steelman
/stˈilmən/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.83 in modern English
10
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
2
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A male steelworker.
noun
A stronger version of an argument that one is about to critically analyze.
verb
To repair flaws in an argument before analyzing it critically; to refute or to weaken the force of a stronger version of an argument than what was actually given.
name
A surname.
Example Sentences
- "a "steel man" is an improvement of someone's position or argument that is harder to defeat than their originally stated position or argument."
- "I want to make that strawman into a steelman, but I eliminated "the pursuit of happiness" from my to-do list so many years ago that I don't even know where I'd begin."
- "I don't agree with the argument, because of 4. If I were to steelman it, which I may try but after work or maybe during lunch, I would first try to make it impervious to this assault:"
- "It is possible that while preparing for the talk I will manage to convince myself that the problem is in fact resolved or dissolved. In that case I will treat you to my best steelmanning of the problem, and its resolution."
- "Perhaps the argument should be steelmanned in that we should generally avoid using algorithms which are so complex that they aren't glass boxes."
- "And America would benefit if our culture of argument elevated the opposite approach, steel-manning, “the art of addressing the best form of the other person’s argument, even if it’s not the one they presented.” […] Coming full circle to our NPR host’s project, Messinger argues that “steelmanning makes you a better person."