I used these words jokingly and also, I don't mean sycophant in a literal sense. I mean more in an AI context as a kind of config/slider you can dial up or down to make it more collaborative or combative.

If I'm knowledgeable in a niche over which there is no mainstream consensus or it's disorganized, and I want to reason more about this topic, I need the AI in the rabbit hole with me. I don't need it to question the existence of the rabbit hole I'm in. Otherwise all of its arguments sound like gaslighting; asking me to disbelieve my eyes and decades of experience about basic ideas which I've already researched many times and proven not to work (at least with high confidence).

For me this happens with some niches of software engineering and architecture and I have lots of physical proof of working, secure, maintainable software to back up my position.

Also, when I say that "most of my contrarian ideas are correct" it's with the caveat that I don't tend to adopt or hold onto contrarian ideas that are easily proven to be incorrect. I'm referring to the kinds of niche ideas which most non-experts would not feel confident to make strong arguments about but AI will.