Ask Lemmy

You cannot reason a person out of a position he did not reason himself into in the first place.

I think at least one position argued in a forum like Lemmy/Reddit is not often arrived at through reason.

I convince myself I convinced them.

I try to. Debates aren’t (or at least in an ideal world shouldn’t be) a victory to win over the other party. It’s to present your ideas and convince. Because of that I try to do it for a few reasons. Namely:

I would wish the other party to hear me out, I should do the same. Especially in a debate with emotional stakes putting yourself in there shoes can help

And considering the other party’s point of view puts you in a position to understand them, and if you’re going to be debating against it then that’s important to know

Plus, especially in politics, I feel as if I become naive enough to become convinced by an idea of moral dubiousness then that is partly a failure on my part to be fooled by it

I can’t remember changing anyone’s mind, but I've changed my mind when someone has given me more information than I previously had. “Oh, huh, I hadn’t thought about that. I think you’re right” type of thing.

No, I suck at it. I suck at defending my opinions with facts and logic. That is why I am always changing my opinions. It is hard to form an opinion that might work, and then find out all the reasons why it is wrong and then have to change it. I should have payed attention in school when they had us write persuasive essays.

Not in an actual argument but reading a back and forth between two people as long as at least one of them is giving solid info and the other one is semi coherent, it's changed my mind.

Closest I’ve come was being in a discussion thread infested with antivaxxers. This was at the height of Covid and right around the time the first vaccines were being given. I had just gotten mine a few weeks prior.

I picked one guy more or less at random and all I did was reiterate my experience getting the vaccine and that I had no regrets doing so. I made it a point not to belittle his point of view and only suggested that maybe at some point in the future he be open to seeing things differently. And then we parted ways, he with what seemed like some increased level of respect for my point of view, and me with still absolutely no respect for his.

Have you ever perused a thread on a subject and had your mind changed without engaging? Maybe you had the wrong perspective and changed your mind or didn't know enough to have an opinion going in but came out with a more informed stance?

That's why I do it. And I've had that happen numerous times.

As person who use to be anti gay and racist I was changed.

Now I'm bi and have admitted to having it bad for women of color.

Which has led me to a happier life overall. Loving people is a lot easier than hate I can tell you that.

Debates aren't always about changing the mind of the person you're debating, they are about presenting your ideas to an audience.

Once, maybe 3 years ago or so, I had the ignorant belief that if the US went to war with Iran, it would be a walkover. (Mind you, this was at least a couple of years before the US was dumb enough to do it.) Someone on Lemmy made very logical and cogent arguments as to why it would be orders of magnitude more difficult than I thought. I read their points and was actually fully convinced that their standpoint was correct. And now here we are in this shittiest of timelines, and that individual was proven correct by, of all things, reality.

A few times, all of which I remember being with someone who started with a point of view based on ignorance about the topic and changed their mind because they gained new knowledge and understanding. In all of the cases they didn't seem too committed to their point of view because of follow up questions and being engaged by asking for more information in more and more nuanced ways.

One person had the opinion that crime stats showed minorities committed more crimes. I presented something that explained how the stats are based on police behavior and decisions prosecutors make that lead to systemic racism. The real point that made it through was the statistic that black people are pulled over disproportionately during the day compared to night, which shows who is driving plays a part. Stop and frisk being targeted into minority neighborhoods resulting in more stops reinforced the police effect on stats.

But that only worked because they were interested in finding out more. I've never convinced anyone who dug their heels in immediately.

I have changed my opinion on exchanges between other people, which is how I learned about the cause of the bias in police stats. Hopefully I changed a few minds for the better without hearing about it as well.

The main problem is that people don't even know how to talk to each other, much less make a convincing case to have someone change their mind. It is possible though. If a black man can convince dozens of KKK members to abandon their racist beliefs through conversation alone, then there's a reliable and repeatable way to change deeply hardened ideas. But no one wants to bother to learn this, they would rather shout at others and try to "own those retards" to make themselves feel better.

Daryl Davis

Podcast with Daryl Davis

Different podcast on changing people's minds on polarising social topics with deep canvassing

Also worth considering how open you (the royal "you", not OP specifically) are to having your own mind changed; before getting worried about the minds of others.

Yes. I have had my owned changed as well.

In my encounters it's more often that a counter argument to what I say is not wrong either. When a morsel of nuance can be introduced, we can understand each others' argument without necessarily having anyone flip around their opinion to the opposite.

However I have tried sometimes to no avail, if there's no progress after around 3 back-and-forths I end the conversation.

If you want some advice to increase your success in getting people to consider, try this: Start with the part you agree or share with the other person's perspective. Try for a "Yes... and..." if possible, or "Yes... but..." if you can't. After the and/but, that's where you can go into the difference in opinion you have.

Years ago, I got into it with somebody on Reddit over climate change. They thought it was normal and expected that the earth went through cycles of temperature ranges, and saw little harm in human acceleration of the process.

I at least got them to go "huh, that's true" by approaching it from the typical conservative top priority: money. I said even if it's "normal to have cyclical temperature range extremes," human acceleration of that is going to be extremely costly as our infrastructure - farms, warehouses, transportation, etc. are all going to have to be rebuilt around where things we need grow better after such changes. And it will frequently have to be done again as accelerated changes keep occurring.

You wanna convince someone of your perspective? Hit 'em where their priorities lie.

Yes, I have changed a mind or two. Low single digit percentage, I'm sure. I'm more focused on countering bad information information or presenting a perspective that hasn't been represented yet. I don't really expect to change the mind of the person I'm arguing with.

As for not getting sucked in, does the Lemmy app you use have User Tags? Best feature reddit was completely missing (aside from, you know, the whole FOSS federation thing). I use to apply a tag and color to users. I use yellow to warn myself about someone who I think previously argued in bad faith or might be trolling. I use red for "do not engage"; on reddit I probably would have blocked them but just red-tafging them, I can still see the rest of the community respond to them. Any time a post or comment comes up from someone I've red-tagged, I know not to get sucked in. I use Voyager app on Android.

In his book Synergetics , Buckminster Fuller points out (don't have the exact quote) that you almost never hear a politician say, "you know, the evidence and logic of the other side are now overwhelmingly persuasive; I must change my political affiliation" -- but among scientists, you hear the equivalent all the time.

Have you ever changed your mind?

I often feel like debate entrenches a belief in both audience and debaters.

Yes, coming from a very conservative religious background challenging my world-view with every media and discussions I read online (reddit when it was good) I changed for the better good.

I personally like to expose myself to ideas which are contradicting my personal experience/views. It is painful, but rewarding.

Also like to use the arguments I heard/read in a debate where I agree with my 'oposition' but want to keep the conversation going. I learned the hard way, that I have to be very clear upfront about it. And the other side has to think through the arguments instead of responding with emotions.

I higly disagree on your point, discussion are required, they don't have to change either side's mind, but should build them. Also don't forget the audience, it is possible they don't have a pre existing strong opinion (or at all) on the topic.

It is very unlikely you will ever get a feedback that your opinion mattered, but it can happen, and it can change lifes.

Yep, happens frequently enough to make discussion worth it in my view. People often message me and let me know that.

No. Possibly because I have never really tried to, after realizing that:

1. People entering said debates are mostly just there to win an argument.
2. I am under no obligation to convince them that their beliefs are utterly stupid

Those who hold stupid positions aren't really the ones with a mind open enough to the position that they might in fact be in the wrong. Plus, I don't have the capacity for bullshit that such an endeavor requires.

I have long since concluded that people will not only hold stupid beliefs, but desperately cling to them and consider me not having the fortitude to put up with all the fallacies that follows as a sign that they're right.

I don't really have an audience, and I therefore don't feel like entering a debate, because debates to me seem mostly performative in an effort to gather soundbites and/or screenshots.

I'm sure you (yes, you reading this) have plenty of positions I find utterly idiotic, but I frankly don't think I'm the one who will be able to convince you. I can't educate the world, the world needs to converge on that on its own.

I think and folks have given me new perspectives. There is decent discourse that develops but not always and not even the majority. Like the rest of life you got to appreciate it when its good because its certainly not always going to be.