Cynicism vs hopeful skepticism

So if you are very cynical, you might not have faith in people, but you have lots of faith in your assumptions, right? You are sure that folks are terrible. And like a lawyer looking to defend their case, you look only for evidence that supports your bleak assumptions, right? And when you try to think that way, like a lawyer, when you try to argue your case instead of thinking like a scientist, you know, you might do a good job convincing other people, but you do a terrible job learning about the world. So being closed off to others also means, in many cases, being closed off to evidence.

I liked this part. It describes something that I find hard to avoid in my own thinking, and something that I see in a lot of online discourse.

if cynics think like lawyers, skeptics think like scientists

I don't know if it's skepticism or cynicism, but I wonder about scientists saying that the best way to think is like a scientist. While I try to skeptical rather than cynical (as defined in the article) I wonder if there aren't some benefits to being cynical. At the very least, I've found that if two strangers can find one thing in common to complain about, they will likely have a pretty good conversation. For whatever reason, rants usually make for better conversation than facts.