This. The problem is that the author may have been right, every time, in the narrow context of consideration they were arguing from and about. But often the problems being solved are multi-dimensional and on some other level.
One could get closer to your wonderful suggestion with the far more indulgent "Maybe I'm right but not yet thinking about a contextual factor or value that might be important. What could possibly be important enough that they don't care about my correctness?"
> The problem is that the author may have been right
Even worse, it's very likely the author wasn't even right most of the time. They claim a frequent occurrence is that "the room" turns against them. Now, their rationalization is that they are ego-driven, yadda yadda, no other possibility of why "the room" is often against their position. If they were rational as they claim to be, maybe they could show some insight or introspection into the possibility they are wrong about some or all of the details, at least some of the time.
But no, their conclusion is that humans are ego-driven and it's best to disengage and only debate with truly smart people.
This reminds me of the joke about the guy who's driving and hears a warning on the radio: "beware of a madman driving the wrong way on Av XYZ", and he replies "ONE madman!? There are HUNDREDS of them!"