trist comments on Questioning and Respect - Less Wrong

20 Post author: jkaufman 10 June 2014 10:52AM

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Comment author: trist 10 June 2014 03:54:26PM 8 points [-]

In such cases I'll say, "Oh! Interesting... how does that work exactly?" It seems to work out alright, and I would guess that other methods of asking for more information without implying that their statement is false are equally effective.

Comment author: JQuinton 10 June 2014 04:14:30PM 5 points [-]

Yes, "Tell me more" is certainly more effective than saying something like "I don't think that's true". Even if you don't think it's true, following a Socractic dialog will probably be more useful at uncovering untruth without being overtly offensive.

Comment author: pianoforte611 10 June 2014 06:03:16PM 2 points [-]

Beware, Socratic dialogs can also piss people off. But yes, "tell me more" or "why do you say that?" are better than "nope".

Comment author: brazil84 12 June 2014 07:47:28AM 4 points [-]

Beware, Socratic dialogs can also piss people off.

I agree, but I suspect a lot of the time the anger is a result of cognitive dissonance which kicks in when the person starts to realize that there are holes in his position.