Never give up

lugal , 23 days ago

Remindes me of the tweet that said something like “My favorite moment on the internet was when someone said, they believe that people will changed their mind when given evidence. Then I linked TWO SOURCES that said otherwise and they were like I still believe it.”

Or when a hexbearian explained to me that hexbear isn’t toxic at all, it’s just when people refuse to read sources but than it’s their fault for not engaging with the material. Later they refused to open my sources.

Anyolduser , 23 days ago

Ya got a source for that?

/s

pumpkinseedoil , 23 days ago

Good that they didn’t change their mind. If they had, you’d have been in trouble because your sources said otherwise.

splonglo , 22 days ago

The person you’re talking to is unlikely to be pursuaded but there’s usually silent, invisible lurkers who can be.

I know I’ve changed my mind on things because of arguments I’ve read on the internet.

It is proven that people do double down on their views when confronted with opposing evidence, but IMO this is more about the psychology of trust and confrontation between individuals, rather than proof of the futility of argument as a concept. Hell, Vsauce made a video called ‘The Future of Reasoning’, where he makes the case that argument might have been selected for as an essential part of human psychology and necessary for our survivial.

lugal , 22 days ago

True. Sometimes it takes more than one random person on the internet to convince you but they might be part of starting a thought process.

Jiggle_Physics , 21 days ago

Evidence shows that arguments are really only conducive to changing opinions when the person has a set of primers to find the person they disagree with otherwise agreeable. They refer to it as being in alignment with socio-epistemic conditions. Basically, people within a group identity can change opinions with others in the group, as long as the difference in opinion is not one that would be diametrically opposed to their group’s underlying identity. So, arguments between people from two different groups, like left v right, don’t really change minds towards the group they do not identify with. Those watching the debate will agree with the people who are in the same socio-epistemic group. This arguably makes public debate a bad thing. This is because those third party on-lookers will side with the person in the debate they most identify with for reasons outside of the debate. So you are simply platforming the person you disagree with, and possibly exposing people more in alignment with them, to an argument for a more extreme version of their position, rather than exposing them to a counter-opinion argument, to be considered.

Here is a good starting point on this subject, it links to a number of supporting papers early in the paper.

academic.oup.com/aristotelian/article/…/7207975

Fallofturkey , 23 days ago

Gabagool was the most important story arc in the Sopranos, change my view.

GBU_28 , 23 days ago

Was gabagool behind the camera in the final scene?

Fallofturkey , 23 days ago

That is one of my favorite theories. Meadow walks in and frisbee throws a full stack of gabagool to Tony. It’s covers the camera, and that was the last of the film for the day. They liked it so much they kept it.