, not what the best possible argument for the position they’re running is.

Still, there are several reasons to be charitable. For one, if you actually believe the conclusion of the argument, you want the argument to make a good case for it. If you like the argument, then you’ll benefit from giving it a strong interpretation.

But more importantly – especially if you don’t believe the conclusion – you are better off attacking a stronger version of the argument. If you’re in a debate with someone and you attack a version of their argument which isn’t as strong as it could be, the person will just say: “That wasn’t what I meant. You’re not attacking my actual argument, you’re caricaturing my argument.” So you won’t have got anywhere.

This, by the way, is related to what we call the Strawman fallacy, which consists of distorting or misinterpreting someone’s view so that it can easily be attacked.

Now, there is a positive message from the Strawman fallacy. And that is just a note that what’s wrong with the strawman strategy from our point of view is that it isn’t truth conducive. It doesn’t move us toward truth, because you just rebut an argument that probably no one took very seriously.

If you can show that even the best version of your opponent’s argument is false, then you’ve made some progress. Quite often, what you see in a good argument is an opponent actually improving the position he or she is going to attack.

So you see things which say: so and so gives the following arguments for their position. There are some pretty obvious problems with it. But I can see how they would fix them if they’ve noticed. And so I’m going to fix the arguments for them. I am also assuming that they would have gone along with these fixes, as they are intelligent people. Sometimes, they don’t, of course.

Then once you’ve got the argument as good as it can be, bearing in mind, you’re trying to evaluate their argument, not yours, you then say that even when repaired charitably, the argument is flawed in the following ways.

Then you’ve really shown something, namely that the best version of the argument won’t work. Showing that a hopeless version is bad, let alone a version that’s not even as good as the one they’ve advanced, doesn’t help.

Since our interest is in arriving at truth rather than simply winning arguments, then you should be charitable.