Comment by emptysongglass | Hacker News Reader

Comment by emptysongglass | Hacker News Reader

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I just don't think that debate is a good tool for getting sympathy for one's ideas. Look at how we are here on HN with the CCP is bad/CCP is vilified debate. No one is going to convince me that the CCP isn't committing genocide and I'm not going to convince anyone that the CCP is. (Dang, this is not me trying to start a nationalistic flamewar: I actually deleted a comment I wrote earlier after reflecting on what it was doing.)

I don't know. I really do want to understand the other side's ideas but we need a better method than debate because debate is fundamentally about winning. Try it with your partner: if either side wins everyone loses.

Where my wife and I find the love and communion is when we soften. And if we've been quarreling a lot often the thing for us is taking a psychedelic together and then crying our eyes out in a long embrace. Very healing and the furthest thing I can imagine from debate.

I don't know how to love someone who advocates for a country doing genocide. Or who says the satellite photos we see are not evidence of genocide. And I'm using this most extreme example to illustrate that there may not be a point of reconciliation: only people feeling good about winning.

I think the question to ask is "what would someone gain from getting convinced about some specific statement?"

In your CCP example: I gain nothing by getting convinced one way or the other, and neither does anyone in China gain or lose anything from me getting convinced. Unlike you and your wife's relationship, you and I don't even truly care if we sympathize with each other or not (us being internet strangers and all). Case in point, have you ever done anything for your nearest Falun Dafa crowd? Personally, I don't plan on getting involved with them, even if I have been convinced of the persecution claims (and the same goes for east africa, venezuela, abused puppies, etc).

The fundamental paradox of debating, IMHO, is that debating is inherently a selfish endeavor: a lot of people do it for self-satisfaction, not because they are trying to accomplish something. Personally, I just acknowledge the selfish motive and use debating as a tool for bringing out ideas from others that I might not have thought of myself, so that I can then incorporate those ideas into my own mental framework of the topic.

> Personally, I just acknowledge the selfish motive and use debating as a tool for bringing out ideas from others that I might not have thought of myself, so that I can then incorporate those ideas into my own mental framework of the topic.

I think that is most people's motive though and it can be mutually beneficial. I think there is an innate satisfaction in acquiring new knowledge or a new perspective. And the applications of this can be very wide-reaching.

> "what would someone gain from getting convinced about some specific statement?"

If you can bring someone in from a political extreme then that is making the world a better place.

What we need is people to be properly incentivized to win whilst arguing the opposing view. From this exercise you will come to understand your opponents view perfectly.

But its a difficult exercise to do without the proper incentive. You can't just say "congrats you won...because the side you had is right". You have to want to win. You would be forced to empathize with the other's situation.

For me, lack of understanding of the other side's argument is the biggest problem with discourse today.

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