Online discussions

[andrewducker]

Chatting to Julie last night about my post yesterday (where she moved part of it to email, and then to face to face discussion) - she said she finds it hard to deal with my online postings because they come across as statements of fact, rather than my opinion.

To which my rather flabbergasted response was that _of course_ they were statements of opinion - what else _could_ they be?  I take everything I read as a statement of opinion.  If it's on my journal it's my opinion, my latest working hypothesis, my guess at what's most likely, or the latest conundrum that's going through my head.

I don't post anything on my journal that I'm not happy to have argued with - and it delights me when peope tell me I'm wrong and then back it up with something that makes me think about it.  I won't hesitate to point out problems in other people's arguments, and I'm glad there are people out there that won't hesitate to point out holes in mine.

And if it helps, next time you're reading, take a bunch of these and sprinkle them over everything I say.

Comments

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

I get that sort of comment sometimes. I think that both of us are so forthright that it can seem intimidating to disagree.

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you do come across as quite confrontational; I know from interacting with you for a while that actually you're challenging people rather than confronting them, but my instinct is to duck.

[andrewducker]

I know I come across differently in person - because I have a large grin on my face and am clearly interested in the other person's point of view. It just doesn't come across that way online.

Still trying to work out how to make it do so more.

[kashandara.livejournal.com]

Surely that's the problem with 90% of online communications though. Until tech develops some sort of plug in that gives us direct access to the emotions being felt by the posted at the time of posting of course...

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

I think the "want to duck" thing comes from: if someone said that in person and unsmiling, they would be opinionated in a way that made me feel that any argument might lead to bad consequences. So, yeah, until knowing you well enough to know that the smile should be taken as default, I would choose not to argue, but rather to walk away. Unless I was in a fighting mood. So, what's the text mark to distinguish between psycho and wind-up merchant?

[andrewducker]

A smiley?

I think a lot of it comes from knowing the person you're arguing with. On a few occasions someone's come back at me with something that felt very argumentative, and I've gone and skimmed their journal to see if they were the kind of person I wanted to argue with.

[likeneontubing.livejournal.com]

i've never had any bother disagreeing with you hehehe - but then, i'm probably *that* kind of person anyway.

i often add things like 'i think' in to sentences to soften them though. perhaps this is a useful thing, perhaps not. remains to be seen.

[kashandara.livejournal.com]

I tend not to disagree with anyone online, because it's extremely rare for online debates to actually get anywhere, except in terms of everyone getting annoyed/upset with each other.

That and I know I -am- confrontational when I let myself be, so I don't let myself get into situations where it'll come up.

[matgb]

t's extremely rare for online debates to actually get anywhere

See, my experience is the opposite—unless you're in the rare opinion where there's an entrenched groupthink going on in a particular location, I generally find online discussions to be informative and though provoking.

There will always be dogmatists and those unable to even consider an opposing viewpoint, but overall you can normally have a good discussion. Depends both on subject and location, naturally, but I've defintely felt the debate has 'got somewhere' regularly.

[kashandara.livejournal.com]

I suspect you've been a lot luckier in your debating partners than I have =)

If I'm honest then I have to accept partial responsibility myself as well. Online debating doesn't work for me, and so I get frustrated by it quickly and start arguing instead of debating, despite knowing very well what the difference is, and that will itself lead to the debate becoming a dead end quite quickly.

[amberite.livejournal.com]

Heh. heron61 has a similar online style, and perhaps needs a similar condiment page.

[neferet.livejournal.com]

To which my rather flabbergasted response was that _of course_ they were statements of opinion - what else _could_ they be?

Was along the lines of my first thought after reading the first paragraph. Anything (other than the basics) related to culture/society/emotion etc can't really be anything else, can it? (I am thoroughly prepared to be corrected here!)

I can see how some of your posts could be perceived as confrontational rather than challenging, depending on how the reader receives information they may find difficult or disagreeable, but have to admit that with the prior assumption that it's -just- an opinion, I do find your posts (and the responses) quite enjoyable reading :P

Interestingly, given that the opinions expressed are online, and therefore in a remote format, I had thought it would be easier to respond to a 'confrontational' statement, in so far as you are removed in some degree from the impact of any potential negative consequence. But some of the comments so far suggest that this is not necessarily the case, and a softening of the presentation of the opinion is still required. Definite learning point for me here :)

[andrewducker]

It's my intuition that flame wars are caused by something similar to road rage - we feel that the threatening statement is occurring inside our own home/safe space, and thus our reaction is much stronger than if it was in public. In addition, without a face to go with it, it's easier to read the statement in a negative manner.

[derumi.livejournal.com]

Hey, I see everything you write that I agree with as fact. Everything else is obviously an opinion.


:)

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

and it delights me when peope tell me I'm wrong and then back it up with something that makes me think about it.

It would have taken me all afternoon to respond to you in text, and some people have work to do :P

[babydyke-82.livejournal.com]

I tend to avoid your comments page when it gets to above 20-odd, especially when you make posts that can sometimes seem opinion-as-fact almost to the point of aggression. I worry that giving an opinion would lead to complete flaming from harsher people on your list.

I don't like TV (from wife swap to confrontational interviews) where people argue, so I avoid it online too.

[call-waiting.livejournal.com]

I think it's entirely reasonable to assume that everything one reads is an opinion rather than fact. I do it too, and indeed in this post-modern world, to assume anything else is fallacy.

The subtlety is in whether or not you assume that the person writing it believes their opinion is fact rather than opinion. Which, generally speaking, people on the internet do.

I tend to assume that if someone's taken the trouble to state something, they probably do believe it's fact, unless the context firmly establishes otherwise. The trouble is that the context of a post on LJ doesn't establish that the poster doesn't neccessarily believe the opinions they're stating. In fact¹, given statistical evidence², it establishes the opposite: that the poster most likely believes what he's saying.

It takes the extra piece of knowledge of "Ah, this is an Andrew Ducker post, and Andy expressing himself this way frequently means he's playing devil's advocate or exploring an idea in a hypothetical context," to establish the correct way of reading things.


I'll also further add that I'd guess Julie is very used to reading academic writing, where you're not allowed to make a statement unless it's believed (and justified) to be fact, which probably colours the way people read everything else...

1 - Actually my opinion, not fact. Sorry about that.
2 - I don't have any such statistics to hand, so I'm going to go out on a limb and make a wild-ass asumption.

[andrewducker]

I tend to assume that if someone's taken the trouble to state something, they probably do believe it's fact, unless the context firmly establishes otherwise.

Well, I certainly have things I post as my working hypothesis. But even if I believe them as fact "Japan exists, I tell you!" then I'm happy to be disagreed with, so long as the other person brings something with them to back them up.

[johncoxon.livejournal.com]

Not everyone has the same healthy and non-personal attitude to arguing as some of us do. Not that I like arguing at all... I really enjoy your posts - they usually make me think, as well. :)

[andrewducker]

And the same is true in return. And yes, I think both of us occasionally get carried away, but I'd rather we _could_ get carried away than that we end up not being open about our opinions.

[johncoxon.livejournal.com]

Yeah - I'm currently spending the week in Plymouth and we're playing D&D 3.5...

[andrewducker]

Hah!

We're currently winding up our 3.5 campaign. 6/7 sessions to go!

(Plus doing a second playtest of 4th Edition this Saturday - I'm trying out an Eladrin Warlord to see how they work).

[johncoxon.livejournal.com]

I'm playing a Chaotic Good Crusader. It's a shame they got rid of Chaotic Good and Lawful Evil in 4th :(

[andrewducker]

I can see it both ways. Chaotic Good wasn't really much different to Neutral Good, as in both cases you did Good, no matter what - doing Good in a specifically chaotic manner never really made sense to me. I guess their thinking is that Good/Evil are the important ones, and Chaotic/Lawful were modifiers on those - which isn't necessarily how everyone saw it.

Alignment, of course, being one of those things that causes massive arguments, on the grounds that it doesn't really make any sense, so everyone has their own justifications for what they _really_ mean :->