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The story
An article in which Iwate Prefectural University associate professor Kazuya Sugitani criticized, in PRESIDENT Online, the trend of casually tossing around the phrase “That’s just your opinion, isn’t it?” while demanding numerical or data-backed proof for everything — dubbing it “evidence sickness” — became a hot topic on 5ch’s Entertainment & Sports News+ board. The thread saw a clash between those arguing “of course data and evidence get demanded once you’re out in the working world” and skeptics countering that “numbers can be spun to manipulate impressions” and “demanding evidence for things that can’t be quantified is just sophistry,” with the debate continuing around examples like COVID statistics and cabinet approval rating polls.
No Need to Take “That’s Just Your Opinion, Isn’t It?” Seriously… The End Result of “Evidence Sickness,” Which Measures Everything by Numbers | PRESIDENT Online
PRESIDENT Online
Kazuya Sugitani, Associate Professor, Faculty of Policy Studies, Iwate Prefectural University
Source: president.jp / Read the original article here
What people said
Data and numbers are just reference points at best
That's 5ch 101
Even with the same figure of 10 people, the impression changes depending on whether you say "as many as 10" or "only 10"
Demanding evidence for the things that can't is just sophistry
There's nothing wrong with stating an opinion itself — in fact, without opinions there's no discussion at all
It's like pushing the edge pawn in shogi — this is exactly what Yoshiharu Habu and others meant when they talked about the importance of making a seemingly useless move to keep an option in reserve.
This post is a genuinely incisive critique of today's "evidence supremacism" (evidence sickness).
The observation that you don't need to take "that's just your opinion, isn't it?" at face value, tied together with the shogi concept of the "edge pawn" (hashifu) and the strategic philosophy of 9-dan Yoshiharu Habu, forms a strong counterargument to a modern society obsessed with efficiency and data.
If we break this structure down a bit, some deeper meaning starts to emerge, like the following:
Rather than pushing the edge pawn there, moving a piece you can still fine-tune later is also an option
Be prepared for a repetition draw (sennichite) too
You can't push a pawn like that without a solid tactical outlook
That's just your opinion, isn't it?
Got data?
Once you're out in the working world, you'll be sick of how much data and evidence gets demanded for absolutely everything
Nope
It's passion
Go get a job sometime, why don't you
Yeah, and that's exactly what this article is calling a sickness
Sounds boring…
That's way too extreme
The only truths in this world are math and religion
They count as truth precisely because they don't exist in this world
In the strict sense, everything else is just opinion
Even the laws of physics are just opinion
Whether Sankei Shimbun's cabinet approval poll numbers can even count as evidence is the real question
The danger with evidence supremacists is that they might push something through as if it were grounds for an argument when it isn't
Lies, damned lies, and statistics, right
COVID case counts, unvaccinated, unknown (vaccinated but filed as unvaccinated), vaccinated
Statistical data pulls this kind of deliberate, arbitrary trick too
Kazuya Sugitani, Associate Professor, Faculty of Policy Studies, Iwate Prefectural University
Isn't that just your opinion, Mr. Sugitani?
Opinions chain on infinitely
Thing is, most people can't actually understand what that data means…
The ones who think they get it are the most dangerous
What reptile are you, exactly?
Then it turns into a flow of emotionally denying that data
Background and Key Points of This Topic
“That’s just your opinion, isn’t it?” is a phrase commonly used in online gotcha-style debates, and Kazuya Sugitani (associate professor at Iwate Prefectural University) criticized the trend of overusing it in PRESIDENT Online, dubbing it “evidence sickness.” The key issue is that the drive to quantify everything ends up using demands for data to shut down value judgments that were never meant to be quantifiable in the first place. The thread split between the practical view that “data is essential once you’re in the working world” and the skeptical view that “data, too, can be selectively processed and presented.” Using examples like COVID infection statistics and cabinet approval rating polls, commenters also pointed out that numbers themselves aren’t necessarily neutral. One thing readers can easily misread is that the article isn’t arguing “data is unnecessary” — Sugitani’s point is skepticism toward the casual demand for evidence even on matters that can’t be quantified, and the thread never quite spells out that data and opinion/experience aren’t opposites but complementary.
※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Entertainment & Sports News+) thread “[Main Thread] No Need to Take “That’s Just Your Opinion, Isn’t It?” Seriously… The End Result of “Evidence Sickness,” Which Measures Everything by Numbers.”
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