One thing that really fascinates me about modern political discourse is how 'opposing' groups can talk right past each other. Libertarians and socialists, for example, get so hung up on their differences relating to the state that they almost totally forget that they are natural allies when fighting for greater personal and, in some cases, economic freedom.
The two possible categorizations of politics popularly portrayed by the media (republican/democrat, conservative/liberal) are obviously convenient categories that oversimplify what political discourse actually should be like. That being said, there do seem to be some political differences that fall down familiar lines (which are then taken up by the two parties). The end result of these divisions often seems to be people yelling conclusions at each with no premises.
You cannot have a conclusion with out an argument, even a very bad argument, sot that leads me to believe that premises to political arguments are implicit to the conclusions that are being yelled. But only the people in support of the conclusions can decipher the argument. My dream project is to find a way to thoroughly reverse engineer the implicit arguments behind the conclusions, and maybe learn something about the groups who support certain ideologies in the posses. The most challenging part of this project is that it will not be possible to decipher the argument without the help of knowledge outside the conclusions themselves, thus leaving me wide open to unproductive bias.
The trick to that is to sift through the biases of each side. Easiest way is that each side leaves rather obvious holes in their arguments. If there is a lack of supporting evidence for the argument being made then it could easily be a biased opinion. It takes a lot of time listening to both sides to sift through everything, but it is beneficial on the long run.
ReplyDeleteThe yelling of conclusions by these politicians seems to me to be because of the inability to form a valid argument. It seems only logical that in order to convince an audience of the soundness of an argument, you would want that audience to understand your argument as completely as possible, to leave as little room as possible for counter-argument or misinterpretation. Perhaps this is just my opinion, but that seems like the best way to gain support. Maybe these politicians simply don't give the time to consider the reasons for their political beliefs, or maybe they don't supply sufficient premises because they see the holes in their own arguments, the absence of certain necessary premises, and do not want to address them.
ReplyDeleteResponse to Mike: rather than call it 'bias,' which suggests some intellectual or moral flaw, better to speak of teasing out presuppositions. These may or may not be biases, and you won't be pre-judging them.
ReplyDeleteTo Bridgett: Consider the possibility that politicians use enthymemes not because they are incapable of argument, but because they think they can communicate more effectively that way. They may or may not be mistaken in this, of course, but to presume stupidity or ill intentions is interpretively uncharitable, and leads to rants rather than analysis.
And Brian: PLEASE TURN OFF WORD VERIFICATION FEATURE!
Would you agree at all that sometimes redundancies in various arguments and conversations form because people are unable to respect the principle of charity?
ReplyDeleteFor instance, two people are talking about a certain political issue on which they disagree. One man brings up the idea that a certain political candidate can change the issue by doing this, that and the other, the second man after hearing the mention of the political candidate immediately loses the initial conversation and doesn't continue the talk respectfully as he refuses to give the benefit of the doubt or respectful belief at face value to whatever the other man will say next only because that political candidate was mentioned.
This leaves their possible debate at a stand still while they argue over what appears to be useless and time wasting points strung together.
A very good observation. Modern politics is more about labels than policies, I would say.
ReplyDeleteThe worst part is that both sides (the political left, and politcal right) are convinced the other side is wrong beyond reasonable doubt. On the surface, it's not a question of arguments. The question of politics SHOULD rely on arguments, and reasoning, but these days its filled with all sorts of fallacious reasoning. There's a wall there that you can't overcome unless there is a fair treatment of any side. It's really a shame that politicians don't debate policies with good arguments, as opposed to logical fallacies (I.E. Argumenta Ad Hominem), these days.
Also, on the topic of bias, it's important to note that EVERYBODY has a bias. Even moderates have a lean towards certain things. Objective facts are extremely hard to deduce with out limited scope, but a strong inductive case can be formed for both sides of a debate based on things we think we know.
DeleteIf you want to look through bias, I'd suggest practicing by taking any article, taking a marker, and marking raw facts only (no interpretations of said facts). Then it becomes easier to see the forest from the trees, as you see the interpretation from the actual support for said interpretation.