Hehe, when two groups believe they are correct, it's really hard to argue.

Lol by the other party you just described exactly how that specific group argues (if i mention their name I’ll be banned as always 💁‍♂️)

First task is to ask them questions and let them answer them. People need to feel like you understand their position, whether it's emotional or reasoned or a mixture of the two before they will entertain the idea that your opinion is worth listening to.

Additional suggestions…

With some people… there’s no moving them and they will not be a rationale actor. Don’t let this derail your intial attempts because what we should more so focus on is breaking people down by a small percent. Maybe I can’t destroy their world view in one fail swoop but I can maybe inch it along to get a better long term result. It doesn’t mean they are bad faith necessarily it just means they are stubborn and determined. Even reading my suggestions to help you now if you even think any of them are worthy; you won’t remember every word but you can try and take a little something and add it to your utility tool belt.

More than ever… people won’t listen to your facts until you find some common ground with their feelings. In this regard, the Ben Shapiro’s of the world eat a bag of dicks; confusing their presuppositions and feelings of god as areas to reverse engineer their whole world views around. It’s circular when you say well god must be because therefor god and therefor this one form of god I just so happened to be born to believe.

I live in anti intellectual land with MAGA conservatives. If I don’t validate their emotions first, they won’t even allow what I say to go into their heads.. that newly created derangement syndrome where even one wrong key hit word can shut down a convo. You can notice they’ll say their own back at you that are intentional triggers with poor semantic definitions and caricatures. I often make them wear others shoes or take their shoes and show them what it’s like to be worn on others. Finding a position that you know they hold and explaining something analogous to it, its the best medicine for this block wall people put up to hide behind. So always finding commonality, where you agree; it’s sets the stage for working out the differences. Compliments from the start are even better… then you can throw in the “but…” For instance, say the person your talking is a contractor. If I can find ways to explain almost any issue we’re discussing in a way that a construction worker understands building, legal codes, material, the process, dealing with other employees. Etc., Well then I can can almost always open their eyes in a new way that they can relate to.

Then tone moderation. If they get out of hand try not to match it. In a competitive debate that might be productive to win rhetorically but not when you really want to open someone’s mind. You can make someone see they are acting irrational by letting their emotions get a hold of them. Some people don’t response well if you timid so I’ve used the tone match and pejoratives to positive effect on rare occasions. These tend to be those people who don’t want NPR they want blood sport Hannity times ten and they are used ti communicating by calling each other names (as hom). Often these are the most emotional softy’s when you break them like a wild horse. So on occasion being able to shit sling back can be powerful and useful in that machismo male dynamic. But I’m serious when I say this it’s typically a redneck drunken bar mindset or someone who’s had a rough upbringing (which can be both). I’ve seen it in rural and urban raised people.

To me it’s like them seeing I can throw down with them. And often these people are the most receptive after you round house kick their emotions to the break point. Sometimes it’s impressive to see how they don’t take it personally too. Almost a hazing type thing. I know many that will say… “aww you know this mean we’re tight, right..” I’ve never been a fan of male bonding in this way myself, where they trash each other all day.

But in this regard I like to consider the Eisenhower White House war room where we all duke out our ideas so that everything’s on the table and nothings missed, everyone says their peace, but we’re cool afterwards like nothing happened and we can go have lunch together. Our politics used to be more like that in some ways now it’s seen as a sign of team weakness if members of the opposing party’s are friends. It’s a bad situation to be in because it closes off the productive discussion.

There’s no golden rules either. Learn to improv and adapt. Take some risk trying different methods. It’s like any skill, you have to practice it to get good.

I learned real fast with the people I live around that my method of telling them their point of view in my own before they ever speak to cut the BS and time doesn’t work at all. Instead, I have to listened to mostly the tired talking points I just tried to get us past to the main point and it’s dreadfully ineffective in certain groups becuase I’m not validating their experience letting them tell me Jimmy dads uncles friends brother anecdote or whatever. So often unless your in the same frame work and intellectual grounding, there are no short cuts either. You have to put in the work to make sure they feel listened to. Along this path of being a good listener you should find some reasonable angles they use (hopefully) that you can then learn from and exploit in a positive way in relating it to them.

Most people run off the simple patternized survival heuristics that humans evolved to become so powerful from. That comes at the determent of understanding data outside our experience. We tend to trust what WE know. So concrete examples are needed with compelling emotional tone. Appeal to their senses of justice to over comes the angles and slant that bury one in their own centered world. “What if this happened to you?” You might just find people who don’t care about anyone but themselves. That typically a facade, yet their are a small percent of sociopaths too. Most people have the ability to empathize if you can get them on that level of comfort. I know people that laugh off rape allegation as insignificant yet if you ask them if it happened to their wife or daughter they’d say they’d go murder whoever it was without thinking.

Hope that’s helpful. ✌🏼

> Animals may have consciousness of some kind, we don’t and probably will never know, but they don’t have reflective self consciousness because they do not use language.

That's a strange thing to say.

E: i.e. saying that animals don't use language. They do, of course.

Maybe one day in the future all of humanity will unite as one society and we'll realize that we're all brothers and it'll be a real big kumbaya moment like John Lennon's "Imagine".

And in those times people will look back on the charters and constitutions of our nations and see them as myths the same as you view the Bible or Star Wars today.

The Bible is just the old myth. Now we have new ones. They will also prove to be bullshit.

Capitalism is a fairy tale that permeates your life and I bet that understanding it would be helpful to you.

There's no such thing as "America" either but it matters very much to millions of people what it means.

I wouldn't throw out the myths so quickly if I were you!

Have our myths gonna away because science has provided better answered or have they just changed form?

The myth of Hades is probably not relevant to us anymore because we have science to explain seasons. But what about our shared myths about how the economy must work or what is "America" or what is "liberty"?

What you've written reminds me of a scene from Il Postino, when the postman is trying to understand why Neruda writes in metaphors. The whole movie might be a good way to think about myths and metaphor...

Anyway:

You see, Mario...

I can't tell you...

in words different

from those I've used.

When you explain it,

poetry becomes banal.

Better than any explanation...

is the experience of feelings

that poetry can reveal...

to a nature open enough

to understand it.

I

Have to

Worth pointing out that Fukuyama himself has long since repudiated the idea.

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As a companion to this article I loved "An illustrated book of bad arguments" by Ali Almossawi - Straw men, Equivocation, appeal to fear. it's all there.

As the author said: "A good arguer has to speak to and be heard by those with whom they disagree. This requires that they know the alternative views in the ways that those who hold those alternative views know them."

The people you perceive as emotional think they're holding their own beliefs for logical reasons. Maybe they're angry or annoyed because you're violating some deeply held principle of theirs, or misunderstanding their position, or seemingly accusing them of something - but from their perspective, the emotions will be reasonable, too.

Bad faith is rarer than people think, but it does happen (e.g. knowing your opponent is right about something specific, but pretending otherwise so you can "win"; or suspecting you're wrong about something but flinching away from any thought or evidence that would confirm it). Those are genuine cases of "emotional rather than logical". Even then, understanding the true details of the position your opponents hold and how they arrived there can only help you, not hurt you. The urge to "retaliate" with bad faith of your own should be ignored, because your perception is almost certainly biased to see bad faith where there isn't any. Bulverism (investigating your opponent's motives instead of the argument itself, using that to explain why they're wrong) needs to be used carefully or not at all - it's easy to do, it's often actually correct, but it harms your arguments a lot if you're wrong but helps very little if you're right, so it's not worth it.

Step 1: Watch Monty Python Step2: Repeat step 1

I think turning an interlocutor into an enemy by default (point 1) does yourself and the other an injustice. Much better to see them as someone who needs help finding their way. The empathy will help you go further than the demonizing.

Point 2 and point 5 sound more like sound marketing advice than sound philosophy. I think the ancient philosophers like Socrates and Aristotle say quite a bit about the pursuit of truth rather than honor in philosophizing. I’m not in an argument to win, I’m in it to find better understanding and if I’m lucky learn something new.

Point 5 might as well concede the pursuit of existential authenticity to cultivating someone else’s very limited perception of you rather than truly going after self expression. Whether you pursue truth, or existential authenticity or the demise of the subject in philosophy, couching one’s self in a “brand” seems to be about as opposite from that kind of pursuit as you can get.

Other interesting cinematographic references to the issue.

Jurassic Park -> scientists stood up on geniuses' shoulders so they didn't develop the appropriate discipline.

Avatar -> they had some sort of biological collective memory bank. They couldn't really consult it I think, but it seemed to enable an intelligence of its own.

I noticed even when logical arguments are presented, if the other party is highly emotional they won’t listen. How do you deal with highly emotional people when debating?

>Would you really sacrifice one of your own kind for some random bears?

it's not some random bears. It's all the pandas now and forever.

>What if the button said: you or the pandas? Would you kill yourself to save the pandas?

I am not the OP but I would.

I think I would.

Just Gorgias things

georges bataille and his work with the college of sociology is relevant on this and seems to resonate with what you’re saying. mircea eliade attended these lectures and worked on related topics as well. strongly recommend either avenue if you’re interested in thinking further.

Artsy article but it doenst give an answer. But it’s truly classy; good woek

Ok but you left out the part where I said “in the context of conveying meaning”. Information transfer != meaning. I’m using meaning in the metaphysical sense here; that excludes addresses and math equations.

I just read that excerpt from Capitalist Realism I think