The Purpose of Debate
Who doesn’t enjoy yelling at complete strangers about the finer intricacies relating to whether or not Pluto is a planet! Or some other equally important topic!
There are idiots online, and it is our job to set them straight! Right!! Can I get an amen? Anyone… Crickets? So, then, if we mostly all agree that arguing with idiots is a waste of time, why do we get sucked into these back and forth intellectual exercises so easily and so often?
The Purposes of Debate
There are many reasons that we get drawn into online debates. Most of them though usually come down to us trying to correct the stupidity of others. Or at least what we perceive to be the stupidity of others. Granted, the other person sees us as stupid too… but that is beside the point since we know that we are right and that they are wrong.
Ask Yourself, How Many Times Have The People You Debated Ever Admitted That You Were Right?
If our goal is to correct the ill-conceived beliefs of every single person we ever encounter, then ask yourself this important question. Do any of the people we attempt to correct ever actually change their minds? Or do they just walk away from our interaction thinking we are jerks? Seriously! Has anyone EVER admitted that you were right, or do you and they both just eventually give up (after 78 replies) from exhaustion?
“Post your sources for that claim!”
“I posted my sources already! You just refuse to accept them! You rushed through my last reply and missed half my points!”
“I don’t appreciate your ad hominem attack!”
“blah, blah, blah…”
Let’s be honest, if our goal is to convince the other person that we are right, then debate is probably about the worst way to go about it.
Is Our Goal To Convince The Lurkers?
This one may actually have merit. Most debates that occur online draw a handful of lurkers, who read but do not comment on the back and forth. These individuals typically have a side they are rooting for, but are often much more open to hearing our arguments given that they are not emotionally attached to the ego driven need to win the exchange.
However, how likely are these people to take your side, if you are rude? How likely are they to be convinced your arguments have merit if you intentionally try to humiliate your opponents? There is a very fine line between making reasonable arguments and turning into a passive aggressive jerk. That line can usually be detected by paying attention to when you start to feel contentious.
Contention is a pretty dependable alarm bell, that warns you that you are starting to value winning above learning.
Is Your Purpose To Learn?
There are very few tools more powerful or effective than debate, when it comes to testing the validity of ideas. Especially when the method being used to validate an idea is logic. Debate forces a person to examine their positions and defend them against someone else, who is equally or perhaps even more intelligent. Those who are capable of engaging in this kind of mental gymnastics without getting contentious have a wonderful gift! These are people who don’t mind losing a debate, because by losing the debate they actually win. That winning being in the form of being able to discard bad ideas and replace them with more sound ones. If you are in this category, and if you are debating someone else who also moves in this category then you can progress your understanding of a topic forward by tremendous leaps and bounds through engaging in debate.
Thriving here requires a total lack of contention, as well as respect and politeness. An individuals must be willing to admit when their current beliefs don’t stand up to scrutiny, and be willing to abandon poorly supported ideas when better ideas are discovered.
What Is Your Purpose For Debating Online
If your purpose is to correct the poor thinking of every stupid person, you pass, then you might as well move along. You are not going to convince them. If your purpose is to appeal to the lurkers, then you will only succeed if you are polite and respectful. If your purpose is to learn, then you must be willing to admit when you are wrong, and you must avoid contention.
Elevate Your Purpose
Most of us start off just wanting to win. We take a sort of egotistical joy in proving that we are smarter or more informed than everyone else. The truth matters far less to us than our ability to win a mental battle against a foe. Very often we are even aware of the flaws in our own thinking, but we hope that the other person doesn’t notice those flaws, so that they don’t expose us.
Eventually as we age and mature many of us realize how futile debate is, when it comes to correcting the views of others. By this point we have made our fair share of “frenemies” online. Who view us as idiots or as persons who are incapable of passing up an opportunity to correct every mistake we perceive in someone else’s posts. Experience teaches us that instead of convincing those around us that we are right, all we have really done is isolated ourselves by ticking off everyone we have ever engaged with online.
This is when many of us progress to the second stage of debate, which is to either disengage entirely, or to begin to appeal to the lurkers. We become more selective in our debates, and more subtle in our arguments. We learn to be polite and to not offend those we engage with. Most people end their journey here. As either completely disengaged, or as polite lurker seekers.
However, a few do take their debate to its final and most elevated level. Which is that of true learning. Debate for the sake of learning is the single most powerful tool that their is when it comes to expanding a person’s mind to the true comprehension of a topic. When two thoughtful and intelligent people debate without contention, they take a variety of positions. Sometimes the person agrees with the position they are arguing. Other times they may totally disagree, but may argue a point regardless, just to see if they can hold that position. Both persons engaging in the debate try out positions to see which ones are defensible. If a position is strong then they build on it. If not then they abandon it in favor of better ideas. Through this process, those engaged in true debate find and then carve out the most solid ground within a topic. They gain a depth of appreciation for the topic unmatched by anyone who simply reads about it. They can then truly make intelligent arguments based on well thought out ideas.
Unfortunately persons capable of this level of debate sans ego and sans a desire to win, are few and very far between. If you are this kind of person, and if you have a friend who is this kind of person, you are best to confine your debates between the two of you. Debates of this nature appear to the rest of the world to fit into the first category. That of trying to win. Others will view you as a contrarian because they will not understand that you are not driven by ego, but by a sincere desire to find out how defensible a position truly is.
A person from the third category cannot debate someone from the first or second categories without appearing to be aggressive.
Which again is why if you belong to this third category, it is best to avoid debates with persons from the first two categories. Only persons from the final group will understand that you are pushing as hard as you do, not to win, but to test the validity of ideas. It is only within this third group that you can avoid contention, and truly get to the heart of learning.
Continue Moving Forward
All of us should strive to move from the first group to the second group as quickly as possible. Where we treat others with respect and politeness, and either avoid debate altogether, or are selective and polite in our debating. Those truly interested in intellectual growth can continue to evolve into the third group, being very careful to avoid contention as they do so, and confining the debates to others who share their affinity for learning. So as to not offend others, or create enemies.
When you arrive in the third group, you learn to pass on opportunities to debate those in the first two groups, because you understand that they do not see debate as a learning tool, and you know that your efforts in engaging with them will be misunderstood.
