6 ms·

> how to talk to these people? listening is far more important than talking to. To reinforce one of the other replies: asking questions is pretty good, as lon

> how to talk to these people? listening is far more important than talking to. To reinforce one of the other replies: asking questions is pretty good, as long as one takes it slow and actually listens to the responses. I've (very lightly and positively) engaged with flat-earth folk for years now, and it's been fairly interesting. Many are 'cranks', many are trolls, but many have something like an honest desire to really know and understand, though with some pretty big blind spots.

asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
Contrarian view warning: neither listening to nor talking to them are important! At least not in the context of helping them come to a more correct belief about the shape of our planet -- talking to them just as people is fine and no worse or better than talking to anyone else. I guess most people presenting themselves as flat Earthers actually know deep down that the Earth is round. Perhaps they enjoy playing the fool. Perhaps they are trolling. Perhaps they just want attention. But they probably know. Even if they don't, who cares? By virtue of being a flat Earther you basically exclude yourself from any position where such a viewpoint might be relevant. They're not hurting anyone, so just leave them alone. Let people be wrong on the internet. (Note that like many aspirational exhortations, this one is a little hypocritical. I've been known to have a problem with people being wrong on the internet before. But I'm trying to be better. :))
- tgflynn 7y ago
  Don't you think there's a danger that letting incorrect (especially wildly wrong) statements stand unchallenged on the internet encourages those ideas to spread further ?
  - asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
    I have seen studies that suggest engaging with incorrect beliefs does nothing to prevent their spread and might even encourage them. Denying prominent supporters of a belief a platform ("cancelling" them) has plainly been effective in a few cases. However, I think that hammer should be reserved for seriously harmful and dangerous beliefs. I think flat Earth is quite harmless and also sufficiently unpopular that there's not really much that needs to be done.
    - tgflynn 7y ago
      I guess there's a distinction to be made between people who appear firmly committed to ill-supported beliefs and those who plausibly may just be basing their beliefs on inaccurate information. It's true that I generally don't engage with people who believe in a flat earth or who claim to be absolutely certain that the government is colluding with extraterrestrials, simply because I doubt any good would come of such an interaction.
      - asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
        > those who plausibly may just be basing their beliefs on inaccurate information. IMO that excludes all flat Earthers, at least those who have received a primary school education.
        tgflynn 7y ago
        Yes, of course. But I understood (perhaps incorrectly) your comments as intending to have broader applicability. The case of flat-earthers has always seemed like an extreme outlier to me even compared to other conspiracy theorists.
    - jstarfish 7y ago
      > I have seen studies that suggest engaging with incorrect beliefs does nothing to prevent their spread and might even encourage them. If there's anything I learned from my experiences in organized religion, the skeptics' society, various mental institutions and a career in criminal justice, it's that confronting irrational targets (or salesmen!) just teaches them how to better-reinforce their own flawed arguments and behaviors. They learn what rational people will come at them with and learn how to counter or subvert it, which helps them become even more persuasive to their next mark. Now they sound more intelligent and authoritative, which is precisely what makes them so dangerous! The same advice applies to internet trolls. It's hard because it's instinctual, but never engage-- smile and walk away. Don't give them an opportunity to learn how to exploit or undermine the thought patterns of a rational person. If you don't yourself drown in their sea of circular logic, you're just giving a malicious organic learning algorithm free training data at the expense of your time and sanity. If you starve them of attention, they can only feed off of each other-- to predictably amusing ends. Without outside input, then like any cult, they eventually become an incestuous feedback loop of lunacy that deviates so far from societal expectations of normality that you no longer have to convince anybody of anything since they do it for you.
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    "You can't reason people out of positions that they didn't reason themselves into."
    - blaser-waffle 7y ago
      Something I keep telling my dad, as he tries to get grandma to stop regurgitating the "forwards from grandma" type of nonsense. She's not spouting this because it's rational.
  - s1artibartfast 7y ago
    As an aside, I think there is a huge danger in poorly challenging incorrect statements on the internet and elsewhere. Dehumanizing or disrespecting others is one of the easiest dangers, as is challenging with a incomplete or fallacious counter. These only add fuel to the fire.
- Diederich 7y ago
  > At least not in the context of helping them come to a more correct belief about the shape of our planet Right, I should have been more clear. I've spoken to these folks not trying to change their minds, but to attempt to understand human psychology better. Among the various large scale conspiracy theories out there, flat eartherism has, in my opinion, some useful properties. Did the US Government fly missiles into the world trade centers? No...but proof to the contrary isn't trivial. How can I prove the world is round? Well, it costs some money, but it's trivial. At the moment, Air New Zealand 30 is flying direct between Auckland, NZ and Buenos Aires, Argentina. The flight time will be just under 12 hours. The aircraft is a Boeing 777-200ER. This is a fast flying aircraft, but it's not supersonic, which it would have to be in order to fly between NZ and AR in 12 hours across a flat earth. Almost anybody with a few thousand dollars can conduct this experiment. So, I have studied flat-eartherism as a way to study some fundamental natures of human thought. I've run into true believer flat-earthers who were intelligent, (mostly) open minded, charismatic and curious. I think that every human brain is packed with irrational beliefs and thoughtful fallacies. Even the best, most clear thinking of us is, I believe, saddled with (nearly) unbreakable irrational thought processes. For most of us, they're not very obvious. This isn't an implicit call to give up on the goal of embracing rational thought in all things. Far from it. For me, at least, understanding that I have such weaknesses hidden inside is an even stronger motivation to do everything possible to think and act clearly.

asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago

Contrarian view warning: neither listening to nor talking to them are important! At least not in the context of helping them come to a more correct belief about the shape of our planet -- talking to them just as people is fine and no worse or better than talking to anyone else. I guess most people presenting themselves as flat Earthers actually know deep down that the Earth is round. Perhaps they enjoy playing the fool. Perhaps they are trolling. Perhaps they just want attention. But they probably know. Even if they don't, who cares? By virtue of being a flat Earther you basically exclude yourself from any position where such a viewpoint might be relevant. They're not hurting anyone, so just leave them alone. Let people be wrong on the internet. (Note that like many aspirational exhortations, this one is a little hypocritical. I've been known to have a problem with people being wrong on the internet before. But I'm trying to be better. :))

tgflynn 7y ago
Don't you think there's a danger that letting incorrect (especially wildly wrong) statements stand unchallenged on the internet encourages those ideas to spread further ?
- asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
  I have seen studies that suggest engaging with incorrect beliefs does nothing to prevent their spread and might even encourage them. Denying prominent supporters of a belief a platform ("cancelling" them) has plainly been effective in a few cases. However, I think that hammer should be reserved for seriously harmful and dangerous beliefs. I think flat Earth is quite harmless and also sufficiently unpopular that there's not really much that needs to be done.
  - tgflynn 7y ago
    I guess there's a distinction to be made between people who appear firmly committed to ill-supported beliefs and those who plausibly may just be basing their beliefs on inaccurate information. It's true that I generally don't engage with people who believe in a flat earth or who claim to be absolutely certain that the government is colluding with extraterrestrials, simply because I doubt any good would come of such an interaction.
    - asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
      > those who plausibly may just be basing their beliefs on inaccurate information. IMO that excludes all flat Earthers, at least those who have received a primary school education.
      - tgflynn 7y ago
        Yes, of course. But I understood (perhaps incorrectly) your comments as intending to have broader applicability. The case of flat-earthers has always seemed like an extreme outlier to me even compared to other conspiracy theorists.
  - jstarfish 7y ago
    > I have seen studies that suggest engaging with incorrect beliefs does nothing to prevent their spread and might even encourage them. If there's anything I learned from my experiences in organized religion, the skeptics' society, various mental institutions and a career in criminal justice, it's that confronting irrational targets (or salesmen!) just teaches them how to better-reinforce their own flawed arguments and behaviors. They learn what rational people will come at them with and learn how to counter or subvert it, which helps them become even more persuasive to their next mark. Now they sound more intelligent and authoritative, which is precisely what makes them so dangerous! The same advice applies to internet trolls. It's hard because it's instinctual, but never engage-- smile and walk away. Don't give them an opportunity to learn how to exploit or undermine the thought patterns of a rational person. If you don't yourself drown in their sea of circular logic, you're just giving a malicious organic learning algorithm free training data at the expense of your time and sanity. If you starve them of attention, they can only feed off of each other-- to predictably amusing ends. Without outside input, then like any cult, they eventually become an incestuous feedback loop of lunacy that deviates so far from societal expectations of normality that you no longer have to convince anybody of anything since they do it for you.
- sokoloff 7y ago
  "You can't reason people out of positions that they didn't reason themselves into."
  - blaser-waffle 7y ago
    Something I keep telling my dad, as he tries to get grandma to stop regurgitating the "forwards from grandma" type of nonsense. She's not spouting this because it's rational.
- s1artibartfast 7y ago
  As an aside, I think there is a huge danger in poorly challenging incorrect statements on the internet and elsewhere. Dehumanizing or disrespecting others is one of the easiest dangers, as is challenging with a incomplete or fallacious counter. These only add fuel to the fire.
Diederich 7y ago
> At least not in the context of helping them come to a more correct belief about the shape of our planet Right, I should have been more clear. I've spoken to these folks not trying to change their minds, but to attempt to understand human psychology better. Among the various large scale conspiracy theories out there, flat eartherism has, in my opinion, some useful properties. Did the US Government fly missiles into the world trade centers? No...but proof to the contrary isn't trivial. How can I prove the world is round? Well, it costs some money, but it's trivial. At the moment, Air New Zealand 30 is flying direct between Auckland, NZ and Buenos Aires, Argentina. The flight time will be just under 12 hours. The aircraft is a Boeing 777-200ER. This is a fast flying aircraft, but it's not supersonic, which it would have to be in order to fly between NZ and AR in 12 hours across a flat earth. Almost anybody with a few thousand dollars can conduct this experiment. So, I have studied flat-eartherism as a way to study some fundamental natures of human thought. I've run into true believer flat-earthers who were intelligent, (mostly) open minded, charismatic and curious. I think that every human brain is packed with irrational beliefs and thoughtful fallacies. Even the best, most clear thinking of us is, I believe, saddled with (nearly) unbreakable irrational thought processes. For most of us, they're not very obvious. This isn't an implicit call to give up on the goal of embracing rational thought in all things. Far from it. For me, at least, understanding that I have such weaknesses hidden inside is an even stronger motivation to do everything possible to think and act clearly.