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I think there is a genuine need for escaping echo chambers but every attempt is usually aimed just showing the opposite side/narrative. If I am conservative I

I think there is a genuine need for escaping echo chambers but every attempt is usually aimed just showing the opposite side/narrative. If I am conservative I won’t be open to be shown the most leftist content, and viceversa, while instead I might be open to be shown more balanced views that might gradually carry me out of my echo chamber instead of reinforcing it. edit: this an OT comment more related to the echo chamber topic than the submission itself. Interesting project, OP.

isogon 6y ago
My own experience is that it works quite well for a certain kind of person: on Reddit I was simultaneously subbed to /r/The_Donald, /r/politics, /r/ChapoTrapHouse, /r/Libertarian, etc (while those were still around). I'd also drop by voat occasionally to get my weekly sample of virulently antisemitic takes. I think looking at extremes is the most realistic path. Purportedly balanced sources are dangerous because their bias is subtle; extreme sources typically have very clear bias that is easy to keep in mind as you. You can read many extreme sources and sort of take the intersection of what they show you to guess at some minimal amount of what must be really true.
- gcatalfamo 6y ago
  My experience is surely anecdotal, but I feel your POV applies more to open minded people, while close minded people are more inclined to feel threatened by opposite perspectives.
  - amanaplanacanal 6y ago
    Sometimes those opposite perspectives really are threatening, though.
    - sixstringtheory 6y ago
      True enough. And the response that I think should appeal even to the close-minded: those perspectives don’t go away just because you’re not exposed to them, and you won’t understand enough to push back if you never study then.
- fouc 6y ago
  That's an interesting idea! I could see it being good training for simultaneously holding two opposing thoughts in your head at any given time. What do you hope to gain out of going to the effort of consuming media like this? Why not just go on an information diet altogether?
  - isogon 6y ago
    I think it is valuable to read a hundred convincingly-written arguments in favor of one point of view, become convinced, and then read a hundred opposing arguments and again become convinced. This maintains my awareness of the fact that I'm a terrible judge of veracity of arguments. Since I want to know what happens in the world, I must be exposed to arguments, so I think it's very important to be viscerally aware that I'm an idiot and should use a lot of care. As for why I want to know what happens in the world and particularly where I live (i.e. North America), it is because those events affect me. If I were on an information diet, then I would probably miss, for example, the recent passing of S.386 [0] by the US Senate, which is intimately relevant to me as my long-term goal is to immigrate to the US. [0] https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/386/all-info https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/386...
    - jorgesborges 6y ago
      That’s very perceptive. Have you been surprised at all, after reading both arguments, which side of the fence you wind up on?
    - tshaddox 6y ago
      This seems to presume that these points of view you’re talking about have no objective truth value, and that the only worthwhile exercise is constructing “convincingly-written” rhetoric to support one side or another.
      - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
        I don't take that from the gp at all. My perspective is that he seems to be saying you're not going to understand a position on an issue until you internalize it "as if" it was your own belief. By internalizing one belief and then another that contradicts it, you can truly compare them on the merits and perhaps become aware of the objective reality that they both share. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thesis,_antithesis,_synthesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thesis,_antithesis,_synthesis
- hyperman1 6y ago
  Aren't you just subscribing to an USA bubble now? Is there a way to add e.g. chinese, indian or islamic reddits to the mix?
  - ARandomerDude 6y ago
    Aren't you just subscribing to the geopolitical bubble now? Is there a way to add quilting, farming, and spelunking? Tongue in cheek, but I bring this up to point out that while it might be good to expand one's knowledge, it can become a virtue. When that happens, we're all condemned because it'll never be broad enough.
  - isogon 6y ago
    That's true. I should add /r/Sino to that list. I also subscribe to ChinaTalk, but I'm not sure how valuable a it is for really gauging what goes on in that part of the net. Unfortunately, I can't read Chinese, so I have to trust someone to translate and aggregate that content in the end. I haven't tried anything outside of US, China (these two being the two major geopolitical players), and Russia (because I am from there and understand the language). I would love to expand that list, but my time is limited. Another factor is that reading American commentary is entertaining because I live here and am immersed in the culture. The same goes for Russia. I haven't been able to make this work with China: there is a mass of cultural material that I'm not "in" on, so it feels much more like work.
- maroonblazer 6y ago
  Balanced sources tend to give you what the extremes don't, which is nuance. Does your approach not gloss over the nuance? Or are you able to surface the complexities of a given topic simply by examining the extremes?
  - isogon 6y ago
    It does often gloss over the nuance. I ultimately try to estimate how bad I am at assessing the veracity of arguments concerning the topic at hand, which I think is most valuable. For example, I read many conflicting predictions concerning the last US election, saw that I could not distinguish bad predictions from good ones, and concluded that I have to remain unconvinced. I was vindicated by it being a very tight race. This doesn't always happen. On the other hand, I read the recent Texas filing [0] and found that I could confidently argue against it, and the best opposing arguments I could find did not convince me. To my SO, I confidently voiced the prediction that this lawsuit will fail, and articulated why the probability argument in the attached Cicchetti Declaration is misguided. This is arguably a very easy task, so this correct prediction does me little credit, but I think that's the point: even if I only become convinced of things which are obvious, it is important to not accidentally become convinced of things which are not obvious. [0] https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22O155/163048/20201208132827887_TX-v-State-ExpedMot%202020-12-07%20FINAL.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22O155/163048/2020...
    - amanaplanacanal 6y ago
      You may think it a very easy task, but it is one that a large proportion of our elected officials failed, or possibly pretended to fail for their own political gain.
    - sonotathrowaway 6y ago
      I don’t understand the basis by which you think this election was “tight”.
      - therealx 6y ago
- magicalist 6y ago
  > on Reddit I was simultaneously subbed to /r/The_Donald, /r/politics, /r/ChapoTrapHouse, /r/Libertarian, etc Maybe you were just enjoying reading shitposts? Nothing wrong with that, everyone has their version of tabloids they enjoy, but these are mostly barely thought through hot takes posted to get a reaction (and surfaced because they were successful at it). There's no reason to think their intersection is going to be anywhere near something "true" (let alone usefully true).
  - sonotathrowaway 6y ago
    ^ A person studying their daily bowel movements for political commentary would be better informed than someone who read those subreddits looking for accurate political news, and they’d have a more honest assessment about the worth of their news sources. I can list plenty of subreddits with worthwhile political discussion, but none of that matters if a persons idea of “balanced” is to find the dregs of fringe and extreme political movements and use them as the basis of said balance. I’d wager that those subreddits represent less than 10% of the views of most Americans.
    - superduperuser 6y ago
      Would you mind sharing those subreddits with constructive political discussions?
      - ars 6y ago
        /r/NeutralPolitics tries pretty hard. The hard part is that reddit is majority liberal, so it's very very hard to find a good balance. Any random non-political subreddit is going to be liberal slanted. In order to find a conservative slant you have to go specifically to a political conservative subreddit.
      - sonotathrowaway 6y ago
        Left: /r/progressives Center left: /r/neoliberal Right: /r/neoconnwo Center right: /r/tuesday Neutral: /r/neutralpolitics /r/geopolitics /r/politicalfactchecking /r/truepolitics A spectrum of subreddits across ideological views, all with discussions you may actually learn something from. You’ll notice that none of those subreddits have been suspended because their members and moderators are repeatedly calling for violence against their political opponents, nor are they just recruiting boards for Stormfront. Again, finding the fringe conspiracy theorists repeatedly calling for violence doesn’t actually give you a well informed or balanced perspective.
postingpals 6y ago
Actually this tool seems to solve that problem by showing you multiple books, and not just direct opposites in terms of content. If you don't believe me search for 'Mein Kampf' and something similar, it doesn't spit out books you would consider opponents of Hitler's worldview necessarily. Now whether the books it spits out are even going to help you break out of your worldview, who knows, but I'm sure reading Shakespeare is going to loosen up a fascist to other ideas at least a little bit.
- gcatalfamo 6y ago
  you're right, I edited my comment to reflect I was being slightly OT.
pjc50 6y ago
The problem with delusional belief systems is that they tend to be coherent and self-supporting, just not rooted in reality. Statistical aggregates make this worse. You can argue that on average X is more than Y, or you can cherrypick all the examples where Y is greater than X to make your point.
- arminiusreturns 6y ago
  Lots of people call stuff they dont like "delusional belief systems" while ignoring the truths, even if nuggets, behind those systems...
  - bilbo0s 6y ago
    I don't know man? People don't like, a lot of things, they don't call them delusional. We call things delusional because they are, in fact, delusional. What makes it dangerous is that people deeply believe that their delusions are "truth". Belief to the point of fundamentalism, where they will kill non-believers in their delusions.
    - User23 6y ago
      Naturally you can’t refute the claim that your stated belief there is delusional.
      - tshaddox 6y ago
        Sure you can. You can provide explanation of why your claim is not delusional.
    - tshaddox 6y ago
      Both obviously happen. The “delusional” label is used (rightly) to dismiss certain claims, but then of course people use the same label incorrectly when attempting to dismiss claims they don’t like.
  - tshaddox 6y ago
kqr 6y ago
I think in order for the opposite thing to work, you have to approach the material with the understanding that "There are people who believe this stuff as firmly as I believe the complete opposite. If you asked them, they say, with absolute conviction, that I'm nuts. How might that happen? What if they're right? What could I have missed?" This engages System 2, hard. And it's so easy to slip back into System 1 and continue to reject the evidence in front of you, as System 1 does so well when it doesn't like what it's seeing. I have to constantly remind myself of the possibility that I could be wrong or have an incomplete view of things, but then that allows me to extract the valuable nuances and hidden assumptions that underlie the belief. Even more importantly, it tends to cast a light on my unconscious biases and assumptions that underlie my beliefs.
- AntiImperialist 6y ago
  >There are people who believe this stuff as firmly as I believe the complete opposite. If you asked them, they say, with absolute conviction, that I'm nuts. How might that happen? What if they're right? What could I have missed? After having read books on two sides of various things, I have found that most people don't have firm beliefs at all. Their beliefs don't even have anything to do with how they live. They have everything to do with what they're told will make them look good. So, just because someone says they believe something, I'm not willing to waste any more of my time on learning how it is justified on an intellectual or logical level (which is what books tend to capture). Even the believers most likely don't have any understanding of it themselves or how or why it matters to them. It's simply not worth it.
  - azeirah 6y ago
    I believe that it's important to understand the perspective of someone you fundamentally disagree with. Or, well, you described it more accurately, it's a bit deeper than disagreement, it's an entirely different epistemology! Like waaayy different
    - AntiImperialist 6y ago
      The problem is most people don't have those perspectives. Their beliefs don't come from their life experience or that of their family handed down to them. It comes from marketing material. Therefore they're highly inconsistent in their beliefs and what they believe they believe does not have anything to do with them or how they actually live their lives. So, if you want to understand what they think they're about, you can just watch the "news" or read other PR material targeted to them. That is now more difficult because it's a bit more targeted because of social media marketing but it is still possible. But if you want to know what they actually believe without even knowing that they do, you have to look at what they actually do and how they live their lives.
cgriswald 6y ago
> I think there is a genuine need for escaping echo chambers but every attempt is usually aimed just showing the opposite side/narrative. I think the idea that there only exists a single spectrum sorted into sides is itself a sort of meta echo chamber shared by people in echo chambers even as they disagree about everything else. In modern politics, even the idea that the opposed party holds opposite views (versus just opposed) is a meta echo chamber idea. In many left/right topics, the disagreement isn't 'pro/anti', but often more fundamental. Some examples: While conservatives might be anti-abortion, liberals aren't pro abortion, they're pro-choice and that's not just a rhetorical device. While liberals are anti-racism and see conservatives as pro-racism, a conservative rejects the idea out of hand because of a difference in definitions. A third, more nuanced view might even see the average conservative as non-racist (as opposed to anti-racist) which many would still argue is not enough, but it's not 'the opposite' at all. I don't think recommendations need to necessarily go to the extremes, but I don't think 'a shade to the left' is enough either, because without understanding the fundamental differences, you have a you-can't-get-there-from-here problem.
- tstrimple 6y ago
  > A third, more nuanced view might even see the average conservative as non-racist What if due to their isolation and the lack of diversity in rural areas actually leads to outcomes where certain parts of our country have more racist beliefs than people who grew up surrounded by people of all different colors and religions? Why do we have to keep ignoring studies and evidence in order to ascribe values to conservatives they never demonstrate? What if this isn't a both sides issue, and one side is definitely more wrong? Hint, the side marching with Neo Nazis chanting "The Jews Will Not Replace Us" is the side which is wrong here.
  - cgriswald 6y ago
    It's not up to me to break you out of your bubble. Your comments are deeply out of touch with reality and I know that nothing I say will convince you.
    - 6y ago
snupples 6y ago
It seems like no matter what books I key off of, the results appear to be pretty nuanced and not even necessarily absolutely opposing. This is really cool. I think part of the problem with just swinging to the absolute other end is, unless you're just interested in psychology, reading the "other side" is only of real value if you're reading quality, or at least good arguments made in good faith. At the extremes there seems to be a much higher tendency for the authors themselves to be deep in the echo chambers of their respective ideologies, as well as a higher likelyhood that its target audience is more forgiving of poor content as long as it hits close enough to the mark. Blindly selecting content by a strict point of view would seem to result in lower value overall. Not to say there isn't good reading out there in the extremes, but the level of chaff to sort through to find a decent seed is just too damn high. The value is ultimately in finding good content and not just an opposing point of view. Whenever I can find both at the same time, those are the real keepers.
kevinpet 6y ago
Agreed. I have long wanted to see a social network or recommendation engine that generated those arguments most likely to appeal to those who disagree. What Julia Galef calls steelmanning.
hinkley 6y ago
We have quite a few conversations here about how some issues aren’t on a continuum but on a plane. Maybe the thing to map out here is the extra dimension where things aren’t black and white. This person has read four books on the dark end of the scale? Let’s show them something in a forest green.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
stared 6y ago
I think that it is hard to beat r/ChangeMyView (https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/ https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/), as the arguments are usually much more detailed than "left vs right". However, there is one crucial prerequisite - someone needs to have an open mind, and courage to at least doubt one's own point of view. Compare and contrast with Change my View by Steven Crowder, which is full of fake openness + trolling, not genuine curiosity.

isogon 6y ago

My own experience is that it works quite well for a certain kind of person: on Reddit I was simultaneously subbed to /r/The_Donald, /r/politics, /r/ChapoTrapHouse, /r/Libertarian, etc (while those were still around). I'd also drop by voat occasionally to get my weekly sample of virulently antisemitic takes. I think looking at extremes is the most realistic path. Purportedly balanced sources are dangerous because their bias is subtle; extreme sources typically have very clear bias that is easy to keep in mind as you. You can read many extreme sources and sort of take the intersection of what they show you to guess at some minimal amount of what must be really true.

gcatalfamo 6y ago
My experience is surely anecdotal, but I feel your POV applies more to open minded people, while close minded people are more inclined to feel threatened by opposite perspectives.
- amanaplanacanal 6y ago
  Sometimes those opposite perspectives really are threatening, though.
  - sixstringtheory 6y ago
    True enough. And the response that I think should appeal even to the close-minded: those perspectives don’t go away just because you’re not exposed to them, and you won’t understand enough to push back if you never study then.
fouc 6y ago
That's an interesting idea! I could see it being good training for simultaneously holding two opposing thoughts in your head at any given time. What do you hope to gain out of going to the effort of consuming media like this? Why not just go on an information diet altogether?
- isogon 6y ago
  I think it is valuable to read a hundred convincingly-written arguments in favor of one point of view, become convinced, and then read a hundred opposing arguments and again become convinced. This maintains my awareness of the fact that I'm a terrible judge of veracity of arguments. Since I want to know what happens in the world, I must be exposed to arguments, so I think it's very important to be viscerally aware that I'm an idiot and should use a lot of care. As for why I want to know what happens in the world and particularly where I live (i.e. North America), it is because those events affect me. If I were on an information diet, then I would probably miss, for example, the recent passing of S.386 [0] by the US Senate, which is intimately relevant to me as my long-term goal is to immigrate to the US. [0] https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/386/all-info https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/386...
  - jorgesborges 6y ago
    That’s very perceptive. Have you been surprised at all, after reading both arguments, which side of the fence you wind up on?
  - tshaddox 6y ago
    This seems to presume that these points of view you’re talking about have no objective truth value, and that the only worthwhile exercise is constructing “convincingly-written” rhetoric to support one side or another.
    - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
      I don't take that from the gp at all. My perspective is that he seems to be saying you're not going to understand a position on an issue until you internalize it "as if" it was your own belief. By internalizing one belief and then another that contradicts it, you can truly compare them on the merits and perhaps become aware of the objective reality that they both share. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thesis,_antithesis,_synthesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thesis,_antithesis,_synthesis
hyperman1 6y ago
Aren't you just subscribing to an USA bubble now? Is there a way to add e.g. chinese, indian or islamic reddits to the mix?
- ARandomerDude 6y ago
  Aren't you just subscribing to the geopolitical bubble now? Is there a way to add quilting, farming, and spelunking? Tongue in cheek, but I bring this up to point out that while it might be good to expand one's knowledge, it can become a virtue. When that happens, we're all condemned because it'll never be broad enough.
- isogon 6y ago
  That's true. I should add /r/Sino to that list. I also subscribe to ChinaTalk, but I'm not sure how valuable a it is for really gauging what goes on in that part of the net. Unfortunately, I can't read Chinese, so I have to trust someone to translate and aggregate that content in the end. I haven't tried anything outside of US, China (these two being the two major geopolitical players), and Russia (because I am from there and understand the language). I would love to expand that list, but my time is limited. Another factor is that reading American commentary is entertaining because I live here and am immersed in the culture. The same goes for Russia. I haven't been able to make this work with China: there is a mass of cultural material that I'm not "in" on, so it feels much more like work.
maroonblazer 6y ago
Balanced sources tend to give you what the extremes don't, which is nuance. Does your approach not gloss over the nuance? Or are you able to surface the complexities of a given topic simply by examining the extremes?
- isogon 6y ago
  It does often gloss over the nuance. I ultimately try to estimate how bad I am at assessing the veracity of arguments concerning the topic at hand, which I think is most valuable. For example, I read many conflicting predictions concerning the last US election, saw that I could not distinguish bad predictions from good ones, and concluded that I have to remain unconvinced. I was vindicated by it being a very tight race. This doesn't always happen. On the other hand, I read the recent Texas filing [0] and found that I could confidently argue against it, and the best opposing arguments I could find did not convince me. To my SO, I confidently voiced the prediction that this lawsuit will fail, and articulated why the probability argument in the attached Cicchetti Declaration is misguided. This is arguably a very easy task, so this correct prediction does me little credit, but I think that's the point: even if I only become convinced of things which are obvious, it is important to not accidentally become convinced of things which are not obvious. [0] https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22O155/163048/20201208132827887_TX-v-State-ExpedMot%202020-12-07%20FINAL.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22O155/163048/2020...
  - amanaplanacanal 6y ago
    You may think it a very easy task, but it is one that a large proportion of our elected officials failed, or possibly pretended to fail for their own political gain.
  - sonotathrowaway 6y ago
    I don’t understand the basis by which you think this election was “tight”.
    - therealx 6y ago
magicalist 6y ago
> on Reddit I was simultaneously subbed to /r/The_Donald, /r/politics, /r/ChapoTrapHouse, /r/Libertarian, etc Maybe you were just enjoying reading shitposts? Nothing wrong with that, everyone has their version of tabloids they enjoy, but these are mostly barely thought through hot takes posted to get a reaction (and surfaced because they were successful at it). There's no reason to think their intersection is going to be anywhere near something "true" (let alone usefully true).
- sonotathrowaway 6y ago
  ^ A person studying their daily bowel movements for political commentary would be better informed than someone who read those subreddits looking for accurate political news, and they’d have a more honest assessment about the worth of their news sources. I can list plenty of subreddits with worthwhile political discussion, but none of that matters if a persons idea of “balanced” is to find the dregs of fringe and extreme political movements and use them as the basis of said balance. I’d wager that those subreddits represent less than 10% of the views of most Americans.
  - superduperuser 6y ago
    Would you mind sharing those subreddits with constructive political discussions?
    - ars 6y ago
      /r/NeutralPolitics tries pretty hard. The hard part is that reddit is majority liberal, so it's very very hard to find a good balance. Any random non-political subreddit is going to be liberal slanted. In order to find a conservative slant you have to go specifically to a political conservative subreddit.
    - sonotathrowaway 6y ago
      Left: /r/progressives Center left: /r/neoliberal Right: /r/neoconnwo Center right: /r/tuesday Neutral: /r/neutralpolitics /r/geopolitics /r/politicalfactchecking /r/truepolitics A spectrum of subreddits across ideological views, all with discussions you may actually learn something from. You’ll notice that none of those subreddits have been suspended because their members and moderators are repeatedly calling for violence against their political opponents, nor are they just recruiting boards for Stormfront. Again, finding the fringe conspiracy theorists repeatedly calling for violence doesn’t actually give you a well informed or balanced perspective.

postingpals 6y ago

Actually this tool seems to solve that problem by showing you multiple books, and not just direct opposites in terms of content. If you don't believe me search for 'Mein Kampf' and something similar, it doesn't spit out books you would consider opponents of Hitler's worldview necessarily. Now whether the books it spits out are even going to help you break out of your worldview, who knows, but I'm sure reading Shakespeare is going to loosen up a fascist to other ideas at least a little bit.

gcatalfamo 6y ago
you're right, I edited my comment to reflect I was being slightly OT.

pjc50 6y ago

The problem with delusional belief systems is that they tend to be coherent and self-supporting, just not rooted in reality. Statistical aggregates make this worse. You can argue that on average X is more than Y, or you can cherrypick all the examples where Y is greater than X to make your point.

arminiusreturns 6y ago
Lots of people call stuff they dont like "delusional belief systems" while ignoring the truths, even if nuggets, behind those systems...
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  I don't know man? People don't like, a lot of things, they don't call them delusional. We call things delusional because they are, in fact, delusional. What makes it dangerous is that people deeply believe that their delusions are "truth". Belief to the point of fundamentalism, where they will kill non-believers in their delusions.
  - User23 6y ago
    Naturally you can’t refute the claim that your stated belief there is delusional.
    - tshaddox 6y ago
      Sure you can. You can provide explanation of why your claim is not delusional.
  - tshaddox 6y ago
    Both obviously happen. The “delusional” label is used (rightly) to dismiss certain claims, but then of course people use the same label incorrectly when attempting to dismiss claims they don’t like.
- tshaddox 6y ago

kqr 6y ago

I think in order for the opposite thing to work, you have to approach the material with the understanding that "There are people who believe this stuff as firmly as I believe the complete opposite. If you asked them, they say, with absolute conviction, that I'm nuts. How might that happen? What if they're right? What could I have missed?" This engages System 2, hard. And it's so easy to slip back into System 1 and continue to reject the evidence in front of you, as System 1 does so well when it doesn't like what it's seeing. I have to constantly remind myself of the possibility that I could be wrong or have an incomplete view of things, but then that allows me to extract the valuable nuances and hidden assumptions that underlie the belief. Even more importantly, it tends to cast a light on my unconscious biases and assumptions that underlie my beliefs.

AntiImperialist 6y ago
>There are people who believe this stuff as firmly as I believe the complete opposite. If you asked them, they say, with absolute conviction, that I'm nuts. How might that happen? What if they're right? What could I have missed? After having read books on two sides of various things, I have found that most people don't have firm beliefs at all. Their beliefs don't even have anything to do with how they live. They have everything to do with what they're told will make them look good. So, just because someone says they believe something, I'm not willing to waste any more of my time on learning how it is justified on an intellectual or logical level (which is what books tend to capture). Even the believers most likely don't have any understanding of it themselves or how or why it matters to them. It's simply not worth it.
- azeirah 6y ago
  I believe that it's important to understand the perspective of someone you fundamentally disagree with. Or, well, you described it more accurately, it's a bit deeper than disagreement, it's an entirely different epistemology! Like waaayy different
  - AntiImperialist 6y ago
    The problem is most people don't have those perspectives. Their beliefs don't come from their life experience or that of their family handed down to them. It comes from marketing material. Therefore they're highly inconsistent in their beliefs and what they believe they believe does not have anything to do with them or how they actually live their lives. So, if you want to understand what they think they're about, you can just watch the "news" or read other PR material targeted to them. That is now more difficult because it's a bit more targeted because of social media marketing but it is still possible. But if you want to know what they actually believe without even knowing that they do, you have to look at what they actually do and how they live their lives.

cgriswald 6y ago

> I think there is a genuine need for escaping echo chambers but every attempt is usually aimed just showing the opposite side/narrative. I think the idea that there only exists a single spectrum sorted into sides is itself a sort of meta echo chamber shared by people in echo chambers even as they disagree about everything else. In modern politics, even the idea that the opposed party holds opposite views (versus just opposed) is a meta echo chamber idea. In many left/right topics, the disagreement isn't 'pro/anti', but often more fundamental. Some examples: While conservatives might be anti-abortion, liberals aren't pro abortion, they're pro-choice and that's not just a rhetorical device. While liberals are anti-racism and see conservatives as pro-racism, a conservative rejects the idea out of hand because of a difference in definitions. A third, more nuanced view might even see the average conservative as non-racist (as opposed to anti-racist) which many would still argue is not enough, but it's not 'the opposite' at all. I don't think recommendations need to necessarily go to the extremes, but I don't think 'a shade to the left' is enough either, because without understanding the fundamental differences, you have a you-can't-get-there-from-here problem.

tstrimple 6y ago
> A third, more nuanced view might even see the average conservative as non-racist What if due to their isolation and the lack of diversity in rural areas actually leads to outcomes where certain parts of our country have more racist beliefs than people who grew up surrounded by people of all different colors and religions? Why do we have to keep ignoring studies and evidence in order to ascribe values to conservatives they never demonstrate? What if this isn't a both sides issue, and one side is definitely more wrong? Hint, the side marching with Neo Nazis chanting "The Jews Will Not Replace Us" is the side which is wrong here.
- cgriswald 6y ago
  It's not up to me to break you out of your bubble. Your comments are deeply out of touch with reality and I know that nothing I say will convince you.
  - 6y ago

snupples 6y ago

It seems like no matter what books I key off of, the results appear to be pretty nuanced and not even necessarily absolutely opposing. This is really cool. I think part of the problem with just swinging to the absolute other end is, unless you're just interested in psychology, reading the "other side" is only of real value if you're reading quality, or at least good arguments made in good faith. At the extremes there seems to be a much higher tendency for the authors themselves to be deep in the echo chambers of their respective ideologies, as well as a higher likelyhood that its target audience is more forgiving of poor content as long as it hits close enough to the mark. Blindly selecting content by a strict point of view would seem to result in lower value overall. Not to say there isn't good reading out there in the extremes, but the level of chaff to sort through to find a decent seed is just too damn high. The value is ultimately in finding good content and not just an opposing point of view. Whenever I can find both at the same time, those are the real keepers.

kevinpet 6y ago

Agreed. I have long wanted to see a social network or recommendation engine that generated those arguments most likely to appeal to those who disagree. What Julia Galef calls steelmanning.

hinkley 6y ago

We have quite a few conversations here about how some issues aren’t on a continuum but on a plane. Maybe the thing to map out here is the extra dimension where things aren’t black and white. This person has read four books on the dark end of the scale? Let’s show them something in a forest green.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

stared 6y ago

I think that it is hard to beat r/ChangeMyView (https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/ https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/), as the arguments are usually much more detailed than "left vs right". However, there is one crucial prerequisite - someone needs to have an open mind, and courage to at least doubt one's own point of view. Compare and contrast with Change my View by Steven Crowder, which is full of fake openness + trolling, not genuine curiosity.