I used to have a colleague that, like me, really enjoyed a good friendly-minded argument. It could be about something that could easily be googled and checked for the right answer (which usually was how that kind of argument ended) or a more open questions like What is the definition of a democratic country? or even Is it possible to prove that flying reindeer do not exist? We enjoyed discussing these kinds of random questions that did not always have a clear answer; it felt like an intellectual challenge to figure out arguments for our respective standpoints. It was not usually important who was “right” or “wrong”—commonly it was not so black and white, but rather a grey scale. The important thing was that we in the process usually learned something new. Unfortunately, I have had many arguments with other people that were not at all interested to learn something new but rather to just “win” the argument, where facts does not matter and there is no hope for a common conclusion. These kinds of arguments usually seem rather pointless afterwards.
Arguments can often be divided into two rough categories: argue-to-win or argue-to-learn. My friend’s and my arguments described above were clearly in the argue-to-learn category. It is the accepted way of doing discussions in academia and scientific circumstances (with some individual exceptions, unfortunately). How else to learn something new? Unfortunately, it is very common in everyday-life to encounter people that just will argue to win. Outside special circumstances, like a court case where lawyers and prosecutors do argue to win, these kind of arguments are seldom constructive. Many arguments on Facebook, Twitter and other public and especially anonymous fora tend to be like this. Usually, these argue-to-win arguments can go on for as long as you like. It does not matter how much facts or reasoning you give, they will normally just be dismissed and at some point you realise that there is no way the other party will change their opinion.
I believe it is important to be able identify bad argumentation, whether it is just a trolling type of argue-to-win argumentation, based on faulty logic or fallacies, untrue facts, or based on a world-view reference system different from yours. If you realise that you are engaged in an argument that fits any of these descriptions, you might save a lot of time by pointing these things out and either win the argument or at least end a pointless conversation.
Fallacies are illogical or misleading arguments. It is much easier to win an argument if you have learned to spot these and, of course, avoiding them yourself makes you a better debater. Common fallacies are:
- Ad hominem, where the personal attacks is used instead of actual argumentation;
- Cherry picking, when only facts supporting the argument are considered, giving a skewed picture of the truth.
- Red herring, where a new argumentation is introduced that has nothing to do with the original question (e.g. Trump calling normal criticism a “witch hunt”).
- Whataboutism, where endless comparisons to similar, but irrelevant, cases are made until both parties are either utterly confused or exhausted (“It is wrong of Russia to invade Georgia”—“What about the USA invading Iraq/Yugoslavia/Granada/…” You can argue whether or not the Russian invasion of Georgia 2008 was wrong or not without discussing every previous invasion in history by other countries. You may even think that all these invasions were wrong. If you however start to dive into all these different cases, the discussion will never end).
- Circular argumentation, where the conclusion is already assumed in the premise (God exists because it written in the Bible; the Bible is true because it is the word of God).
There many more fallacies (see a list here) and knowing about them makes it easier to identify them when you encounter them.
Basing your arguments on facts sounds like something straight-forward, but different people may have different definitions on what constitute “a fact”. In a modern society, we usually think of facts as something scientifically proven—and this is also my view—but some people may have another worldview, another reference system, such as the Bible or the Quran, which they interpret literally. I have encountered scientifically trained Muslims that seems to consider what is written in the Quran more important than what is the scientific consensus, even if it is a clearly scientific question like the age of the universe or the origin of the species. These are questions where the scientific and the literal Islamic references systems clashes, but one could also consider questions that are only relevant within either system. Whether kangaroos are mammals (they are) is a question that scientist at some point might have discussed, but is probably not covered in the Quran, which was written down long before Australia was known to the people in the Middle East. On the other hand, “what is the right way to pray” is not a scientific question but probably something that a Muslim could argue about based on what is written in the Quran. My point here is that if your reference system is different from your counterpart’s, then you will never reach any common conclusions unless you first agree on a common reference system.
It does not need to be a different religious reference system that is the problem. It is common to have different definitions of what you are discussing. By first agreeing on common definitions, a common conclusion might be reached. However, if no common definitions can be found, there is no point in continuing the discussion. I remember one discussion I had about the Estonian-Russian history, only to realise that my counter-part had no understanding on how objective historical research is conducted. Unfortunately, the historical accounts in some countries are neither objective nor trustworthy, but it does not mean that historical research cannot be done properly and scientifically, as is the rule in e.g. Western Europe.
Finally, I have often found that many arguments are about current events where it might be much harder to agree on what are the facts of an issue. If you want to understand what is happening now in Ukraine, you will have to rely on news reports from the media. Unfortunately, if you are not careful about which media you follow, you will find very contradictory reports about the war. A person only following Russian news media is likely to have a very different view on what is true than somebody following, say, Finnish media or Western media in general. The Russian media landscape is by now completely controlled by the Kremlin and its major purpose is to spread disinformation and confusion among the Russian population and as many as possible outside Russia. No code of journalism ethics is followed and the media has no independence. By claiming that all foreign media is lying, the Kremlin is creating its own “reference system”, as discussed above, for those who follow and believe their media reporting. Trying to discuss what is really happening in the war in Ukraine with somebody that is only believing the propaganda from the Russian news media will be pointless as both sides will accuse the other of not knowing the facts. This happens of course also with other topics with people reading bad Western media such as Fox News in the USA or Daily Mail in the UK. In order to have a constructive discussion with somebody about a current topic, there will first be a need to have an agreement on what are the proper sources or what news media is trustworthy. It is of course not easy to learn to identify serious journalism, but I recommend following news sources that have promised to follow the journalistic code of ethics, are well established with a good track record, and are trusted by other trusted news media.
Losing an argument about a question with an objectively true answer does not need to be that big kind of a deal. Hopefully you learned something new from the discussion. Insisting on getting the last word even though the facts are against you generally just make you look bad and ignorant. In some cases you might want to engage in an argument that you know nobody will ever win (arguments about e.g. believes or subjective opinions) in order to learn more about a person, but in most cases they are just a wast of time. By knowing how to identify bad arguments or pointless discussions, you can possibly save yourself a lot of time by ending them, ignore them, or perhaps win them, but hopefully it will also help you not to start them yourself.
Picture: Wikimedia Commons, available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
Ville Jansson, PhD 