political conversations
So, I got linked this,
https://www.ted.com/talks/robb_willer_how_to_have_better_political_conversations?utm_source=tedcomshare&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=tedspread
After pondering it for a while, I came to a realization. Of all the people that I know, the single worst offender, is... Myself. I don't tailor an argument to appeal to the person I am talking to. At all. What I do instead is restate the arguments that sold me.
I have come to understand that that is partly due to what is required to convince me, and the chances are that I am unusual. Because my core values are not represented in anything that he listed. Appeals to "purity" make me ask "Pure what?", appeals to "fairness" typically make me want to offer a lollypop. "Gross" is in the eye of the beholder, and authority is to be respected only insofar as it is worthy of the respect (well, maybe a little more than that, because lawlessness is often worse than bad laws). My core values are "fact", and "economy". A person possesses agency only insofar as they can make their own decisions. Making decisions requires the processing of facts. When a politician lies to the public, they are attempting to substitute their judgement for your own, and that's not different except stylistically to the slavers whip. Economy, for this purpose, means that public policy should, over the long term, and considering all the realities, provide the greatest good to the greatest number. Now, that means that IF someone can make the lives of 1 million people 1% better, and he himself makes himself wealthier than all of them combined by doing it, then it's better that he do it than not, even though it's wildly unequal, 1 million and 1 people are better off. It's win/win!
Which has always meant (in my mind) that if you want to convince me of a thing, present your data. I will weigh it against the data the other side presents, apply the most scientific analysis I know of to which evidence is the more credible, and make a decision*. If you want to convince me that a certain policy is better than another, consider the variables, and sell me on why the future you are building is better than the future the other guy is building. Simple, right? If you want to convince me, be right, and prove it! So why do so few people even attempt that method? I may beginning to understand. It seems likely that where there is a story on one side, and evidence based facts on the other, people will usually believe the story.
Similarly, I assume that most of the people that I have debated with have been nonplussed because I was A) flatly denying things that they had long accepted as fact based on evidence that they found convincing, and B) not evidently valuing the thing that they valued above all else. The realization is, most people are NOT Vulcans. And that's okay.
It's okay because humanity, in all our illogic, all of our falling for fraudsters, charlatans, hucksters, demagogues, con men and monsters… Is beautiful! In between horrors, we built the most *amazing* world of wonders! Somehow, people are able to pick up the brass knuckles and brutally attack mostly innocent people, and then go to work in the morning and build miracles. I don't know *how* that works, but the evidence of my eyes tells me that it does. We're here. Surrounded in miracles.
Now, none of this means that I am suddenly going to start hearing substance in the speeches of Sanders or trump, neither of them uses the types of appeal that interest me, and that isn't going to change (at least partly because I don't want it to). Nor am I likely to start accepting the types of arguments that most of my friends are likely to present. I *am* however, more likely to stop trying to convince other people using the thing that convinced me.
*For the record, let me give you an example of something that caused me to reverse a prior belief. My lived experience, and a large body of anecdotal evidence suggested to me that people purchasing food with food stamps purchased more junk food than people using their own money. It turns out, that the difference *does exist*, but is relatively slight, except for a fairly dramatic difference in the consumption of soda. https://www.fns.usda.gov/…/SNAPFoodsTypicallyPurchased-Summ…, there goes that. Beliefs should (in my mind) follow evidence, not vice versa.
https://www.ted.com/talks/robb_willer_how_to_have_better_political_conversations?utm_source=tedcomshare&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=tedspread
After pondering it for a while, I came to a realization. Of all the people that I know, the single worst offender, is... Myself. I don't tailor an argument to appeal to the person I am talking to. At all. What I do instead is restate the arguments that sold me.
I have come to understand that that is partly due to what is required to convince me, and the chances are that I am unusual. Because my core values are not represented in anything that he listed. Appeals to "purity" make me ask "Pure what?", appeals to "fairness" typically make me want to offer a lollypop. "Gross" is in the eye of the beholder, and authority is to be respected only insofar as it is worthy of the respect (well, maybe a little more than that, because lawlessness is often worse than bad laws). My core values are "fact", and "economy". A person possesses agency only insofar as they can make their own decisions. Making decisions requires the processing of facts. When a politician lies to the public, they are attempting to substitute their judgement for your own, and that's not different except stylistically to the slavers whip. Economy, for this purpose, means that public policy should, over the long term, and considering all the realities, provide the greatest good to the greatest number. Now, that means that IF someone can make the lives of 1 million people 1% better, and he himself makes himself wealthier than all of them combined by doing it, then it's better that he do it than not, even though it's wildly unequal, 1 million and 1 people are better off. It's win/win!
Which has always meant (in my mind) that if you want to convince me of a thing, present your data. I will weigh it against the data the other side presents, apply the most scientific analysis I know of to which evidence is the more credible, and make a decision*. If you want to convince me that a certain policy is better than another, consider the variables, and sell me on why the future you are building is better than the future the other guy is building. Simple, right? If you want to convince me, be right, and prove it! So why do so few people even attempt that method? I may beginning to understand. It seems likely that where there is a story on one side, and evidence based facts on the other, people will usually believe the story.
Similarly, I assume that most of the people that I have debated with have been nonplussed because I was A) flatly denying things that they had long accepted as fact based on evidence that they found convincing, and B) not evidently valuing the thing that they valued above all else. The realization is, most people are NOT Vulcans. And that's okay.
It's okay because humanity, in all our illogic, all of our falling for fraudsters, charlatans, hucksters, demagogues, con men and monsters… Is beautiful! In between horrors, we built the most *amazing* world of wonders! Somehow, people are able to pick up the brass knuckles and brutally attack mostly innocent people, and then go to work in the morning and build miracles. I don't know *how* that works, but the evidence of my eyes tells me that it does. We're here. Surrounded in miracles.
Now, none of this means that I am suddenly going to start hearing substance in the speeches of Sanders or trump, neither of them uses the types of appeal that interest me, and that isn't going to change (at least partly because I don't want it to). Nor am I likely to start accepting the types of arguments that most of my friends are likely to present. I *am* however, more likely to stop trying to convince other people using the thing that convinced me.
*For the record, let me give you an example of something that caused me to reverse a prior belief. My lived experience, and a large body of anecdotal evidence suggested to me that people purchasing food with food stamps purchased more junk food than people using their own money. It turns out, that the difference *does exist*, but is relatively slight, except for a fairly dramatic difference in the consumption of soda. https://www.fns.usda.gov/…/SNAPFoodsTypicallyPurchased-Summ…, there goes that. Beliefs should (in my mind) follow evidence, not vice versa.