Wether it's on the internet or at a bar counter, I like to engage in debate to better myself.
If your goal is to turn every fanatic that crosses your path, you're gonna be depressed real soon.
If your goal in an argument is to change the other person's mind, then changing your mind (by taking in new information, learning, and understanding a different point of view) is seen as losing. That's a terrible way to look at what is ultimately personal growth.
Love this, thank you.
As I've just said in two other comments, "changing someone's mind" is just a return to barbarism and Middle Ages. When a few literate theology doctors would publicly "defeat" their opponents, the barely literate mass of their audience (monks, nobles and such) would watch and approve, and the illiterate mass would kinda get that those pesky heretics\infidels got totally owned by facts and logic.
So any person arguing with that emotion and visible goal should just be left to eat other such ignorami. Nobody worth arguing with has those.
There's no hope in changing the mind of every fanatic you come across.
But we generally don't have internet debates in DMs, we do it in public forums. The goal isn't to sway the fanatics, it's to publicly quash their arguments. To sway curious onlookers away from fanaticism before they become fanatics themselves.
People always forget about the lurkers. Most people with less-informed, more impressionable views on a given topic aren’t posting and debating, they’re reading and learning (despite the unfortunate exceptions). Seeing some wacko extremist nonsense or voter suppression tactic go unchallenged by a more reasonable argument may be enough to sway a not-yet-fanatic in the wrong direction.
The goal isn’t to sway the fanatics, it’s to publicly quash their arguments. To sway curious onlookers away from fanaticism before they become fanatics themselves.
As I've said in another comment, this is return to Middle Ages. Debating skills have not much in common with reasoning skills.
Nor are they mutually exclusive. A competent debater can intertwine rhetoric with logic to make a compelling argument for a well-reasoned position.
For my argument it's sufficient that they are very much not the same.
This is similar to saying that a big company leading in some area can be benevolent and do good things. Yes, it can, like DEC, Sun, at some point even IBM. Doesn't prove the statement that every social institution and mechanism out there must be replaced by markets.
You're the only one making that argument, and it doesn't follow from my initial point. I'm not even really sure what point you're trying to make.
How does anything you're saying negate the fact that people make bad but persuasive points online, and gullible people fall for that persuasion? Or that those gullible people lack the entrenchment of the bad actors, and can be redirected from those bad points to better ones if persuasive arguments are presented directly in response to the bad ones?
he goal isn’t to sway the fanatics, it’s to publicly quash their arguments. To sway curious onlookers away from fanaticism before they become fanatics themselves.
Friendly reminder that the above is what I answered first.
Sorry, but this is a load of bollocks. It's you putting yourself above some "gullible people" and still using debate skills to deceive them, just in some "good" direction. Maybe you are really right, but they believe you for the wrong reasons, and the process itself doesn't reinforce that you are right in any way.
If they're already going to believe the wrong things for the wrong reasons, why not present the right things for the wrong reasons? Those who need the right reasons to change their mind are beyond the scope of this approach.
This is outreach to the gullible for harm reduction when they might otherwise filter themselves into a dangerous pipeline. This isn't using debate skills to deceive, it's using them to counter those who do use their debate skills to deceive. Even if the content may possibly be wrong, by presenting it in contrast to preceding content it necessarily widens the debate-space from an unopposed confident statement to a dialogue that the onlooker can take into consideration while making their own decision.
it necessarily widens the debate-space from an unopposed confident statement to a dialogue that the onlooker can take into consideration while making their own decision.
That part would be right if we weren't talking about social media, which are designed to neuter this effect.
All the better to counter-act that neutralizing force at every potent opportunity.
That would be try to attract people outside of social media, not try to divert them inside social media where you'll waste energy
But - debates don't better yourself. Only your debating skills in particular get better. It's a return to Middle Ages with theologists publicly "defeating" heretic and Jewish and Muslim philosophy.
And "turn" is an interesting word, making the association even stronger.
If you're debating in good faith you are bettering yourself by improving your understanding of a different view point, and letting your own views be challenged so you can reassess if you still hold them.
So who debates in good faith and how often?
Apparently not you.
Well, this comment of yours doesn't look like a good faith argument.
What I meant is that it takes two sides for one. And when two people are ready to argue in good faith, one may downgrade the level of contention from "argue" to "discuss" without any loss.
(For me and my sister it would still be "argue", but we are just rude to each other.)
Well, this comment of yours doesn't look like a good faith argument.
Neither did your comment of
So who debates in good faith and how often?
Someone JAQing off is not having a good faith argument, and it does not invalidate my argument if I don't waste effort on someone who isn't continuing in good faith.
I see the argument you're hinting at, and it doesn't invalidate the argument either, but I'm not going to spend time debating an argument you haven't bothered to actually make.
You are making a good example of a person who maybe thinks they can argue in good faith but very clearly doesn't, with emotional pressure and such.
it does not invalidate my argument if I don’t waste effort on someone who clearly isn’t continuing in good faith.
That's true. It also doesn't invalidate it if I do waste it though. OK, bye
Wether it's on the internet or at a bar counter, I like to engage in debate to better myself. If your goal is to turn every fanatic that crosses your path, you're gonna be depressed real soon.
If your goal in an argument is to change the other person's mind, then changing your mind (by taking in new information, learning, and understanding a different point of view) is seen as losing. That's a terrible way to look at what is ultimately personal growth.
Love this, thank you.
As I've just said in two other comments, "changing someone's mind" is just a return to barbarism and Middle Ages. When a few literate theology doctors would publicly "defeat" their opponents, the barely literate mass of their audience (monks, nobles and such) would watch and approve, and the illiterate mass would kinda get that those pesky heretics\infidels got totally owned by facts and logic.
So any person arguing with that emotion and visible goal should just be left to eat other such ignorami. Nobody worth arguing with has those.
There's no hope in changing the mind of every fanatic you come across.
But we generally don't have internet debates in DMs, we do it in public forums. The goal isn't to sway the fanatics, it's to publicly quash their arguments. To sway curious onlookers away from fanaticism before they become fanatics themselves.
People always forget about the lurkers. Most people with less-informed, more impressionable views on a given topic aren’t posting and debating, they’re reading and learning (despite the unfortunate exceptions). Seeing some wacko extremist nonsense or voter suppression tactic go unchallenged by a more reasonable argument may be enough to sway a not-yet-fanatic in the wrong direction.
As I've said in another comment, this is return to Middle Ages. Debating skills have not much in common with reasoning skills.
Nor are they mutually exclusive. A competent debater can intertwine rhetoric with logic to make a compelling argument for a well-reasoned position.
For my argument it's sufficient that they are very much not the same.
This is similar to saying that a big company leading in some area can be benevolent and do good things. Yes, it can, like DEC, Sun, at some point even IBM. Doesn't prove the statement that every social institution and mechanism out there must be replaced by markets.
You're the only one making that argument, and it doesn't follow from my initial point. I'm not even really sure what point you're trying to make.
How does anything you're saying negate the fact that people make bad but persuasive points online, and gullible people fall for that persuasion? Or that those gullible people lack the entrenchment of the bad actors, and can be redirected from those bad points to better ones if persuasive arguments are presented directly in response to the bad ones?
Friendly reminder that the above is what I answered first.
Sorry, but this is a load of bollocks. It's you putting yourself above some "gullible people" and still using debate skills to deceive them, just in some "good" direction. Maybe you are really right, but they believe you for the wrong reasons, and the process itself doesn't reinforce that you are right in any way.
If they're already going to believe the wrong things for the wrong reasons, why not present the right things for the wrong reasons? Those who need the right reasons to change their mind are beyond the scope of this approach.
This is outreach to the gullible for harm reduction when they might otherwise filter themselves into a dangerous pipeline. This isn't using debate skills to deceive, it's using them to counter those who do use their debate skills to deceive. Even if the content may possibly be wrong, by presenting it in contrast to preceding content it necessarily widens the debate-space from an unopposed confident statement to a dialogue that the onlooker can take into consideration while making their own decision.
That part would be right if we weren't talking about social media, which are designed to neuter this effect.
All the better to counter-act that neutralizing force at every potent opportunity.
That would be try to attract people outside of social media, not try to divert them inside social media where you'll waste energy
But - debates don't better yourself. Only your debating skills in particular get better. It's a return to Middle Ages with theologists publicly "defeating" heretic and Jewish and Muslim philosophy.
And "turn" is an interesting word, making the association even stronger.
If you're debating in good faith you are bettering yourself by improving your understanding of a different view point, and letting your own views be challenged so you can reassess if you still hold them.
So who debates in good faith and how often?
Apparently not you.
Well, this comment of yours doesn't look like a good faith argument.
What I meant is that it takes two sides for one. And when two people are ready to argue in good faith, one may downgrade the level of contention from "argue" to "discuss" without any loss.
(For me and my sister it would still be "argue", but we are just rude to each other.)
Neither did your comment of
Someone JAQing off is not having a good faith argument, and it does not invalidate my argument if I don't waste effort on someone who isn't continuing in good faith.
I see the argument you're hinting at, and it doesn't invalidate the argument either, but I'm not going to spend time debating an argument you haven't bothered to actually make.
You are making a good example of a person who maybe thinks they can argue in good faith but very clearly doesn't, with emotional pressure and such.
That's true. It also doesn't invalidate it if I do waste it though. OK, bye