5 ms·

> There's nothing like attacking something you are oblivious to. This is why, when it comes to rejecting a particular ideology, I believe you need to have adop

by walterk 18y ago

> There's nothing like attacking something you are oblivious to. This is why, when it comes to rejecting a particular ideology, I believe you need to have adopted that ideology to the point that you genuinely grok it. If you can't replicate the mental operations that allow a subscriber to make sense of the world, what its problems are and how to solve them, and the ways they derive comfort and validation from those operations, then you're guilty of being uncharitable to their worldview. And if you're uncharitable, you're unlikely to develop an argument that demonstrates how an ideology is flawed given its own values and assumptions, or how that ideology actually conflicts with one's pre-ideological values and assumptions. The ideologies that survive are always more resourceful at countering counterarguments than a non-grokker will expect. Which is as good a reason as any to actually try it out, first.

DanielBMarkham 18y ago
Absolutely agree. Which is why the goal of any net conversation should not be to persuade, but to understand how the other ideology deals with arguments against it. That can sometimes sound like bickering, but the real goal should be understanding, not to "win" or "lose".
- walterk 18y ago
  Yes, exactly. As a recent fortune cookie fortune put it: "The purpose of argument, should not be victory, but progress."
Retric 18y ago
One of the problems with that viewpoint is reality is harsh. Pollution is a classic cases of the tragedy of the commons and all successful forms of government need to deal with this and thousands of other issues. Maximizing prosperity is something with many local minimums over the short and long term. IMO saying X is correct when you are wrong should lead to ridicule lest others assume it's a reasonable argument. PS: Read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Selfish_Gene http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Selfish_Gene works as an analogy for ideologies. They don't need to help their followers as ideology only needs to propagate faster than it's killed off.
- walterk 18y ago
  > IMO saying X is correct when you are wrong should lead to ridicule lest others assume it's a reasonable argument. I think ridicule is a bad idea, because it invariably activates one's ego defense mechanisms. When that happens, your chances of convincing someone that they're wrong (assuming that they're wrong) drop to zero, while the level of polarization goes up. Granted, some people are so hardened in their beliefs that only widespread ridicule may be able to put a crack in their shell (albeit at high psychological cost).
  - Retric 18y ago
    I am not trying to convince the person I am talking with to my side of the argument rather it's the audience. When people sit back and say your wrong because of X, Y and Z others see this as a demonstration of conflict so both sides could be right. But, when people say "the world is 6,000 years old" and you respond with "Did the talking snake tell you that?" it works on a different level. Take global worming there is a manufactured debate on the issue and few people are willing to say, "Ok, smart guy how should we rewrite the laws of physics?" Or, letting people say "Clean Coal" like there is such a thing when they can say, "Ok, I agree that Clean Coal is great let's mandate zero CO2 emissions from coal in 5 years." so they need to say, "Well we don't have the ability to do that."
  - stcredzero 18y ago
    Since this reaction is so strong, wouldn't the logical move be to exploit it? I think successful salesmen often figure out how to reinforce people's ego defense mechanisms. They play to their audience's fears and offer some sort of relief.
    - walterk 18y ago
      Not if you want to live in a reason-based society. Exploitation as an effective maneuver is dependent on a society unpracticed and unconditioned in the use of reason. It may be a practical move in the short run, but invariably has terrible consequences in the long. A society that remains vulnerable to such exploits will be swayed by the best exploiters rather than the best arguments (which is how it is now). In the long run, our best strategy is to cultivate cool, calm, collected, and charitable discourse.
pelle 18y ago
I agree as well. Too many people in the US use the term "liberal" or "socialist" without really understanding what that means. The same seems to be very much true at the moment about libertarians. Zed who I have a world of respect for doesn't seem to have the faintest idea what a libertarian is. What he describes is a centrist Republican. I grew up a Socialist in a Socialist house hold. I spent much of my teenage years in all kinds of "important" positions in a socialist party in Denmark. Then I became an entrepreneur and my whole world view changed. I didn't read Ayn Rand or any libertarian literature until 15 years later, but my world view changed completely during a year and I became what I later realized was a Libertarian. Most of my opinions are based on observation. This also frustrates me sometimes with other libertarians (and in particular Republican's) is that they don't understand where socialists come from, so they often have difficulties communicating with them. I understand all the arguments socialists make because I used to make them. But I also understand that their reasoning is based on absolutely flawed understandings of economics and human behavior. I would recommend anyone reads Marx's Communist Manifesto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Manifesto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Manifesto as it expresses the basic ideas behind not just Communism, but socialism as a whole and to a somewhat smaller extent the more left wing parts of the Democratic party in the US. It would also be useful if Republicans, "liberals" and socialist had a quick read of Adam Smith's truly profound Wealth of Nations as this is kind of the libertarian equivalent of Marx's writings. So they would actually have a clue what we believe. PJ O'Rourke wrote a pretty good cliff notes edition of it: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6743689 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6743689
- walterk 18y ago
  That's pretty fascinating. My own ideological path went from - Republican conservatism (raised in a Republican household) to - pseudo-communism (some crazy idea I had in high school without reading Marx) to - Objectivism (a friend gave me The Fountainhead while in college, picked up Atlas Shrugged shortly after, then Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal and Peikoff's book on Objectivism) to - utilitarian liberal (introduced to Mill in a course on political philosophy (along with Nozick, who is unconvincing), studied more utilitarianism in other courses) Note that I'm a utilitarian first, and liberal by implication of (my) utilitarian logic. I'm also aware of the bevy of criticisms that have been leveled at utilitarianism, some of which are persuasive (the Greatest Happiness Principle does not adequately address the complexity of moral psychology), while others are simply demanding a precision of calculation that's not attainable. In practice, one can successfully apply utilitarian reasoning in a great many situations. The problem that I have with libertarianism is that I don't buy the "negative rights only" stance (at all), and believe that social interventions backed by force of law are necessary to overcome historically and sociologically entrenched inequalities of opportunity (positive feedback loops of discrimination and decay). That we haven't done it as effectively or efficiently as we would like doesn't mean that it shouldn't be attempted at all. There's room for experimentation, and we're getting better at experimenting. Many of the recently developed entrepreneurial practices (fail early) can be fruitfully applied in this area.
MaysonL 18y ago
To reject an ideology, you need ONLY to know that it is an ideology. Rhetorical fever: the communicable mental illness of humanity.

by walterk 18y ago

DanielBMarkham 18y ago

Absolutely agree. Which is why the goal of any net conversation should not be to persuade, but to understand how the other ideology deals with arguments against it. That can sometimes sound like bickering, but the real goal should be understanding, not to "win" or "lose".

walterk 18y ago
Yes, exactly. As a recent fortune cookie fortune put it: "The purpose of argument, should not be victory, but progress."

Retric 18y ago

One of the problems with that viewpoint is reality is harsh. Pollution is a classic cases of the tragedy of the commons and all successful forms of government need to deal with this and thousands of other issues. Maximizing prosperity is something with many local minimums over the short and long term. IMO saying X is correct when you are wrong should lead to ridicule lest others assume it's a reasonable argument. PS: Read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Selfish_Gene http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Selfish_Gene works as an analogy for ideologies. They don't need to help their followers as ideology only needs to propagate faster than it's killed off.

walterk 18y ago
> IMO saying X is correct when you are wrong should lead to ridicule lest others assume it's a reasonable argument. I think ridicule is a bad idea, because it invariably activates one's ego defense mechanisms. When that happens, your chances of convincing someone that they're wrong (assuming that they're wrong) drop to zero, while the level of polarization goes up. Granted, some people are so hardened in their beliefs that only widespread ridicule may be able to put a crack in their shell (albeit at high psychological cost).
- Retric 18y ago
  I am not trying to convince the person I am talking with to my side of the argument rather it's the audience. When people sit back and say your wrong because of X, Y and Z others see this as a demonstration of conflict so both sides could be right. But, when people say "the world is 6,000 years old" and you respond with "Did the talking snake tell you that?" it works on a different level. Take global worming there is a manufactured debate on the issue and few people are willing to say, "Ok, smart guy how should we rewrite the laws of physics?" Or, letting people say "Clean Coal" like there is such a thing when they can say, "Ok, I agree that Clean Coal is great let's mandate zero CO2 emissions from coal in 5 years." so they need to say, "Well we don't have the ability to do that."
- stcredzero 18y ago
  Since this reaction is so strong, wouldn't the logical move be to exploit it? I think successful salesmen often figure out how to reinforce people's ego defense mechanisms. They play to their audience's fears and offer some sort of relief.
  - walterk 18y ago
    Not if you want to live in a reason-based society. Exploitation as an effective maneuver is dependent on a society unpracticed and unconditioned in the use of reason. It may be a practical move in the short run, but invariably has terrible consequences in the long. A society that remains vulnerable to such exploits will be swayed by the best exploiters rather than the best arguments (which is how it is now). In the long run, our best strategy is to cultivate cool, calm, collected, and charitable discourse.

pelle 18y ago

I agree as well. Too many people in the US use the term "liberal" or "socialist" without really understanding what that means. The same seems to be very much true at the moment about libertarians. Zed who I have a world of respect for doesn't seem to have the faintest idea what a libertarian is. What he describes is a centrist Republican. I grew up a Socialist in a Socialist house hold. I spent much of my teenage years in all kinds of "important" positions in a socialist party in Denmark. Then I became an entrepreneur and my whole world view changed. I didn't read Ayn Rand or any libertarian literature until 15 years later, but my world view changed completely during a year and I became what I later realized was a Libertarian. Most of my opinions are based on observation. This also frustrates me sometimes with other libertarians (and in particular Republican's) is that they don't understand where socialists come from, so they often have difficulties communicating with them. I understand all the arguments socialists make because I used to make them. But I also understand that their reasoning is based on absolutely flawed understandings of economics and human behavior. I would recommend anyone reads Marx's Communist Manifesto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Manifesto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Manifesto as it expresses the basic ideas behind not just Communism, but socialism as a whole and to a somewhat smaller extent the more left wing parts of the Democratic party in the US. It would also be useful if Republicans, "liberals" and socialist had a quick read of Adam Smith's truly profound Wealth of Nations as this is kind of the libertarian equivalent of Marx's writings. So they would actually have a clue what we believe. PJ O'Rourke wrote a pretty good cliff notes edition of it: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6743689 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6743689

walterk 18y ago
That's pretty fascinating. My own ideological path went from - Republican conservatism (raised in a Republican household) to - pseudo-communism (some crazy idea I had in high school without reading Marx) to - Objectivism (a friend gave me The Fountainhead while in college, picked up Atlas Shrugged shortly after, then Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal and Peikoff's book on Objectivism) to - utilitarian liberal (introduced to Mill in a course on political philosophy (along with Nozick, who is unconvincing), studied more utilitarianism in other courses) Note that I'm a utilitarian first, and liberal by implication of (my) utilitarian logic. I'm also aware of the bevy of criticisms that have been leveled at utilitarianism, some of which are persuasive (the Greatest Happiness Principle does not adequately address the complexity of moral psychology), while others are simply demanding a precision of calculation that's not attainable. In practice, one can successfully apply utilitarian reasoning in a great many situations. The problem that I have with libertarianism is that I don't buy the "negative rights only" stance (at all), and believe that social interventions backed by force of law are necessary to overcome historically and sociologically entrenched inequalities of opportunity (positive feedback loops of discrimination and decay). That we haven't done it as effectively or efficiently as we would like doesn't mean that it shouldn't be attempted at all. There's room for experimentation, and we're getting better at experimenting. Many of the recently developed entrepreneurial practices (fail early) can be fruitfully applied in this area.

MaysonL 18y ago

To reject an ideology, you need ONLY to know that it is an ideology. Rhetorical fever: the communicable mental illness of humanity.