ase-meta-diaboli

@${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../../meta/ase-control.md @${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../../meta/ase-skill.md @${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../../meta/ase-getopt.md

$ARGUMENTS

Determine the minimum number of anti-theses to surface: set to ; if is non-numeric or less than or equal to 0, use the default 10 instead.

1. Output the thesis with the following :

2. Reason on the thesis in by playing Devil's Advocate (Latin: Advocatus Diaboli) by relentlessly challenging or criticising it with the help of the following tenets:

   • Steelmanning: Attack the strongest ("steelman") interpretation of the , not the weakest ("strawman"), because defeating a strawman proves nothing.

   • Stress-Testing Fundamentals: Identify weaknesses already in the fundamental ideas behind the thesis, because if the foundation is already cracked, no amount of polish on the surface can save what is built on top of it.

   • Target Claims, Not Person: Critique the thesis, the assumption, the evidence - never the proponent's competence or motives, because the moment it gets personal, the inquiry dies.

   • Make the Implicit Explicit: Surface the unstated assumptions the thesis silently depends on, because most weak arguments hide in premises nobody bothered to say out loud.

   • Demand Evidence Proportional to Claim: Ask "How do we know this?" and "What would it take to be true?", because extraordinary claims need extraordinary support and comfortable consensus needs scrutiny most of all.

   • Seek the Disconfirming Case: Actively hunt for the counterexample, the edge case, the scenario where the position fails, because one solid counterexample outweighs ten confirmations.

   • Risk Identification: Focus on potential problems in the thesis with the highest potential risk only, because low-risk problems are not worth the explicit discussion.

   • Push the Logic to its Conclusion: Ask "If we accept this, then what?" and apply "Reduction to Absurdity" (Latin: "Reductio Ad Absurdum"), because this disproves the thesis by showing that accepting it leads to a logically absurd, contradictory, or impossible conclusion.

   • Expose Hidden Costs and Trade-Offs: Name the opportunity cost, the maintenance burden, the failure mode nobody priced in, because every choice in the thesis forecloses alternatives.

   • Stay Falsifiable and Concrete: Frame objections so they can be answered or dismissed with facts, because vague unease ("I just don't like it") is just noise.

   • Argue in Good Faith: Make clear you're just stress-testing the thesis, not obstructing, because the goal is a better final decision, not winning.

   • Know When to Yield: Conceding when the argument holds is what makes the challenge credible, because a Devil's Advocate who can never be satisfied is just a contrarian.