Wright Brothers argument

[Katana314]

I kind of thought of this reading that stick figure comic, xkcd. Apparently the Wright Brothers periodically switched views on an argument, and tried to defend the other's side in order to see the other person's point.
We have a lot of debates in this forum, and while it almost never gets to flaming, I think this might be kinda fun to try. Just put "Wright Brothers Argument" at the start of a post in a debate thread, then find a way to defend the viewpoint you were opposing.

 

[Lance Icarus]

That's a neat idea. I'll try it sometime when I think the other person is riding the short bus to the thread.

 

[Russ Pitts]

This is one of the neatest ideas I've heard in a long time.

 

[Goofonian]

Sounds cool in principle, although I'm not sure I'm gonna be very good at it....

 

[Arbre]

That's basically what you do when understanding what your opponents try to argue, and how they do it.
If you don't do it, your own position is pretty much meaningless.

So what does the WA really achieve exactly, safe wasting time arguing for the adversary, instead of defending your point?

 

[Anton P. Nym]

That's basically what you do when understanding what your opponents try to argue, and how they do it.
If you don't do it, your own position is pretty much meaningless.

So what does the WA really achieve exactly, safe wasting time arguing for the adversary, instead of defending your point?

It forces the more adamant persons on the Intertubes to do pretty much what your first paragraph says.

Besides, defending "your" point is bound to get much more heated than defending "a" point because us typing primates still get territorial even when it's just electrons wiggling. If the WBA gets more folks to divorce themselves from viewing the debate as "me vs. you" and get remarried to "point vs. point", maybe we can keep things sane(r) here.

-- Steve

 

[Andraste]

us typing primates still get territorial even when it's just electrons wiggling.

-- Steve

I'm stealing this and putting it on my wall on Monday. I love it.

 

[Arbre]

It forces the more adamant persons on the Intertubes to do pretty much what your first paragraph says.

Intertubes? Watizit?

 

[J.theYellow]

Unfortunately, this could also lead to absurdist sarcasm.

"Of course Doom is still the best FPS ever, because it was the first one! It should be obvious!"

 

[Di22y]

Lotta people saying 'your best argument to me would be' me thinks. Then theres a whole new argument, Thumbs up.

 

[Arbre]

Lotta people saying 'your best argument to me would be' me thinks. Then theres a whole new argument, Thumbs up.

Yes, I tend to do that, but it's only inserted within an ensemble of arguments I used to defend my point of view, largely because it tends to be more constructive.
Well, "tends" being the key word.

But I'm certainly not solely building a tirade for the opposite side.

 

[saganaw]

I've done this before on another forums - we call it "Devil's Advocate". In fact, I felt the idea was so good that I've even discussed the concept at the receptions of the College Historical Society in Trinity College, Dublin.

I was going to say that the "Wright brothers" idea seemed awfully familiar; playing Devil's advocate is a pretty common rhetorical device, as far as I know, but generally one does so just before shooting down that argument, while doing a "Wright brothers argument" seems to require one to ignore one's own opinion for the time being.

 

[Anarchemitis]

This is an awesome argument method. Maybe I'll get my siblings and I to do it.

 

[Earthbound]

Ah, we used to do this in my English classes. It's rather interesting if you have people intelligent enough to argue a differing point, which we have a surplus of here.

 

[Isaac Dodgson]

I've done this before on another forums - we call it "Devil's Advocate". In fact, I felt the idea was so good that I've even discussed the concept at the receptions of the College Historical Society in Trinity College, Dublin.

I play Devil's Advocate quite a bit actually. It lets one get into the opposing side's psyche

 

[jim_doki]

nice in theory, it will never work. mainly because on one side of the argument is complete nonsense, or is so brilliant we as mortals cannot understand it

 

[sneakypenguin]

I had this idea for a thread yesterday, dang my twin for saying it was stupid. wright is my name so heck it would have fit perfectly.
Arguing for something you dont agree with strengthens your own arguments, the whole "Know your enemy" ideal

 

[NewClassic_v1legacy]

This is an awesome argument method. Maybe I'll get my siblings and I to do it.

On your mark.
Get set.
NECROBUMP!

While I'm all for Devil's Advocacy...
Dang, Anarch. This one's positively ancient.

 

[PatientGrasshopper]

Sounds cool in principle, although I'm not sure I'm gonna be very good at it....

yea same here, I don't know how well I could defend my opponent's view, it would always be a biased parody. However I have played devil's advocate a few times on somethings that I haven't opposed as adamantly.

 

[black lincon]

Oddly enough I already do this a lot. Primarily because I'm a very middle of the road guy on a lot of issues and am usually very willing to compromise. Then again it happens most often for me on religious debate when I'm sick of defending the losing side (guess which one) and simply join on the opposite side because it's more fun to ridicule the idiot than defend him. So I guess a thumbs up from me, I'd like to try this with abortion, because I still can't find a good reason to support that.