Devils Advocate

Devil's Advocate

Critically examine a research design, methodology, or assumption with 5-7 specific challenges.

Steps

1. Understand the target: Read $ARGUMENTS and any relevant project files (CLAUDE.md, manuscript, estimation code).

2. Generate 5-7 challenges from these categories:

   • Identification: Could the causal claim be undermined by [specific threat]?
   • Specification: What if the functional form is wrong? Alternative specifications?
   • Data: Are there sample selection issues? Measurement error concerns?
   • Methodology: Could a different estimator give different results? Why this method?
   • Assumptions: Which assumptions are most vulnerable? What if they're violated?
   • Robustness: What robustness checks are missing?
   • External validity: Does this generalize beyond the sample?