Concise Summary简洁概述
When someone rejects a claim — say, a transhumanist idea — they usually cite a stated objection ("you don't have a PhD"). But the rejection often happened first, instantly and sub-verbally, driven by pattern recognition: the idea feels weird, cultish, or like sci-fi. The stated objection is a post-hoc justification, not the cause. This matters practically: fixing the stated objection (getting the PhD) rarely changes minds, because the same initial rejection persists and finds a new stopping point. The same trap applies in business, negotiations, and rational disagreements generally. Before spending effort satisfying an objection, ask: is that your true rejection?
当一个人拒绝某个主张——比如某个超人类主义观点——时，他通常会给出一个表面理由（「你没有博士学位」）。但拒绝往往早已发生：瞬间的、无意识的，源于模式识别——这个想法感觉奇怪、像邪教、像科幻小说。表面上的反对理由只是事后的合理化，而非真正的原因。这在实践中至关重要：满足表面上的反对（拿到博士学位）很少能改变人心，因为同样的初始拒绝还在，只是换了个停靠点。同样的陷阱适用于商业、谈判，以及一般的理性分歧。在花费大量精力去满足某个反对意见之前，先问：那是你真正的拒绝理由吗？
Infographic信息图
Instant rejection precedes verbal thought
即时拒绝先于语言思维
Pattern recognition fires at the speed of perception — the idea is rejected before any explicit reasoning has occurred.
模式识别以知觉的速度触发——在任何明确推理发生之前，想法已被拒绝。
Stated objection is a post-hoc search
表面反对是事后搜索
After rejection, the mind searches for a justification. It finds something plausible — but that something is not necessarily what caused the rejection.
拒绝发生之后，心智开始搜寻合理化理由。它找到某个看起来说得通的东西——但那未必是导致拒绝的原因。
Fixing the stated objection often changes nothing
满足表面反对往往什么都改变不了
If you got the PhD, the objector would simply move to the next stopping point: "Come back when you're tenured."
如果你真的拿了博士学位，反对者只会移到下一个停靠点：「等你拿到终身教职再来。」
Applies to business and negotiation
适用于商业与谈判
A VC's or customer's stated rejection ("sales too slow", "missing feature X") may not be the real barrier — spending to fix it may change nothing.
风险投资人或客户的表面拒绝（「增长太慢」「缺少功能X」）未必是真正的障碍——为此花费精力可能毫无改变。
The polite way to probe true rejections
礼貌地探寻真实拒绝的方式
You can openly ask whether the simple stated reason is really the rejection, or whether it traces to an intuition or professional zeitgeist — leaving the embarrassing options for the other's own conscience.
你可以公开询问：这个简单的表面理由是否真的是拒绝所在，还是它源于某种直觉或职业时代精神——把令人尴尬的可能性留给对方的良知去处理。
Detailed Summary详细概述
The Setup: Why "Get a PhD" is Bad Advice
Yudkowsky opens with a recurring scene: someone encounters his transhumanist ideas — superintelligence, Friendly AI — and rejects them with the objection, "You don't have a PhD." Well-meaning bystanders advise him to get one. This is, he says, one of the bad reasons to pursue a PhD.
Rejection Before Reasoning
The real action happens before any explicit thought. When an unusual idea is encountered, pattern recognition fires instantly — the thesis is tagged as "strange weird idea," "science fiction," or "end-of-the-world cult" at the speed of perception. The rejection is already done. Only afterward, when asked to justify it, does the mind launch a search for a verbal reason. That search need not find the true cause; it finds the first justifying-sounding candidate and stops.
The PhD objection is telling: Yudkowsky doesn't have a PhD when he writes about human rationality either, yet that objection is never raised there. The asymmetry reveals the cited reason is post-hoc.
The Credential Escalator
Suppose he did get a PhD. The same initial rejection — triggered by the exotic subject matter, not the credentials — persists. The search for justification simply finds a new stopping point: "Come back when you're tenured at a major university." And if that? "Come back when you're well-known in your field." Arbitrary Harvard professors saying weird things don't get believed either. Yudkowsky's estimate: the credential needed to override a stranger's initial negative reaction to truly strange-sounding claims is roughly Nobel Laureate level — "beyond the mundane."
The Drexler Case
Eric Drexler heard "Come back when you have a PhD" about molecular nanotechnology. He spent six years doing exactly that — writing Nanosystems and earning his PhD under Marvin Minsky, producing a serious technical work. Did the same critics change their minds? As far as Yudkowsky can tell, no. The true rejection was never about credentials.
Practical Implications: Business and Negotiation
The pattern matters beyond intellectual debates. A venture capitalist says, "If only your sales were growing a little faster!" A potential customer says, "You're missing feature X." These may not be the true rejections. Fixing them may, or may not, change anything. Before investing huge effort in satisfying a stated objection, one should carefully consider whether that objection is the real barrier.
Disagreements Between Rationalists
Drawing on Robin Hanson's principle that two rationalists shouldn't agree to disagree, Yudkowsky argues that persistent disagreements have true sources that are typically hard to communicate or hard to expose. His list includes:
- Uncommon but well-supported scientific knowledge or math
- Long inferential distances
- Hard-to-verbalize intuitions from specific visualizations
- Professional zeitgeists inherited from a field
- Patterns recognized from experience
- Sheer habits of thought
- Emotional commitments to a particular outcome
- Fear that a past mistake could be disproved
- Deep self-deception for pride or personal benefit
If all true rejections were easily statable, the disagreement would already have resolved at the first exchange.
How to Use the Question
"Is this my true rejection?" is something each disagreer should ask themselves. Openly psychoanalyzing the other person tends to detonate the conversation. But humbly asking, "Is that simple-sounding reason your true rejection, or does it come from intuition-X or professional-zeitgeist-Y?" — while leaving the more embarrassing possibilities to the other's own conscience — may be fair game.
设定：为何「去拿博士学位」是坏建议
Yudkowsky 以一个反复出现的场景开场：有人遇到他的超人类主义观点——超级智能、友好人工智能——然后以「你没有博士学位」为由拒绝了它们。好心的旁观者建议他去拿一个。他说，这是攻读博士学位的坏理由之一。
推理之前的拒绝
真正的动作发生在任何明确思考之前。当一个不寻常的想法被遇到时，模式识别瞬间触发——论题以知觉的速度被贴上「奇怪的想法」、「科幻小说」或「末日邪教」的标签。拒绝已经完成。只有之后，当被要求给出理由时，心智才启动一次搜寻语言理由的过程。那次搜寻不必找到真正的原因；它找到第一个听起来合理的候选项就停下来了。
博士学位的反对理由很能说明问题：Yudkowsky 在写关于人类理性的文章时同样没有博士学位，但那个反对从未在那里被提出。这种不对称揭示了所引用的理由是事后的。
资历的自动扶梯
假设他真的拿到了博士学位。同样的初始拒绝——由奇异的主题内容触发，而非资历——依然存在。寻找合理化理由的搜寻只是找到了新的停靠点：「等你在主要大学拿到终身教职再来。」 如果这个也满足了？「等你在你的领域里声名卓著再来。」 即便是哈佛任意一位教授说出奇怪的话，人们也不会相信。Yudkowsky 的估计是：要覆盖陌生人对真正听起来奇异的主张的初始负面反应，所需的资历大约是诺贝尔奖级别——「超凡脱俗」。
Drexler 案例
Eric Drexler 在分子纳米技术上听到了「等你拿到博士学位再来」。他花了整整六年去做这件事——撰写了《纳米系统》，在 Marvin Minsky 指导下获得了博士学位，完成了一部严肃的技术著作。同样的批评者改变了看法吗？就 Yudkowsky 所知，没有。真正的拒绝从来就不是关于资历的。
实践意义：商业与谈判
这种模式的重要性超越了思想辩论。风险投资人说：「如果你们的销售增长能快一点就好了！」潜在客户说：「你们缺少功能X。」这些未必是真正的拒绝。满足它们可能改变一些东西，也可能什么都改变不了。在投入大量精力去满足一个表面上的反对意见之前，应该仔细考虑：那个反对意见是否真的是真正的障碍。
理性主义者之间的分歧
借鉴 Robin Hanson 的原则——两个理性主义者不应该同意各执己见——Yudkowsky 认为，持续存在的分歧往往有真正的根源，这些根源通常难以沟通或难以暴露。他的列表包括：
- 不常见但有充分支持的科学知识或数学
- 漫长的推断距离
- 源于特定视觉化的难以言说的直觉
- 从某个职业继承来的时代精神
- 从经验中感知识别出的模式
- 纯粹的思维习惯
- 对特定结果的情感承诺
- 对过去错误可能被揭露的恐惧
- 为维护自尊或其他个人利益而产生的深层自我欺骗
如果所有真正的拒绝都容易言说，那么分歧早在第一次交流时就应该解决了。
如何使用这个问题
「这是我真正的拒绝理由吗？」是每个存在分歧的人都应该问自己的问题。公开地对另一方进行心理分析往往会让对话爆炸。但谦逊地询问：「那个听起来简单的理由是你真正的拒绝吗，还是它来自某种直觉X或职业时代精神Y？」——同时将更令人尴尬的可能性留给对方自己的良知去处理——也许是合理的。
FAQ常见问答
What does "true rejection" mean, exactly?「真正的拒绝」究竟是什么意思？
The true rejection is whichever causes were actually decisive at the historical moment the rejection occurred — the first instant, before any verbal search for reasons. It is not the best reason that could be offered in retrospect, but the real psychological or epistemic trigger.
真正的拒绝是指在拒绝发生那一刻——最初的瞬间，在任何语言搜索理由之前——实际上起决定性作用的那些原因。它不是事后可以提出的最佳理由，而是真实的心理或认识论触发器。
Why doesn't fixing the stated objection usually work?为什么满足表面上的反对意见通常不管用？
Because the stated objection was a post-hoc stopping point, not the cause. The underlying rejection — from pattern recognition, emotional response, or deep intuition — remains intact. The mind simply finds a new justification: a higher credential, a different missing feature, a new threshold.
因为表面上的反对意见是一个事后的停靠点，而非原因。潜在的拒绝——来自模式识别、情感反应或深层直觉——依然完好无损。心智只是找到了新的合理化：更高的资历、另一个缺少的功能、一个新的门槛。
Is this saying we should distrust all stated reasons for disagreement?这是说我们应该不信任所有分歧中给出的表面理由吗？
Not exactly. Stated reasons can sometimes be the true rejection — but when a disagreement persists and the stakes are high (or when fixing the stated problem demonstrably changes nothing), it is worth asking whether you have reached the real source. The essay flags persistent disagreements as the main context.
不完全是。表面理由有时确实可能是真正的拒绝——但当分歧持续存在且风险较高（或者满足表面问题后明显毫无改变）时，值得询问你是否触及了真正的根源。文章主要针对的是持续存在的分歧。
How does the Drexler example prove the point?Drexler 的例子如何证明这一点？
Drexler did exactly what his critics demanded — he got the PhD and produced a detailed technical book (Nanosystems). If the stated objection had been the true rejection, this should have resolved matters. It didn't. The critics' resistance to molecular nanotechnology came from deeper sources, and the credential merely displaced the objection.
Drexler 完全按照批评者的要求去做了——他拿到了博士学位，并撰写了一本详细的技术著作（《纳米系统》）。如果表面上的反对意见是真正的拒绝，这本应解决问题。但没有。批评者对分子纳米技术的抵制来自更深层的来源，资历只是让反对转移了方向。
What are the acceptable ways to probe someone else's true rejection?有哪些可接受的方式来探询他人真正的拒绝？
Yudkowsky suggests you can openly ask whether the simple stated reason is really the rejection, or whether it might stem from a known intuition or professional zeitgeist. The more embarrassing possibilities — emotional commitments, fear of past error, self-deception — should be left to the other person's own conscience, not named publicly, to avoid derailing the conversation.
Yudkowsky 建议你可以公开地询问：那个简单的表面理由是否真的是拒绝所在，还是它可能源于某种已知的直觉或职业时代精神。更令人尴尬的可能性——情感承诺、对过去错误的恐惧、自我欺骗——应该留给对方自己的良知，不要公开点名，以避免对话脱轨。
Why do true rejections tend to be hard to communicate or expose?为什么真正的拒绝往往难以沟通或暴露？
Because if they were easy to lay on the table, the disagreement would probably have resolved at the first meeting. Genuine persistence signals that the source is something subtle: a non-verbal intuition, a deep habit of thought, a professional worldview the person doesn't know they inherited, or something emotionally uncomfortable to acknowledge.
因为如果它们容易摆到台面上，分歧很可能在第一次会面时就已解决。真正的持续存在意味着根源是微妙的：一种非语言的直觉、一种深层的思维习惯、一种当事人不知道自己继承了的职业世界观，或者某种在情感上令人不舒服而难以承认的东西。
In-depth Analysis · Pros & Cons深入解读 · 优缺点
This short essay makes a single, sharp diagnostic point: the stated reason for a rejection is reliably a post-hoc artifact of the search for justification, not the historical cause. From a practical standpoint this is a warning against wasting effort on satisfying stated objections; from an epistemological standpoint it is a warning about self-knowledge in disagreement.
这篇短文提出了一个单一而犀利的诊断性观点：拒绝的表面理由可靠地是寻找合理化的过程中的事后产物，而非历史上的原因。从实践角度来看，这是对浪费精力去满足表面反对意见的警告；从认识论角度来看，这是对分歧中自我认知的警告。
- Vivid, falsifiable prediction生动而可证伪的预测The PhD example yields a concrete, testable claim: get the credential and the same objector will move the goalposts. This makes the thesis feel like an empirical observation, not just philosophical moralizing.博士学位的例子产生了一个具体的、可检验的主张：拿到资历后，同一个反对者会移动目标。这让论点感觉像是经验性观察，而非单纯的哲学说教。
- Drexler case as evidenceDrexler 案例作为证据Using a real-world example where someone did satisfy the stated objection and still got nowhere gives the argument empirical ballast beyond a thought experiment.使用一个真实世界的例子——有人确实满足了表面上的反对意见，却仍然一无所获——给论点提供了超越思想实验的经验支撑。
- Practical cross-domain scope跨领域的实践范围By extending the insight to business (VCs, customers) and rationalist disagreements, Yudkowsky shows the pattern is structurally general, not merely a complaint about his own reception.通过将洞察延伸到商业（风险投资人、客户）和理性主义者的分歧，Yudkowsky 表明这种模式在结构上是普遍性的，而非仅仅是对自身遭遇的抱怨。
- Respectful framing of the probing question探询问题的尊重性框架The essay's practical advice — ask about intuitions and zeitgeists but leave embarrassing sources to the other's conscience — is nuanced and conversation-preserving rather than confrontational.文章的实践建议——询问直觉和时代精神，但把令人尴尬的来源留给对方的良知——是细致入微、维护对话的，而非对抗性的。
- Assumes rejection precedes reasoning in all cases假设在所有情况下拒绝都先于推理The essay treats the "instant rejection then post-hoc search" sequence as the general rule, but people sometimes engage in genuine prior reasoning before forming a rejection. The distinction between "stated reason is post-hoc" and "stated reason is always post-hoc" does real work here that the essay doesn't fully establish.文章将「即时拒绝→事后搜索」的顺序视为普遍规律，但人们有时确实在形成拒绝之前进行了真正的先验推理。「表面理由是事后的」和「表面理由总是事后的」之间的区别在这里承担了实质性工作，但文章并未充分确立这一点。
- True rejection may itself be wrong — and still worth engaging真正的拒绝本身也可能是错的——而且仍然值得回应Identifying that a stated objection is post-hoc does not show the underlying rejection is irrational or bad. Sometimes the pattern-recognition that fires instantly is epistemically correct (unusual claims do warrant skepticism). The essay's implicit conclusion that the true rejection is less tractable than stated objections is debatable.确定一个表面反对是事后的，并不表明潜在的拒绝是非理性的或糟糕的。有时即时触发的模式识别在认识论上是正确的（不寻常的主张确实值得怀疑）。文章的隐含结论——真正的拒绝比表面反对更难处理——是有争议的。
- No method for locating the true rejection没有找到真正拒绝的方法The essay diagnoses the problem elegantly but offers only a question ("Is this my true rejection?") as a tool, plus a list of candidate categories. It provides no systematic way to actually identify which item on the list is operative in any given case — the hard work of introspection is gestured at, not taught.文章对问题诊断得很优雅，但只提供了一个问题（「这是我真正的拒绝理由吗？」）作为工具，加上一个候选类别列表。它没有提供任何系统性的方法来实际识别列表中哪一项在任何给定情况下是起作用的——内省的艰难工作只是被指了指，并未被教授。
- The Drexler case is suggestive, not conclusiveDrexler 案例是暗示性的，而非决定性的Yudkowsky acknowledges he can only say critics "didn't change their minds as far as I ever heard." The example is anecdotal and limited. It's at least conceivable that the PhD and Nanosystems did shift expert opinion among those who read it carefully, making the real epistemic landscape murkier than the clean narrative suggests.Yudkowsky 承认他只能说批评者「就我所听说的而言」没有改变看法。这个例子是轶事性的且有限的。至少可以想象，博士学位和《纳米系统》确实在仔细阅读了它的专家中改变了看法，使真实的认识论格局比干净的叙事所暗示的更加模糊。
A compact, practically useful essay that names a genuine epistemic trap. Its main contribution is a diagnostic question worth carrying into any persistent disagreement. Its limitation is that diagnosing "this is not the true rejection" does not yet tell you what the true rejection is or how to engage with it — the hard work begins after this essay ends.
一篇精炼而实际上有用的文章，点名了一个真实存在的认识论陷阱。它的主要贡献是一个值得带入任何持续性分歧的诊断性问题。其局限在于：诊断出「这不是真正的拒绝」，并不能告诉你真正的拒绝是什么，或如何与之接触——真正艰难的工作在这篇文章结束之后才开始。
Original Text原文
It happens every now and then that someone encounters some of my transhumanist-side beliefs—as opposed to my ideas having to do with human rationality—strange, exotic-sounding ideas like superintelligence and Friendly AI. And the one rejects them.
If the one is called upon to explain the rejection, not uncommonly the one says, “Why should I believe anything Yudkowsky says? He doesn’t have a PhD!”
And occasionally someone else, hearing, says, “Oh, you should get a PhD, so that people will listen to you.” Or this advice may even be offered by the same one who expressed disbelief, saying, “Come back when you have a PhD.”
Now, there are good and bad reasons to get a PhD. This is one of the bad ones.
There are many reasons why someone might actually have an initial adverse reaction to transhumanist theses. Most are matters of pattern recognition, rather than verbal thought: the thesis calls to mind an associated category like “strange weird idea” or “science fiction” or “end-of-the-world cult” or “overenthusiastic youth.”^1^ Immediately, at the speed of perception, the idea is rejected.
If someone afterward says, “Why not?” this launches a search for justification, but the search won’t necessarily hit on the true reason. By “‘true reason,” I don’t mean the best reason that could be offered. Rather, I mean whichever causes were decisive as a matter of historical fact, at the very first moment the rejection occurred.
Instead, the search for justification hits on the justifying-sounding fact, “This speaker does not have a PhD.” But I also don’t have a PhD when I talk about human rationality, so why is the same objection not raised there?
More to the point, if I had a PhD, people would not treat this as a decisive factor indicating that they ought to believe everything I say. Rather, the same initial rejection would occur, for the same reasons; and the search for justification, afterward, would terminate at a different stopping point.
They would say, “Why should I believe you? You’re just some guy with a PhD! There are lots of those. Come back when you’re well-known in your field and tenured at a major university.”
But do people actually believe arbitrary professors at Harvard who say weird things? Of course not.
If you’re saying things that sound wrong to a novice, as opposed to just rattling off magical-sounding technobabble about leptical quark braids in N + 2 dimensions; and if the hearer is a stranger, unfamiliar with you personally and unfamiliar with the subject matter of your field; then I suspect that the point at which the average person will actually start to grant credence overriding their initial impression, purely because of academic credentials, is somewhere around the Nobel Laureate level. If that. Roughly, you need whatever level of academic credential qualifies as “beyond the mundane.”
This is more or less what happened to Eric Drexler, as far as I can tell. He presented his vision of nanotechnology, and people said, “Where are the technical details?” or “Come back when you have a PhD!” And Eric Drexler spent six years writing up technical details and got his PhD under Marvin Minsky for doing it. And Nanosystems is a great book. But did the same people who said, “Come back when you have a PhD,” actually change their minds at all about molecular nanotechnology? Not so far as I ever heard.
This might be an important thing for young businesses and new-minted consultants to keep in mind—that what your failed prospects tell you is the reason for rejection may not make the real difference; and you should ponder that carefully before spending huge efforts. If the venture capitalist says, “If only your sales were growing a little faster!” or if the potential customer says, “It seems good, but you don’t have feature X,” that may not be the true rejection. Fixing it may, or may not, change anything.
And it would also be something to keep in mind during disagreements. Robin Hanson and I share a belief that two rationalists should not agree to disagree: they should not have common knowledge of epistemic disagreement unless something is very wrong.^2^
I suspect that, in general, if two rationalists set out to resolve a disagreement that persisted past the first exchange, they should expect to find that the true sources of the disagreement are either hard to communicate, or hard to expose. E.g.:
- Uncommon, but well-supported, scientific knowledge or math;
- Long inferential distances;
- Hard-to-verbalize intuitions, perhaps stemming from specific visualizations;
- Zeitgeists inherited from a profession (that may have good reason for it);
- Patterns perceptually recognized from experience;
- Sheer habits of thought;
- Emotional commitments to believing in a particular outcome;
- Fear that a past mistake could be disproved;
- Deep self-deception for the sake of pride or other personal benefits.
If the matter were one in which all the true rejections could be easily laid on the table, the disagreement would probably be so straightforward to resolve that it would never have lasted past the first meeting.
“Is this my true rejection?” is something that both disagreers should surely be asking themselves, to make things easier on the other person. However, attempts to directly, publicly psychoanalyze the other may cause the conversation to degenerate very fast, from what I’ve seen.
Still—“Is that your true rejection?” should be fair game for Disagreers to humbly ask, if there’s any productive way to pursue that sub-issue. Maybe the rule could be that you can openly ask, “Is that simple straightforward-sounding reason your true rejection, or does it come from intuition-X or professional-zeitgeist-Y ?” While the more embarrassing possibilities lower on the table are left to the Other’s conscience, as their own responsibility to handle.
^1^See “Science as Attire” in Map and Territory.
^2^See Hal Finney, “Agreeing to Agree,” Overcoming Bias (blog), 2006, http://www.overcomingbias.com/2006/12/agreeing\_to\_agr.html.
有时候，某个人会遇到我的某些超人类主义方面的信念——而非我那些关于人类理性的想法——那些听起来奇异而新奇的想法，比如超级智能和友好人工智能。然后那个人拒绝了它们。
如果那个人被要求解释这种拒绝，不少情况下他会说：「我为什么要相信 Yudkowsky 说的话？他没有博士学位！」
偶尔，另一个旁听的人会说：「哦，你应该去拿个博士学位，这样人们才会听你的。」或者，这个建议甚至可能由同一个表达了怀疑的人给出，说：「等你拿到博士学位再来。」
现在，攻读博士学位有好的理由，也有坏的理由。这是坏理由之一。
有很多原因可能导致某人对超人类主义论题产生最初的负面反应。大多数原因是模式识别的问题，而非语言思维：这个论题让人联想到某个关联类别，比如「奇怪的想法」、「科幻小说」、「末日邪教」或「过度热情的年轻人」。^1^ 立即地，以知觉的速度，这个想法被拒绝了。
如果随后有人问：「为什么不呢？」这就启动了一次寻找合理化理由的搜索，但这次搜索不一定会找到真正的原因。我所说的「真正的原因」，并不是指可以提出的最佳理由。而是指在历史事实上，在拒绝发生的最初那一刻，哪些原因起到了决定性作用。
相反，寻找合理化理由的搜索找到了听起来像是理由的事实：「这个演讲者没有博士学位。」但我在谈论人类理性时也没有博士学位，那为什么同样的反对意见不在那里被提出呢？
更重要的是，如果我有博士学位，人们不会把这视为一个决定性因素，表明他们应该相信我说的一切。相反，同样的初始拒绝会出现，出于同样的原因；之后寻找合理化理由的搜索会在不同的停靠点终止。
他们会说：「我为什么要相信你？你只是某个有博士学位的人！这种人多的是。等你在你的领域里声名卓著、在一所主要大学拿到终身教职再来。」
但人们真的相信哈佛那些说奇怪话的任意教授吗？当然不相信。
如果你说的话对新手来说听起来是错的，而非仅仅是在喋喋不休地发出关于 N+2 维中轻子夸克辫的听起来很神奇的技术术语；如果听者是陌生人，对你个人和你领域的主题都不熟悉；那么我认为，普通人会真正开始因为学术资历而授予信誉、覆盖其初始印象的门槛，大约在诺贝尔奖级别。如果那样的话。大致上，你需要任何能被视为「超凡脱俗」的学术资历级别。
据我所知，Eric Drexler 大体上就是这种情况。他提出了他的纳米技术愿景，人们说：「技术细节在哪里？」或者「等你拿到博士学位再来！」于是 Eric Drexler 花了六年时间写出技术细节，并在 Marvin Minsky 指导下因此获得了博士学位。《纳米系统》是一本很好的书。但那些说「等你拿到博士学位再来」的同一批人，真的对分子纳米技术改变了看法吗？就我所听说的，没有。
这对年轻的企业和刚起步的顾问来说，可能是一件重要的事情——你失败的潜在客户告诉你的拒绝理由，未必是真正的差距所在；在花费大量精力之前，你应该仔细权衡这一点。如果风险投资人说「如果你们的销售增长能再快一点就好了！」或者潜在客户说「看起来不错，但你们没有功能X」，那未必是真正的拒绝。修复它可能会改变一些东西，也可能不会。
这在分歧过程中也值得铭记。Robin Hanson 和我共同持有这样一种信念：两个理性主义者不应该同意各执己见：除非出现了严重问题，否则他们不应该在认识论分歧上形成共同知识。^2^
我认为，一般来说，如果两个理性主义者着手解决一个在第一次交流后依然存在的分歧，他们应该预期会发现，分歧的真正来源要么难以沟通，要么难以暴露。例如：
- 不常见但有充分支持的科学知识或数学；
- 漫长的推断距离；
- 难以言说的直觉，也许源于特定的视觉化；
- 从某个职业继承来的时代精神（可能有其充分的理由）；
- 从经验中感知识别出的模式；
- 纯粹的思维习惯；
- 对相信特定结果的情感承诺；
- 对过去的错误可能被揭露的恐惧；
- 为了自尊或其他个人利益而产生的深层自我欺骗。
如果所有真正的拒绝都能容易地摆到台面上，这个分歧很可能就会如此直接地得到解决，以至于它从来不会持续到第一次会面之后。
「这是我真正的拒绝理由吗？」是两个存在分歧的人肯定都应该问自己的问题，以便让对方更轻松。然而，据我所见，试图直接、公开地对另一方进行心理分析，往往会让对话非常迅速地恶化。
尽管如此——「那是你真正的拒绝理由吗？」应该是分歧双方可以谦逊地提问的，如果有任何富有成效的方式来追究那个子问题的话。也许规则可以是：你可以公开地问：「那个听起来简单直接的理由是你真正的拒绝，还是它来自直觉X或职业时代精神Y？」而更令人尴尬的可能性，则留给对方的良知，作为他们自己的责任去处理。
^2^ 参见 Hal Finney，「同意各执己见」，超越偏见（博客），2006 年，http://www.overcomingbias.com/2006/12/agreeing\_to\_agr.html。