Point, Non Counter Point
A Pre-Stein Night observation: Sometimes it happens at Stein Night, and other conversations where topics lead to heat, where a point will be made. At this point in the conversation a rebuttal of the point may be in order, but instead of a rebuttal the second person in the conversation doesn’t even address the first point, they go and make their own (seemingly unrelated) point. This is not an efficient way to get at the truth. It is a rhetorical trick. I think the goal is to divert the momentum of the conversation away from an unpleasant truth or a difficult and precarious rebuttal.
To be clear, here is an example:
3XHAR: A
NotHAR: Oh? What about B?
3XHAR: You have not addressed A.
NotHAR: You have not addressed B!
I’ve noticed this a lot when politics comes up. Oh, and it doesn’t help to address B. NotHAR will just move on to C and D without ever addressing A. A just ends up standing out there all alone like one of those high school dreams where you’re standing there in your underwear in the middle of class…
3XHAR: Bush/Clinton did this awful thing. Please acknowledge it’s awfulness or defend it.
NotHAR: Clinton/Bush did this other unrelated thing! What about that? Now you defend that.
3XHAR: Uh… you haven’t addressed my first statement…
Please, just answer the question. If your rebuttal is ripped apart, then either refine and restate it or change your mind.
Interestingly, this happens with blogs too. I think it’s because there are conversational correlates to blogging that make it an easy trap to spring… Well, we’ll see if this happens tomorrow at Stein Night.
posted by 3XHAR @ 9:51 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
You clearly haven't even addressed the issue of arguments posted on internet discussion boards and newsgroups!
My half-assed theory is that it's because constructing arguments is hard, so people tend to just repeat already-prepared arguments by rote, rather than constructing them on the fly to address the unique, immediate discussion. It deflects the discussion into an area that they are more comfortable with, because they already have a pre-recorded argument tape in their heads that they can pull out and play.
I've seen the true masters of the art on some discussion boards: They can literally deflect the discussion thread into an entirely different direction with every single post they make. Arguing with someone like that is the perfect example of "like nailing jelly to a tree".
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