Re: sqlite3

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>
> Cc: eliz@gnu.org, larsi@gnus.org, emacs-devel@gnu.org
> Date: Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:40:37 -0500
> 
>   > I guess it must be hard to develop with so many devils advocates :-)
> 
> I hope anyone tempted to play "devil's advocate" will reconsider and
> not do that.  It is never helpful to present arguments you don't
> sincerely believe.
> 
> See https://gnu.org/philosophy/devils-advocate.html.

This is a tangent, so I'll try to be very short.

I disagree with Richard on this point, and I disagree with that essay.
IME, hearing devil's advocates is very important for cleansing my
ideas and thoughts, and for making good balanced decisions.  Moreover,
in many rational organizations, the decision-making process requires
the participation of the so-called "red team", which plays the role of
an adversary ("devil") with the purpose of making the decisions sound
and sustainable.  So others have found this useful.

Every technique can be subverted by using it with hostile or cunning
motives, of course, but the ability to discover the hostile intent (or
just those with some agenda) and ignore some of such "devil's
advocates" is part of the necessary process of considering some idea
or decision.