> We can, and should, argue things we have not tried or experienced, like heroin and murder. What makes it so that this has to be tried?
It's not that you absolutely have to have experience with something, but you'd be foolish to discount the input of people who do. In debates about drug policy I try to be polite to people with zero first hand experience, but their contributions are rarely of interest. Murder is a bit more abstract insofar as anyone who has fully experienced it by definition didn't survive to testify, but I give a lot more weight to the views of people that have first-hand knowledge of violence and crime.
It's not that you shouldn't weigh in on a topic without first hand experience, but that it's a good idea to specify the scope of your understanding, or frame uncertainties as open questions rather than assumptions.
It's not that you absolutely have to have experience with something, but you'd be foolish to discount the input of people who do. In debates about drug policy I try to be polite to people with zero first hand experience, but their contributions are rarely of interest. Murder is a bit more abstract insofar as anyone who has fully experienced it by definition didn't survive to testify, but I give a lot more weight to the views of people that have first-hand knowledge of violence and crime.
It's not that you shouldn't weigh in on a topic without first hand experience, but that it's a good idea to specify the scope of your understanding, or frame uncertainties as open questions rather than assumptions.