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> Remaining curious about the speaker’s perspective, where it comes from and what it means to them, is always the best policy. I wouldn't advocate that people

by jl6 3y ago

> Remaining curious about the speaker’s perspective, where it comes from and what it means to them, is always the best policy. I wouldn't advocate that people with delusional beliefs should be ignored 100% of the time, but it's hard to remain curious in the face of a lot of delusional beliefs that you've heard a hundred times before. Yeah, sure, 5G gives you Covid. That was a fun one to unpack the first time - definitely worth being curious about where that came from. But eventually you start to recognize patterns of nonsense, and it just becomes boring, so we arrive at dismissal as a time-saving heuristic. I’m all up for hearing some novel delusions.

roenxi 3y ago
> Yeah, sure, 5G gives you Covid. That was a fun one to unpack the first time... Asking out of curiosity rather than cynicism - did you actually encounter that one in the wild? Where? I've never met anyone who believed that, despite the remarkable amount of effort that seems to go in to debunking it.
- jl6 3y ago
  Yes, I have a close relative who is deep into conspiracy theories, and in conversation we skirted around that one. He referenced the idea and then said something like “of course, we are told that can’t possibly be true, although there are some very serious people who do think there might be something to it”. That was his off-ramp as he didn’t want to try to defend it, but he clearly didn’t completely dismiss it. The guy has a PhD from a respectable university.
empath-nirvana 3y ago
I think mostly the problem with arguing with people that have certain classes of delusions is not the belief that they're crazy or lack agency, or even that they're just inherently _stupid_, but that they're either profoundly ignorant or engaging in motivated reasoning. Often they believe (or profess to believe) in something because it makes them feel better for one reason or another. A lot of people claim certain beliefs because it's important for whatever group they claim membership in that they claim to believe it. In either case, arguing them out of it just isn't worth the effort. In the case of people being profoundly ignorant, there's so much you have to explain about how the world works, including really basic things like "how you know something is true", before you have enough common ground to have a reasonable conversation about it. In the case of people who have motivated reasoning, they believe those things for reasons that are entirely immune to any kind of rational argument, because they are starting with the conclusion they want and only see evidence and rational arguments as tools to persuade others of that belief and not as a means of getting to "the truth". They're not crazy, they just don't care about what's true. You can be deeply wrong about a lot of things in life and it _never matters_. Does it matter if you believe the world is flat or not? In almost all cases, no it doesn't. So if it makes you feel better, why not believe that?

by jl6 3y ago

roenxi 3y ago

> Yeah, sure, 5G gives you Covid. That was a fun one to unpack the first time... Asking out of curiosity rather than cynicism - did you actually encounter that one in the wild? Where? I've never met anyone who believed that, despite the remarkable amount of effort that seems to go in to debunking it.

jl6 3y ago
Yes, I have a close relative who is deep into conspiracy theories, and in conversation we skirted around that one. He referenced the idea and then said something like “of course, we are told that can’t possibly be true, although there are some very serious people who do think there might be something to it”. That was his off-ramp as he didn’t want to try to defend it, but he clearly didn’t completely dismiss it. The guy has a PhD from a respectable university.

empath-nirvana 3y ago

I think mostly the problem with arguing with people that have certain classes of delusions is not the belief that they're crazy or lack agency, or even that they're just inherently _stupid_, but that they're either profoundly ignorant or engaging in motivated reasoning. Often they believe (or profess to believe) in something because it makes them feel better for one reason or another. A lot of people claim certain beliefs because it's important for whatever group they claim membership in that they claim to believe it. In either case, arguing them out of it just isn't worth the effort. In the case of people being profoundly ignorant, there's so much you have to explain about how the world works, including really basic things like "how you know something is true", before you have enough common ground to have a reasonable conversation about it. In the case of people who have motivated reasoning, they believe those things for reasons that are entirely immune to any kind of rational argument, because they are starting with the conclusion they want and only see evidence and rational arguments as tools to persuade others of that belief and not as a means of getting to "the truth". They're not crazy, they just don't care about what's true. You can be deeply wrong about a lot of things in life and it _never matters_. Does it matter if you believe the world is flat or not? In almost all cases, no it doesn't. So if it makes you feel better, why not believe that?