| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
+1
Thanks Tacticslion, I do enjoy reading your perspective on the issue.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
One final thought: sometimes it's worth engaging a person, even when they argue in bad faith and there is no method by which reasonable communication can be achieved, if only because their arguments can seem reasonable and lead others to either emulate those (causing more problems than it solves) or simply to the wrong conclusion.
In that case, it becomes not about the person who is incorrect, and it's certainly not about having the last word, but rather it's about clarifying the concepts for the sake of others - clarifying the path so that others can follow, as another poster put it succinctly, above.
I can vouch for the fact that this has worked in the past for me, when I've been an outside observer -- someone made a dishonest argument, another person made a seemingly pointlessly masochistic clarification -- and I saw the clarification, realized what was wrong with the argument being presented (which I had been agreeing with up until then), and changed my view accordingly.
Actually, this happened to me a lot during the Pathfinder Alpha/Beta playtesting, until the dissenting voices finally gave up and went away and there was no one left to debunk the dishonest arguments anymore. There were a lot of people whose tone I disagreed with, who nevertheless had far more awareness of their opponents' views, and far more logical arguments backing up their own, than I was willing to give them credit for until I saw them continuing to offer clarifications to people who weren't listening.
It's definitely been true for me, as well. I've found that there are some arguments that seem good on the surface, but if taken to their logical conclusions (instead of stopped somewhere arbitrarily chosen that has anyone else has no basis to choose as a stopping point) would automatically implode or cause problems. Even if there is a reason to stop at a certain point, sometimes it just doesn't suss itself out... and it's not always possible to see that unless someone walks me through it, patiently, and fully.
I'm grateful for this community, and the people within it, not only for that purpose, but just for the over-all attitude and spirit - whether they agree with me or not!