Debunked And Well-Refuted

A sequel to 'Beware The Man Of One Study.' Beyond cherry-picking studies, partisans dismiss inconvenient ones by calling them 'debunked' / 'well-refuted' — which usually means only (1) someone on their side later published a contrary study, or (2) someone alleged methodological flaws. Anyone can type 'that study is garbage.' REAL debunking (Wakefield: failed replications, fraud findings, retraction, license revocation, a BMJ editorial) is rare and categorically different from 'argued against' (the campus-rape surveys; the Card-Krueger vs Neumark-Wascher minimum-wage 'titanomachy' where BOTH sides claim to have debunked the other). The 'second layer of confirmation bias' is believing every refutation that flatters you; "that's been debunked" is how shutting out inconvenient evidence feels from the inside.

Quality 78 · Excellent. An excellent, important, highly applicable epistemics essay — the distinction between an ex-cathedra scientific consensus and 'one guy with an axe to grind,' illustrated perfectly by the mutual-debunking minimum-wage literature. A worthy sequel to the Man-of-One-Study classic (88); Excellent, just below the named-80 epistemics essays as it extends rather than coins.

Claude’s paradigm shift 64 · Notable shift. The 'second layer of confirmation bias' / 'debunked-as-authority-claim vs. real consensus' framing is a fresh, valuable extension of the one-study insight. Notable, high.

Real-world impact 2 · Minor. A within-rationalist-discourse epistemics essay; the debunked-vs-argued-against distinction is used but not materially impactful. Within-blog influence.