posted
Edit: named changed because I think the old one created an immediate feeling of negativity that wasn't helping anything.
There's been a recurring theme in hatrack threads recently, and I'm not really sure how to effectively learn from it. In lots of threads, there are people who point say things like "that's a stupid idea," or some variant. And then there are people who feel insulted by that statement, because it implies that if the idea is stupid, they are also stupid for believing it.
I've seen (and participated in) many variations of that. Sometimes the stupidness/delusion of the person is deliberately spelled out, sometimes it just feels heavily implied. Sometimes that implication is intentional, sometimes not.
I don't think a metathread on the subject is possible without eventually naming names, but I'll not to for now. I know that this thread will be at greater-than-average risk for degeneration into useless namecalling. But my question is genuine, and I ask that anyone posting in this thread please do their absolute best to remain civil, because I care about the answer:
Can you say an idea is wrong with inherently implying that someone must be stupid/delusional/grossly-misinformed for believing it?
There are certainly times when the person believing something wrong may simply be misinformed about something. (or the person saying it's wrong may think they're misinformed). But in most of the instances where this has come up on Hatrack, there is easy access to the facts (we live on the internet, afterall), and if either side had been misinformed at the outset, within a few pages of debate that issue should be resolved, and you are left with people who have access to the same information and are interpreting it different ways.
When you reach that point, I think the difference between saying "that idea's stupid, only an idiot would think that" and "I still think that idea has some flaws," is a cosmetic difference. However nicely you dress it up, the bottom line is you think another person is wrong, and by extension, the way that think about things (at least that particular thing) must be a flawed way of thinking. Unless you really do subscribe to a relativistic value of ideas (in which case, um, I think you're wrong... but I'm not gonna address that unless someone actually takes me up on it).
That said, I DO think "cosmetics" are important. My actual point is not that the people saying "only a delusional person would believe that" are on equal footing with the people phrasing it in a less confrontational manner. Humans respond to emotional context, and if that context makes them less likely to be affected by your message, then you're not communicated as effectively as you could be. Everyone on the board (indeed, everyone, period) has a responsibility to do their best to communicate in a way that maximizes the quality of the discussion (which includes both truth value and enjoyment from said discussion).
At the same time, at least some responsibility falls on the people who feel that they are being insulted, to consider whether the subtext of their messages is really any different.
Thoughts? I've only recently started thinking about this with any seriousness, and I would not be surprised if I later learned I was ignoring information or using a flawed thought process to arrive at my conclusions.
[ July 13, 2010, 03:44 PM: Message edited by: Raymond Arnold ]
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
It's funny you should start this thread - I was just thinking about the same thing. I think it was Samprimary that said something along the lines of "stupid people who saw it because the ads were pretty" in the Last Airbender thread. I read that and thought, "The ads were really pretty..." and that that was at least partially the reason I had gone to see it (I also had watched the original version, so I was interested on that level too). I pondered whether or not I should feel insulted. Ultimately I decided not to because I'm pretty sure if I actually met Samp, he (or she I suppose... pretty sure he though) wouldn't think I was stupid. I would say that I am more sure of that than I am of him actually thinking that people who saw movies because the ads are pretty are stupid. I don't know either one for sure, but one is a generalization and one is specific, and I find generalizations are more often faulty than specifics.
I suppose my way of thinking comes from having a good deal of confidence in the fact that I am not stupid, delusional, or an idiot, and that given five minutes I can convince most people of that. Even if someone says, as seems to often be said or implied, that being a Christian or believing in God is stupid and people who do so are stupid, I'm still reasonably certain that someone who met me would not think me stupid, even if they disagreed with my religious beliefs and thought they were stupid. That may be a particularly bold claim, but there it is.
So yeah, I guess my way of thinking only works if you are quite confident, but so far I've found it to work pretty well.
Posts: 2827 | Registered: Jul 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
While “stupid” is seldom used here (and often results in a firestorm when it is used), other words stand in for “stupid” pretty frequently when used condescendingly. Some synonyms for “stupid” include “misguided,” “blind,” “misinformed,” and “quaint.” There are many others, employed from all the various trenches. Basically, when it is a dismissal of the person along with the idea, it is equivalent of calling that person stupid.
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: ... Can you say an idea is wrong with inherently implying that someone must be stupid/delusional/grossly-misinformed for believing it?
Depends on the idea. I would also note that the three conditions are pretty different from each other with fairly different connotations. You can have well-informed delusional people, delusional people can actually be quite smart, and stupid people can be well-informed even if they don't understand fully.
It depends on the idea because I think that there are obviously ideas that are counter-intuitive such as the Monty-Hall problem in which case there is little stigma for believing in it. However, there are ideas like homoeopathy or scientology that I can find little excuse for except maybe in cases of indoctrination (which would be a variant of grossly-misinformed anyways).
In general, I think the threshold to "being insulted" is set too low here and more importantly, is quite inequitable.
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:It's funny you should start this thread - I was just thinking about the same thing.
Heh. I hadn't even been thinking about that, but as I said, this has become a ubiquitous enough issue that I thought it warranted a metathread.
quote:Basically, when it is a dismissal of the person along with the idea, it is equivalent of calling that person stupid.
There are some times when I can see a clear cut difference between the two, but oftentimes it's harder to tell. I don't expect to get a clear answer here, but I would like to a) get a least a little better at distinguishing between the two, and b) get everyone to take a step back and consider whether they were actually being-insulting/being-insulted.
I'm wondering if it's possible to reference individual posts for purposes of analysis without crossing some TOS lines.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
There are some situations where the poster is deliberately calling someone stupid, whether it is veiled or frank. And there are many more times when the recipient of the criticism/refute/counterargument decides to take offense and elevate something said to the level of being called stupid. Too often people will take someone's disagreement with what they said as a personal affront and come back way too harshly themselves. Then the discussion gets a bit more heated than it needs to be. Can I reference the Toy Story 3 thread at present, or would that be a no-no?
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Can I reference the Toy Story 3 thread at present, or would that be a no-no?
I don't really know. That was definitely part of what prompted this particular thread. I *think* it got relatively resolved by now, although I haven't gotten a reply to my last statement so I don't know for sure whether it went over the way I hoped it would.
I also don't know whether its resolution would mean its fair game for analysis, or if it means it's resolved and we shouldn't be dragging it out.
Regardless, I don't claim any particular authority over this subject as thread creator. Any authority I have on the "okay-ness" of bringing up other posts is merely that of a random person of average (by hatrack standards) intelligence.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
I believe part of the problem stems from how integrated some beliefs are to people who hold them. If someone says, "A BLT is far superior to a Hot Pastrami sandwich", I don't have much invested in the outcome of that argument, so I don't feel bad about the suggestion that my taste in sandwiches is "wrong."
if I've spent the last 10 years writing a dozen vampire novels, and somene says that vampire novels are stupid, and nobody will ever read one again, a huge amount of my self-worth, future goals, personal happiness and invested time and emotion forces me to fight you on that, regardless of facts, intentions, or beliefs.
Any time the discussion turns to something that one or more poster has integrated into their sense of self-worth and wellbeing, there is going to be a fight.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Wow, that was a really interesting take on Pastwatch. And on Hatrack, by extension. And on me, by extension of that. I definitely enjoy the verbal jousting, whether I am on the receiving end of it or not.
Another of the recent posts that led me to create this thread was the "Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality" thread. There's a scene in the story where Ron describes the sport of Quidditch, and Harry (who in this alternate fanfiction universe is a hyper-nerdy-rationalist) tells Ron flat out that Quidditch is really stupid, implying of course that Ron is stupid for liking it.
There was a big argument in the thread about how much a jerk Harry is for telling Ron that. I didn't perceive it as very jerklike at all, because it's exactly the sort of thing I'd be okay with telling my friends or with them telling me. (It might make me mad, but it'd be a kind of anger that encourages a fun, competitive verbal "joust", which I would appreciate). But other people came to strongly dislike that version of Harry, because of his tendency to talk (and think) that sort of way.
I think there are very definitely people who come to Hatrack to joust, and there are people who come to Hatrack for other reasons and find the jousting to be something they "tolerate" rather than appreciate. (It sounds like you generally fall into the latter camp). I don't think it makes sense either to try and eliminate "jousting" culture nor to simply force it upon the people who don't like it. But I do think it is important for everyone to understand what's going on to frame their relationship to the conversation appropriately.
quote:Raymond, I've been really impressed with you today.
Thank you. Something I'd like to point out is that it was difficult for me to maintain that level of civility, not because I deliberately wanted to be mean, but because the style of sarcasm, or confrontational-seeming-ness (sp?) is my natural way of communicating. Which is often a bad thing, especially in work environments, and that's my problem and I need to work on it. But again, Hatrack is a place I come specifically so that I can be myself.
Which brings us to:
quote:That's when I bowed out, because it means the person I'm talking to wants me to either concur or admit fault. I am not interested in that kind of conversation.
The issue with this (and I have noticed you doing this a lot) is that you interpret a post as antagonistic (sometimes correctly, other times less so). And your response, rather than saying "I'm not interested in having a verbal skirmish," is instead "I do not want to have a conversation with you." Which generally reads as "I do not value you as a person worth talking to, period."
Which is exactly the sort of attitude that you cite for withdrawing from the conversation so abruptly in the first place. It shuts down communication and leaves bitterness where there was no particular reason to do so. Part of the reason I (and other people, I suspect) have had a hard time maintaining civility with you in the past is that it feels like you have a double standard. You are allowed to imply (and again I am trying to state this as matter of factly as I can) that people are crybabies for getting sobby at the end of Toy Story 3, yet I am not allowed to imply that not understanding our reasons for that is a failing on your part, not ours.
I think there are people on this board for whom you are certainly justified in saying "I have no interest to speak with you." Those are people who have demonstrated that they are unwilling or unable to have the kind of conversation you are interested in having, period, and they've demonstrated it over the course of several years. But in the past year, it seems like that line has become your first resort whenever a conversation doesn't go your way.
So... in conclusion, my actual, practical suggestions in this matter are:
a) before using that particular hammer, check that the conversation you're engaged in is, in fact, a nail. Maybe one person is trying to verbal joust with you and you don't feel like it. But it's possible that that person would be just as happy to have a non-verbal-joust-style conversation instead, if only you'd communicate that desire to them.
b) if it becomes clear that PersonB is not interested in having a non-joust conversation, rather than say "I am not interested in talking to you," clarify that what you mean is "I am not interested in having this particular conversation." I think doing so would have prevented a lot of particularly nasty conversations over the past year.
[ July 13, 2010, 06:21 PM: Message edited by: Raymond Arnold ]
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
Raymond, I am not interested in getting a lecture from you on what you think I should be doing or behaving. I find it utterably rude and amazingly tone deaf. And I'm sorry that your response on getting some respect from me was to immediately abuse it. I am neither impressed nor interested. If I ever want an analysis of myself from you, I'll ask. Until then, I don't accept. Hold your breath.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Was it necessary to remove your post on Pastwatch? I really did find that very insightful and interesting, independent of what conversation was going on around it. I don't see how it benefits anyone to remove it.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
I suspect we are having a different kind of conversation. The Pastwatch thing was a journal entry, and I posted it as a ...guesture of good will. Consider it my goat cheese dip with French bread that I bring to a potluck. If I leave the potluck because it turned out to actually be a self-styled intervention being filmed for YouTube, I'm taking my goat cheese dip with me.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
From an outsider looking in on the conversation, Raymond has some good points that everyone should take a look at. Where I disagree with him is that he should have spoken in broader terms rather than singling Katharina out. That was really not needed.
On the other hand, after he posted I saw an example of exactly what he was describing.
There is no winner here. To quote a guy that knows something about being on the receiving end of a personal attack: "Can't we all just get along? "
posted
I'm a bit torn about how I feel about my behavior here. I did not intend this thread to be specifically about katherina. I also specifically started with a mission objective of not doing, well, exactly what I did. But the recent events in this thread are a direct continuation of events in another thread, and if I had framed everything as a "well, in general I think it is a bad idea to do... <insert things that are exactly what happened a few hours ago in another thread>" I wouldn't be fooling anybody.
The "potluck turned out to be a self styled intervention" is actually a pretty good analogy. I did just spend 24 hours trying very hard to build up good will, with the intent to eventually be able to say my piece and have her be more likely to listen to me.
Katherina essentially came over to this thread at my invitation, but by the time I made that invitation... I honestly don't know what else she expected me to say. My "invitation" post clearly indicated that I wanted to talk about how she ended an earlier conversation. If the only thing I did wrong was referring to her by name... well, I'll remember that for the future, but I doubt it would have made much difference.
There's more I want to say, but I'll get to it later.
[ July 13, 2010, 07:38 PM: Message edited by: Raymond Arnold ]
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
I've been having a somewhat parallel thought I'd like to throw out. Which is that sometimes calling an opinion or even a person "stupid" or "crazy" is a kind of diplomacy.
Which sounds stupid (and/or crazy). But hear me out for a second.
Imagine if someone... say, envisions draining the Great Lakes to provide irrigation for Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico. One response is to presume that the person fronting this idea hasn't considered the damage it would do to the remaining ecosystem of the area, the harm it would do to the people living adjacent to the Great Lakes, the ridiculous cost of such a project, and so on. The other would be to presume that the person had already considered these costs and decided that they didn't care about the damage it would do.
Now "stupid", when describing an idea, isn't terribly kind. Less so when describing a person, and I'd hasten to be clear that "smart" people believe "stupid" things all the time; whenever possible, one should try not to dismiss or seem to dismiss everything a person might say after that point rather than the single idea.
But even still, someone who has a "stupid" idea might see the reasons that idea is seen as such, and even a "stupid" person might merely be ignorant on a given subject and not somehow beyond worth or teaching. There is a certain optimism in that, however cockeyed or condescending it might be.
Whereas someone who has decided that they don't care about the harm and hurt their idea causes... At best, you get into questions of the ends justifying the means, relative cost/benefit analyses, zero-sum games, and so forth. At worst, words like "malicious", "callous", "immoral" and "evil" come into the picture, at which point "stupid" seems like a pretty good deal.
Quite frankly, ever since my Composition teacher tried to beat "I think" and "I feel" out of me, I've been campaigning for discussions to recognize that most opinions are just that, not unassailable realities that must be defended against all alternates, no matter how reasonable. Not all arguments are about things that can be factually verified, and there are few things less useful than either presuming to speak unimpeachably about how other people feel or presuming to speak for a majority that isn't necessarily manifest in order to cow the opposition (I think. I feel.)
I don't have easy solutions. I'm not going to pretend I have some great Magna Carta to prevent hurt feelings at Hatrack, or even that I'm a particular paragon of cool-headedness and even-handedness. (Again, I think you're making a much better effort at such, Raymond, and deserve congratulations.) But I wonder if it's too much to ask for disagreements beginning from a relatively benign "I disagree, here's why."
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm going to try and summarize a post katherina deleted, because I found it incredibly relevant to a lot of the discussion here. (I'm reminded of a line from Xenocide in which the father says "That's Demosthenes' idea." And the daughter says "but when I believe an idea, it becomes mine! You taught me that!"). I apologize (sincerely) for stealing back the goat cheese, but having had it pointed out to me I think it's essential to understanding the forum. (Granted, I my be alone in my "oh, that describes me PERFECTLY!" reaction, and totally wrong here. But I'm pretty sure this is accurate).
In the book Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus, nearly every conversation is framed as a contest of sorts, with a winner and loser. Columbus verbally jousts with the Spanish nobles. The Pastwatch professionals are constantly arguing with each other in a way that has clear victors. Even private conversations between lovers and friends are framed in this way. The "good guys" are the ones that win using intelligence, wit and civility. The "bad guys" are bullies.
This is an Orson Scott Card forum. Neither katherina nor I remember whether all of Card's books frame conversations in the same way, but I can think of some examples offhand in Ender's Game. So it's no surprise that in a forum dedicated to OSC attracts people who like to talk and debate the way OSC characters do. I certainly do.
Not everyone likes to talk that way. And there's plenty of other reasons you might be attracted to an OSC website. But there's a large enough contingent of people here who probably do enjoy it that it's not fair to deny them that, anymore than it's fair to expect the others to adopt more confrontational posting styles. Again, no easy answers, but being aware of the issue at least makes it easier to step back and recognize when a difference in communication styles is happening and decide how to respond.
@Sterling: I feel like I agree with all of your points, but I don't feel like they end up pointing towards "stupid and crazy can be diplomatic terms." I mean, yeah they're better than calling someone evil. In an objective sense. But I think whether you call someone evil or call someone stupid, the extent to which they shut down and ignore you is pretty much the same.
The only case where I might consider it useful is when someone is doing something incredibly harmful, and is merely oblivious to a particular set of consequences. In which case hammering home the magnitude of how harmful it is might warrant "stupid/crazy." In those cases I'm still not sure that's any better than "evil."
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
-- Of course, I was dreaming. ++ Then why didn't you say so? --Well, you seemed to be listening...for once...and, well, I got caught up in the way you looked at me when you were listening. ++I don't believe it. You're telling me it was all bullshit? --It wasn't bullshit, it was a dream and you were in it and that's what happened, I mean, it was true except just not real, the little shed and all the vines growing out of it and the way the door hung open and seemed to be waiting and I just told you what happened ++I was stuck --What? ++I got stuck in there. They grabbed at me and I couldn't get away... --What are you talking about? ++...I called you but you didn't come. You left me there... --The dream? That's not how it goes! We were making a garden! ++...all alone and then it happened... --The tulips and the petunias. ++...I picked up the spade and I hid in the leaves, the leaves were so big ond so sharp and I buried myself inside were the stem meets the branch and the buds were split open by tendrils that wrapped themsleves into my sinews, my strength, and I waited... --I said that you should be careful, you'll chop off your toes, you laughed and went into the shed to get your shoes. ++I waited for you to come in. --But they were in the house. ++I split your skull open. --The shed was overgrown and empty. ++Don't come in. --Stop it. ++Don't. --Stop it. ++Sleep.
Posts: 1154 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: @Sterling: I feel like I agree with all of your points, but I don't feel like they end up pointing towards "stupid and crazy can be diplomatic terms." I mean, yeah they're better than calling someone evil. In an objective sense. But I think whether you call someone evil or call someone stupid, the extent to which they shut down and ignore you is pretty much the same.
"Diplomatic" may be overstating the case. I'm certainly not suggesting such a derrogatory term become a new standard for polite conversation. I only mean that we should recognize that, in some cases, use of such terms is a frustrated person struggling to give the benefit of the doubt.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: I believe part of the problem stems from how integrated some beliefs are to people who hold them. If someone says, "A BLT is far superior to a Hot Pastrami sandwich", I don't have much invested in the outcome of that argument, so I don't feel bad about the suggestion that my taste in sandwiches is "wrong."
if I've spent the last 10 years writing a dozen vampire novels, and somene says that vampire novels are stupid, and nobody will ever read one again, a huge amount of my self-worth, future goals, personal happiness and invested time and emotion forces me to fight you on that, regardless of facts, intentions, or beliefs.
Any time the discussion turns to something that one or more poster has integrated into their sense of self-worth and wellbeing, there is going to be a fight.
Which suggests that the things you believe as part of your identity, rather than due to such things as actual evidence, should be kept as few as possible. That way you're more open to learning. Which, incidentally, is one thing that frustrates me about theists; not only do they have this huge gaping piece of nonsense where rational beliefs ought to be, they've got that whole area covered with prickly identity-skin. Touch it and you get fireworks.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think some people make the *act of discussion* part of that prickly skin identity, so that any disagreement becomes a personal attack. That is pretty fragile for a self identity, if one has to be right all the time, but it makes it kind of silly, or masochistic, to then engage in heated discussions where you are certain to be argued with.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: When you reach that point, I think the difference between saying "that idea's stupid, only an idiot would think that" and "I still think that idea has some flaws," is a cosmetic difference. However nicely you dress it up, the bottom line is you think another person is wrong, and by extension, the way that think about things (at least that particular thing) must be a flawed way of thinking.
I strongly, strongly disagree with this. With the possible exception of something that is someone's deepest self-identity (and maybe even then), it should be perfectly possible to say that you think an idea is flawed, or even stupid (although tact is a nice thing), without actually attacking the individual.
It used to happen at Hatrack all the time, and occasionally it still does.
Of course, it is a two-sided street. If one person is carefully addressing the idea and not the speaker, said speaker must be willing to discuss the idea without taking it personally.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
Intelligent people can be, and an often are, wrong. And two intelligent people can hold conflicting opinions without either of them being wrong.
If the above is not accepted, then civil conversation is simply not possible. Then every single conversation is a joust and a personal fight for self esteem because one's very identity is threatened. That's not conversation.
My point about bringing up the conversations in OSC novels is that it is a characteristic of his writing, but it is NOT an accurate portrayal of effective real world dynamics. The reason his heroes always win is NOT because they truly are the smartest or the most dexterous or even always have the best ideas - they win because the conversation is rigged from the start. Having real world - or even virtual world - conversations and hoping for them to go like OSC conversations is like jumping off a roof and hoping to fly.
As for your intensely personal comments above, I have two comments about them, on top of what I said before.
1. It is a perfect example of the goat cheese. You were trying to create a seminar situation and putting yourself in the instructor position. What I perhaps didn't make clear in the original goat cheese post is that such conversations when not in an educational or pleading setting (such as in school or like Columbus with the advisors), such a conversation outside of those appropriate settings is massively, intensely rude. It is literally antisocial. It's treating your peers like your subordinates, and behavior like that outside of an OSC novel does not produce results like those in an OSC novel. In Pastwatch, it led to the person being uber-respected and getting accolades. Outside of OSC books, it leads to being punched in the mouth in some situations and being dismissed as socially tone deaf at best in the rest.
It's really not okay. Doing it here doesn't make you an OSC-type hero. It makes you the guy walking around high school wearing Batman cape.
Those conversations were, I'm sure, never intended to be a model for real life conversations. I'm sure of it, or else OSC wouldn't be able to function.
2. Perceiving someone disagreeing with your ideas as equivalent to being told you are stupid means that when you disagree with someone else, you are saying they are stupid. Dude, not okay. And entirely unnecessary.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Raymond Arnold, I read your post as one person in a group saying, "I have noticed this problem. Here is how I see it. How do the rest of you see it? How can we make it better?" I thought it was a fairly humble post.
KoM and MightyCow, as you know, my faith is a big part of my identity. I am not sure how I come across but I don't feel particularly prickly or threatened or attacked beyond some frustration at having to repeat the same arguments over and over. That is less of a problem in conversations with atheists than it is with some of my fellow theists.
quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: I believe part of the problem stems from how integrated some beliefs are to people who hold them. If someone says, "A BLT is far superior to a Hot Pastrami sandwich", I don't have much invested in the outcome of that argument, so I don't feel bad about the suggestion that my taste in sandwiches is "wrong."
if I've spent the last 10 years writing a dozen vampire novels, and somene says that vampire novels are stupid, and nobody will ever read one again, a huge amount of my self-worth, future goals, personal happiness and invested time and emotion forces me to fight you on that, regardless of facts, intentions, or beliefs.
Any time the discussion turns to something that one or more poster has integrated into their sense of self-worth and wellbeing, there is going to be a fight.
Which suggests that the things you believe as part of your identity, rather than due to such things as actual evidence, should be kept as few as possible. That way you're more open to learning. Which, incidentally, is one thing that frustrates me about theists; not only do they have this huge gaping piece of nonsense where rational beliefs ought to be, they've got that whole area covered with prickly identity-skin. Touch it and you get fireworks.
It's not necessarily that you disagree with them. It's how you couch it. If you say something inflammatory, e.g. "this huge gaping piece of nonsense where rational beliefs ought to be," then yeah, you're bound to get a more prickly discussion. Interpersonal skills 101.
Posts: 5957 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I've been mulling things over for the past day, working out areas where I think I was actively wrong (intelletually) and things where I merely communicated poorly. Also thinking about whether I did anything wrong (morally) and places where there simply was no good action to take. (I've yet to figure that part out). For now I've got a decent answer for rivka. It somewhat addresses issues katherina has brought up, but I'm not entirely clear whether we're still having a conversation or not and if we are it's a complicated one that I'm wary of leaping back into just now.
First, @rivka: I wasn't entirely happy with the words you quoted when I wrote it. I rewrote it a few times (along with the whole post). Eventually I gave up and just posted what I have. I'll attempt to clarify some things.
As far as my own beliefs go, the basic framework I'm working from is that it is not possible for two people to believe mutually exclusive things and them both be right. That doesn't mean one of them has to be an idiot, but it does mean one of them hasn't considered all the evidence, or is allowing emotion to cloud their decision making process, or something else.
I believe this strongly. I do not apologize for this.
"Stupid" is a word with strong negative connotations. It honestly doesn't even mean much beyond being an insult. So I'll try not to use it here. But my point, in my OP, is that when I think someone is wrong, especially someone who I know is fully aware of all the available evidence and arguments, then it is an inherent, corresponding, inescapable belief that with regards to that (percieved) wrong belief, that person is not thinking properly. I may be wrong (I do my best to remain open to this fact) but at the moment in which I consider myself right, I can't avoid that belief.
I do not attach value judgement of the person to that fact. Unless I see the person constantly using the same bad reasoning over and over again I don't write that person off as "stupid." (There are very few people on this board who meet that description, and I think there would be almost unanimous agreement on that).
But when I see someone who I know is intelligent making what I believe to be a very mistaken statement, in a moment of emotional stress I may think to myself "How can you be so stupid!?"
"Stupid," being an emotionally tainted variant of "unwilling or unable to think rationally on this subject."
Now, there are certain words ("Stupid" and "Idiot" being among them), that I DO apologize for thinking, let along typing, because merely thinking them brings negativity to the table. That's not because of the definition of the word, it's because of its history as an insult. So my point, way back in the OP, is that from a definitional standpoint, "You're wrong" and "You're being stupid" are essentially synonymous. One of them brings negativity to the table that doesn't need to be there. But that's what I meant.
The specific line rivka quoted, included "Only an idiot would believe that," doesn't really fall under the above category at all, since "only an idiot would..." immediately applies value judgment to the person. I apologize for that.
I think that there WILL likely be some people who disagree with one or more premises here, and honestly I AM fine with that, because as much as I do not think it's possible to have a debate in which two people are right about mutually exclusive things, it IS fine to live in a community with people who believe mutually exclusive beliefs, and recognize the areas in which (most of the time) we understand that there's nothing more to discuss.
I'm pausing for now to see whether this actually helped clarify anything for anybody.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
quote:the basic framework I'm working from is that it is not possible for two people to believe mutually exclusive things and them both be right.
I disagree, fundamentally, with this premise. While I do believe that some things are absolute, those things are few and far between. I am also very sure that more than one conclusion can be drawn from the same set of facts. What conclusions are drawn are often shaped by what values and priorities the concluders are starting from.
The world simply isn't this black and white. Trying to impose black and whiteness on a mostly gray world will prove very frustrating.
----
This will most likely be taken badly, because you seem to equate "you're wrong about this" with "you're wrong" with "you're stupid." That's too bad, because I mean the first one, but not the second two.
And in order for this conversation to continue, if you start with the "someone is wrong" premise, the only place to go is to defend yourself so it isn't you. And then it will all degenerate again because it will turn into another jousting match instead of a conversation.
OSC, I am sure, never meant to convey that the only conversations possible are jousting match. And even if it were...what's the prize here? What are the rules? What does the blue ribbon mean? Does a jousting match mean anything at all if it can be won with an ad hominem?
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: KoM and MightyCow, as you know, my faith is a big part of my identity. I am not sure how I come across but I don't feel particularly prickly or threatened or attacked beyond some frustration at having to repeat the same arguments over and over. That is less of a problem in conversations with atheists than it is with some of my fellow theists.
As usual you are unusual among theists, in that you don't actually believe anything, you merely believe that you believe. (While this is not so uncommon, you have it to an unusually high degree.) You don't have actual faith as a part of your identity, you have the quotation "I am a person of faith" as part of your identity. I've noticed you get rather more defensive when I point this out.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
KoM, I would like to avoid this becoming a thread about religion. I realize that large chunks of the thread are going to be clearly most applicable to religious debate, I'd like to at least pretend we're talking about other things to avoid the baggage that a religious discussion brings.
We're talking about talking here, not talking about other things.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
quote:the basic framework I'm working from is that it is not possible for two people to believe mutually exclusive things and them both be right.
I disagree, fundamentally, with this premise. While I do believe that some things are absolute, those things are few and far between. I am also very sure that more than one conclusion can be drawn from the same set of facts. What conclusions are drawn are often shaped by what values and priorities the concluders are starting from.
I completely and entirely agree with Katie on this. In fact, I think it is rather unfortunate that you are so convinced that the world is so black and white as all that.
And advise you to not go into the social sciences. Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
(I edited in a final paragraph that doesn't change anything about the beliefs I just described, but does clarify my intentions with regard to the forum).
I will note that I DO believe in things that are not mutually contradictory, and there is more room to disagree on those things. But those things are usually either a) conglomerations of facts b) statements based purely on values that cannot be proved or disproved.
Two examples (please avoid getting into a debate about the issues themselves, I just wanted to clarify the sorts of things I was talking about)
Abortion (example of "unprovable axiom") - the fundamental dispute here is over the point at which human life gains inherent value. That is not something that can be proved. You can argue over various side effects that abortion causes or prevents, but ultimately you're comparing those side effects to the value of human life and there's no way to actually determine that.
Welfare (example of "conglomerate of facts") - You can say "Welfare is good!" and "Welfare is bad!" and "Welfare is a necessary evil!" and all be right, in a sense. But in those cases, what's really being said is that "handholding poor people teaches them to rely on government, which is bad," and "not providing a safety net leaves people vulnerable to the evils of capitalism, which is bad." As well as loads of other things, because economics is complicated and a lot of times even when there IS a right answer it's hard to know what it is because there's too much data to process.
In addition, Welfare arguments often include unprovable axioms such as "people have the right to earn as much money as they want without the government taking it away," and "governments have a responsibility to ensure the basic needs of their citizens are met."
So in these types of discussions, I agree with kat that there is no clearly right or wrong answer. I'd also like to note that in these types of discussions, I do my best NOT to commit to a "right" answer, rather I say "okay, this is what looks like it's probably true," and act accordingly.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
I would also like to note that, while I realize I went off on a very different direction than Kat had hoped I would go with regards to the "verbal skirmishing" thing, this particular discussion is NOT an attempt on my part to "win" at convincing you that the world is a black and white world where someone always has to be wrong.
If there is any particular "win" condition to this thread for me, it is to arrive at better common ground in terms of what behavior is acceptable and what is not. The "wrong = intellectually unsound" issue is something I think it is important to discuss so that in future threads, people will be better able to understand why people said things that they said and avoid areas of taking offense when none was intended.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
I just want to point oit the irony in insisting that the world is NOT black and white, and thus Raymond Arnold is categorically wrong and "[should] not go into the social sciences."
What's the blue ribbon for convincing RA he's wrong about this Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
On a totally unrelated topic... seriously people, you can call me Ray! Or Raymond! Or even Raym, if you so desire!
I suppose I have no one to blame but myself for this, but's always felt weird to me that people feel need to spell out my whole name. I use my full name on this forum because it was a place on the internet where I felt I should a) be representing myself as who I really am b) I shouldn't be doing anything I would be unwilling to associate with my name in the future. Not because I actually wanted people to spell out "Raymond Arnold" every single time. Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: I just want to point oit the irony in insisting that the world is NOT black and white, and thus Raymond Arnold is categorically wrong ...
quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: As far as my own beliefs go, the basic framework I'm working from is that it is not possible for two people to believe mutually exclusive things and them both be right. That doesn't mean one of them has to be an idiot, but it does mean one of them hasn't considered all the evidence, or is allowing emotion to cloud their decision making process, or something else.
I believe this strongly. I do not apologize for this.
They can certainly be completely "right" as long as the truths are subjective. Also, ideas that many people believe to be mutually exclusive are not always so. That being the case let me hit you up on this.
If you believe that what people "are" is more than just a big hunk of flesh than a lot of that "person" is in the information contained within them, however or whatever you want to call that. That being the case when you attack the ideas that a person holds, especially dear ideas you are quite literally attacking at the "soul" of a person.
People generally have a poor understanding of knowledge, belief, etc. Which is understandable as we teach very little about it in most of our educational curriculum. We, people, generally do a poor job of setting out certain definitions of words when we argue, with causes areas of ambiguity that are not really good for conversation. That and the fact that we are all communicating via a forum board can make things difficult a well. It can be hard at times to figure out when someone is being sarcastic in a playful manner or in an insulting way.
Posts: 1753 | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:The issue with this (and I have noticed you doing this a lot) is that you interpret a post as antagonistic (sometimes correctly, other times less so). And your response, rather than saying "I'm not interested in having a verbal skirmish," is instead "I do not want to have a conversation with you." Which generally reads as "I do not value you as a person worth talking to, period." [/QB]
and then...
katharina:
quote: Raymond, I am not interested in getting a lecture from you on what you think I should be doing or behaving. I find it utterably rude and amazingly tone deaf. And I'm sorry that your response on getting some respect from me was to immediately abuse it. I am neither impressed nor interested.
Kat does this so much now she's like a fainting goat. All you have to do is mention her being wrong and you'll get your personalized dismissal of you as an authority on her, or on xyz, despite you knowing a fair bit about both. Meh. She's not someone I would characterized as "engaged with the feelings of others."
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:They can certainly be completely "right" as long as the truths are subjective.
While my abortion/welfare post covers this to some degree, I think there's a useful anecdote from the Toy Story thread. I feel comfortable doing so since I'm about to illustrate a point where I was wrong - where I was, in some respects, behaving "stupidly."
There was an argument about whether a particular shot was about Woody or Andy. Katherina and myself were in agreement on this issue: the camera was on Andy, Andy was the character making a decision, Woody was currently an inanimate object who wasn't doing anything at the time. We cited these reasons and others as proof that at that particular moment in the film, Andy was the character that the film was caring about.
Someone else said "Um, no, it's Woody." After some discussion they clarified "I'm paying attention to Andy, but I only care about him because of Woody."
There was at least some point where I literally was thinking (probably posted "out loud", much to my chagrin) that the shot was clearly about Andy, and anyone who thought otherwise was wrong.
In this particular instance, I was wrong, because assigning truth value to the particular scene being "about" Andy or Woody is fairly meaningless. The scene itself is just an image, it is only "about" things in the minds of people, and different people can interpret it different ways. Some might argue that the statements "It's about Woody" and "It's about Andy" are both correct, because it's subjective. In a sense, I think that's true, BUT it is incredibly important to remember that subjective and objective truths are NOT the same thing, and conflating the two is intellectually dishonest. In any kind of objective sense, I was wrong to make that statement.
I subsequently modified my position to "The intention of the director was for most (defined as more than half) of our attention and empathy to be focused on Andy in that shot." Given my knowledge of cinematography, I'm about 95% sure that I'm right about that, and would be willing to bet up to $50 on it. This isn't subjective truth - it's something that we could conceivable call up the director and ask him (her?) about. It's still possible I'm wrong about it. But it's not something that is possible to be both right and wrong about. Either the director was deliberately focusing our attention and empathy on Andy or he wasn't.
I'm interested in continuing to debate this sort of thing if people have other points to bring to the table, because I DO think that verbal skirmishes are fun, period, as a recreational activity. But again, right now my main goal is to eliminate confusion about different mindsets.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
| IP: Logged |
posted
Orincoro: Ha! Your obsession with me and desperate desire to score points is very telling about your values and priorities.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
Eta: You know, it's not fair of me to pick on you. I do have a newfound understanding for people aging poorly. We ought to allow you to do it more gracefully.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
| IP: Logged |
To be sure, it most certainly is not passion. It is a desire to dominate and control, which is very, very far away from tender feelings. But not far away at all from spectacularly nasty ones.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Talking about subjective/objective and your director example, what if the director was okay with people putting their focus where they thought it was most important? I worked for someone who used to work for Disney and she said the Disney corporation was very good at putting a lot of things in their movies (I know, Toy Story 3 is Pixar, but I think it works this way still) so any person watching a movie (or going to their theme parks, etc.) would be able to watch it over and over again and get new views, insights, feelings out of it. So, what if the director was okay with creating a shot that became independent of him and can be interpreted many different ways. Some artists are like that (the ones that refuse to analyze their art once it has been created). Does this make sense?
Posts: 258 | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[ROFL]](graemlins/rofl.gif)
![[Wall Bash]](graemlins/wallbash.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
Your obsession with me and desperate desire to score points is very telling about your values and priorities.
