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juliawise comments on Bayesian Judo - Less Wrong
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Interesting. Do we have any good information on the attributes of discussions or debates that are the most likely to educate the other person when they disagree? In hindsight this would be a large shortcoming of mine, having debated for years now but never invested much in trying to optimize my approach with people.
Something I've noticed: when someone takes the "conquer the debate" adversarial approach, a typical-minded audience appears more likely to be interested and side with the "winner" than if the person takes a much more reserved and cooperative approach despite having just as supported arguments. Maybe the first works well for typical audiences and the second for above-typical ones? Or maybe it doesn't matter if we can foster the second in "typical" minds. Given my uncertainty it seems highly unlikely that my approach with people is optimal.
Do you have any tips for someone interested in making a mental habit out of cooperative discussion as opposed to being adversarial? I find it very difficult, I'm an aggressive and vigorous person. Maybe if I could see a video of someone using the better approach so I can try to emulate them.
An adversarial approach may impress spectators. In Eliezer's example, it impressed at least one. But I think it's more likely to alienate the person you're actually conversing with.
I don't have objective research on this. I'm working from personal experience and social work training. In social work you assume people are pretty irrational and coax them round to seeing what you think are better approaches in a way that doesn't embarrass them.
In social work we'd call it "collaborative empricism" or Socratic questioning. Here's video example of a therapist not shouting "Of course you're not being punished by God!" It's more touchy-feely than an argument, but the elements (taking the outside view, encouraging him to lay out the evidence on the situation) are there.
Shortly after my stroke, my mom (who was in many ways more traumatized by it than I was) mentioned that she was trying to figure out what it was that she'd done wrong such that God had punished her by my having a stroke. As you might imagine, I contemplated a number of different competing responses to this, but what I finally said was (something along the lines of) "Look, I understand why you want to build a narrative out of this that involves some responsible agent making decisions that are influenced by your choices, and I recognize that we're all in a difficult emotional place right now and you do what you have to do, but let me offer you an alternative narrative: maybe I had a survivable stroke at 40 so I'd start controlling my blood pressure so I didn't have a fatal one at 45. Isn't that a better story to tell yourself?"
I was pretty proud of that interaction.
Nice work!
That's the same idea as narrative therapy: drawing a new storyline with the same data points.
Hmm! I found that actually quite helpful. The therapist didn't even voice any apparent disagreement, he coaxed the man into making his reasoning explicit. This would greatly reduce the percent of the argument spent in an adversarial state. I noticed that it also put the emphasis of the discussion on the epistemology of the subject which seems the best way for them to learn why they are wrong, as opposed to a more example-specific "You're wrong because X".
Thank you for that link. Would it be useful for me to use other videos involving a therapist who disagrees with a delusional patient? It seems like the ideal type of behaviour to try and emulate. This is going to take me lots of practice but I'm eager to get it.
Thank you for your help and advice!
I'm not sure. The kind of irrational beliefs you're likely to talk about with others are some kind of misconception or cached belief, rather than an out-and-out delusion like "people are following me everywhere", which probably stems from a chemical imbalance and can't really be talked away.
You could try reading up on CBT, but the literature is about doing therapy, which is a pretty different animal from normal conversations. Active listening might be a more useful skill to start with. People are less defensive if they feel you're really trying to understand their point of view.