Fair point. I think I agree with this distinction!
It's a creative idea and would be an interesting experiment. That being said, I can't help but wonder why the focus is on sharing such heavy opinions. I'll be honest in that it's not been a major challenge for me in my life to not avoid talking about things that could likely spell discomfort. It's not even been intentional, because to me, it's a party and I want to be talking about things that are fun for myself and for others.
If you are deliberately getting into heavy discussions about a potential socially dangerous topic, I'd ask why you feel the need to talk about it in that setting anyway. Is a party really the place where the requirements for good outcomes to the discussion are going to be present? Sure, mention something in passing but leave the actual discussion for other settings/atmospheres.
I'm not going to tell you how to party though - I just think it's odd that when others are coming together to have a good time, voicing heavy opinions and fielding heavy discussions are where these attendees minds go to.
Just returning to this -- Thank you for your comment. I think I need to do a bit more epistemological legwork before I can truly give you a response. Suffice it to say for now that I'm not really torn up about the issue and asked more out of boredom/general curiosity, but I see now that my question was asked lazily.
Perhaps one day soon I'll comment on this with the relevant context/information.
His view on AI alignment risk is infuriating simplistic. To just call certain doomsday scenarios objectively "false" is a level of epistemic arrogance that borders on obscene.
I feel like he could at least acknowledge the existence of possible scenarios and express a need to invest in avoiding those scenarios instead of just negating an entire argument.
I will review these. Thank you for your input!
Really fantastic conflict mitigation advice. Many people do not often stop to think about why they are communicating and with this lack of organized direction, it is easy to fall into more emotional patterns of communicating. People's desires to appeal to others come out more and constructive discourse is no longer possible. Stopping Out Loud does a great job of recognizing these types of things and organizing it into words in a way that really halts what otherwise often becomes a runaway train.
One point I would add that is I feel that when it comes to online trolling or criticism, more often than not someone is not interested in constructive dialog in the first place and is typically reacting to their own personal ideas being challenged. This type of intention usually leads to people responding negatively to SOL and they will attempt to re-frame your attempt at to de-escalate as you "running away" or refusing to voice your opinions in front of others because you realize how "weak" your arguments are. While I am not sure there is a way to avoid this, it is helpful to be prepared for this type of response when you do go into SOL.
Fair question - I guess that a certain discussion doesn't necessarily have to be "heavy" but I believe that humans are far less skilled at communication, especially in social settings, for the majority of these interactions to not flare up some level of insecurity, human bias, or offend someone's held beliefs.
I personally would say that I'm quite good at navigating a social context while also being able to broach traditionally taboo'd topics, but I do not think this I represent the norm. The general heuristic of avoiding potentially controversial topics has served me well in most social settings like this, where I believe the purpose is for social connection on a lighter, surface level.
As I replied to a previous comment, I think I'd append my original comment that if OP was advocating for banning normal parties in favor of this format, I'd be against that. I suppose the idea I'm trying to communicate is that it's important to know your setting and the social context before engaging in these types of behaviors, and that this habit will serve you far better in facilitating social connection.