When you’re operating based on principles, a priori thinking is typical. It’s the same approach I took to COVID lockdowns, masks, useless “vaccines,” etc. It just means that everything is a bad idea until I’m convinced it’s a good idea. It’s served me well.
***It is a classic fallacy. You should try not to uphold classic fallacies as if they are sound reasoning.
I work in a field where public safety is paramount. If someone in my profession tells me they have a great new idea for a bridge design, I'm going to consider it a bad idea until it is proven otherwise. I'm not sure why that approach to business -- and life in general -- would be a problem for anyone.
The “a priori fallacy” is only applicable if someone has decided ahead of time as to what their conclusion is going to be, without considering any other particulars or pieces of evidence on matters which are explicitly empirical.
Looking at America’s track record with foreign military interventions (and their consequences) over the past 20 years and deciding “let’s hold off on doing that for a change” is hardly an example of the “a priori fallacy.”
This is also notwithstanding the fact “a priori reasoning” in and of itself isn’t fallacious if you’re dealing with truths which aren’t empirical.