Thinking models in practice: the steelman

To steelman an argument is to restate the opposing view in its strongest form — better than its own advocates might — before you respond to it. It is the opposite of a straw man. If your position still stands against the steelman, it is worth holding; if it does not, you found out cheaply.

Part of Thinking models in practice, a short series on classic methods and how to run them on your own material.

Why it is worth the effort

Beating a weak version of the other side feels like winning and teaches you nothing. The people you need to persuade — reviewers, colleagues, the reader of your essay — already know the strong version. If your argument only answers the weak one, they will notice before you do.

The idea has a well-known formulation in what the philosopher Daniel Dennett called Rapoport's rules: before criticising a view, restate it so clearly that its holder would say "thanks, I wish I had put it that way", list where you agree, and mention anything you learned from it. Only then rebut.

How to do it

1. Name the view precisely. Not "the critics" — the specific claim, ideally in a sentence its supporters would sign.
2. Find its best evidence. What would a thoughtful supporter point to? Their strongest data, not their loudest slogan.
3. Find its best reasoning. Which values or assumptions make it compelling to intelligent people? A view held by smart people usually rests on something real.
4. Write it out as its advocate would. In the first person, without sarcasm, a paragraph or two.
5. Check the test. Would someone who holds this view recognise it and be satisfied? If not, revise.
6. Only now, respond — to that version.

A worked example

Your position: remote-first teams should drop most recurring meetings in favour of written updates.

The steelman of the other side: "Written updates are excellent for reporting what happened and terrible at surfacing what nobody thought to write down. The value of a recurring meeting is not the agenda; it is the two minutes at the end when someone says 'one more thing' — the half-formed worry that would never survive being written. Removing meetings removes the cheapest channel for weak signals, and the cost does not show up until a problem that was mentioned in passing in March becomes a crisis in June."

That is a better objection than "people like meetings", and it changes the proposal: keep written updates, but protect one short, agenda-free slot for the things nobody would write down.

Running it with AI

Steelmanning is one of the best uses of an AI, because it has none of your attachment to your position and it has read a great deal of the other side. Two conditions:

• Point it at the actual argument. Give it the paper you are disagreeing with, not a description of it. A steelman built from the source text is grounded; one built from a summary drifts toward the generic.
• Ask for the steelman before the critique. If you ask for both at once, you mostly get critique.

In MindMax, steelman is one of the built-in critique skills on the canvas. Apply it to a card holding a claim — or to a card pointing at the paper you are arguing with — and it builds the other side at its strongest before anything else happens, citing the passages it drew on. Then run an assumption audit on your own position and see which one survives.

Where it goes wrong

• The steelman becomes a different argument. Strengthening a view is not replacing it with one you find easier to agree with. Check it against what its advocates actually say.
• It turns into false balance. Steelmanning a view does not make it right. Some positions are weak at their strongest, and saying so after a fair hearing is the point.
• You never come back to your own view. The exercise is a step toward a position, not a substitute for having one.

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Part of thinking models on the canvas. Previous in the series: the pre-mortem. Next: first principles.