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> If someone is a member of a group, it is almost not worth listening to their arguments, especially arguments in support of views held strongly by that group.
by mistermann 4y ago
> If someone is a member of a group, it is almost not worth listening to their arguments, especially arguments in support of views held strongly by that group. They are arguing in order to maintain their group membership, not to find the truth. It appears this is true of academic and scientific disciplines as much as anywhere else.
I tend to agree with you, but based on the way you have worded this, I am curious if you think that people have conscious awareness (which is required to form intent) of this?
And as a follow-up: if this phenomenon is sub perceptual, might that change how one might go about addressing it, or even discussing it (it is a fairly common point raised in these sorts of discussions)?
- bigmatto 4y agoI think there can be different things going on under the hood. Some people will be self aware, and not take arguments or positions too seriously - their own or others - they know they hold the points of view for group membership - they tend to not to like to debate them, aware of the futility. More common though is ego-defense/group-defense reaction. This is the zealot. Both a person's ego (you're wrong) and their group (your group is wrong) is on the line. This is in addition to losing their membership of a group if they adopt a different position.
- mistermann 4y agoYa, it's a big chaotic mess, but I wonder if we humans are somewhat prone to letting the apparent complexity of it (the actual complexity isn't actually known) scare us away from trying to make sense of it all. Look how much complexity about the physical world that science has come to understand, because we applied some of the sharpest minds we have to the problem, and funded them well. If we don't even try (including if the idea doesn't even cross our minds), we may never succeed.