How do you know if you are in an Ideological Echo Chamber?

I am open for constructive criticism, Sturgis. Go ahead... if you want to act as prosecutor, I will act in my own defense.

Where do you feel I have slipped? I asure you can find some instances, but I do try to step out of any ideological bubble in which I find myself (I plead nolo contendere for my running feud with Izzy. Anything else is fair game )

If anyone would take the unpopular side of the Google Memo argument, that the guy shouldn't have been fired. I would love to try arguing the other side of that one. I would need someone who could make a sincere effort on that one... I don't think there is anyone except for me who is willing to defend that position. Any takers?

If it's of any interest to you, I feel that Google was wrong to fire the engineer. But as it's just my opinion I can't really argue the case convincingly. "People should learn to be more thick-skinned," probably wouldn't cut it as an acceptable line of reasoning.

I've referenced this guy before but if you ever have the time check out some of the writings of Donald Lazere. Here's one journal article I was able to find:
Teaching the Political Conflicts: A Rhetorical Schema

There is little sense towards having me detail areas in which I believe you to be wrong or too pig-headed to admit there may indeed be another viewpoint.

Time and again, you issue forth a statement and when people don't agree with it in its entirety, you react with what appears to me to be a stiff impenetrable suit of armor. I get tired out from it. I'll still give my side on things and read your response, but, if it seems to be just a rehash of your past statements it'll end there.

Thanks, that was a very interesting read!

Cheers
Cycloptichorn

You are making a very broad accusation, without offering any examples. Furthermore you are telling me that I am incapable of change.

I will tell you, Sturgis, people can step out of their ideological echo chambers without reaching an agreement. It seems like you are suggesting that when I debate. with people on the left I should accept what they are saying. Of course I don't know what I am talking about because you are making a criticism with no explanation. That is worse than useless, it is a cheap swipe.

There is a big difference between constructive criticism and personal attack. I will ask again, nicely, if you have any specific examples of what you are talking about. I don't promise I will agree with you (although I have changed my mind in Able2know debates before), but I will thoughtfully consider it.

He may well be thinking of your performance in the immigration thread that you (I think) started, eh, Max?

I'll give you credit there that, in the end, you acknowledged that your positions were based on subjective values--values which you said would NEVER change.

Fair enough. But I can say I value anything, say, "honesty," and that alone won't tell me what a devotion to abstract honesty implies in terms of practical choices, or what "honesty" actually consists of in particular cases.

I don't really understand your point Layman.

Everyone has subjective values. Values aren't something I usually change based on what other people think. It doesn't make any sense to argue about a value, it is something that is core to who I am. At the core of any value system is a set of axioms. You can't prove them, you have to just assert that they are true (and accept that other people have different value systems).

Honesty, means stating one's values as values... rather than pretending that there is any logical basis to them.

I never argue with anyone. I merely try to explain to them why they are so wrong

I think it's a good list with the addition of layman's item:

you do everything on that list and nonetheless adamantly deny that you are in a bubble.

I've stated before that the primary value of A2K for me is as a means to hone my thinking.

Along the same vein as maporche, when writing a post I often try and anticipate the counter-argument that will be made and pre-empt it. If I can't come up with a satisfactory counter to the counter-argument, I will usually scrap what I've written or rewrite it. In doing so I learn what ideas to scrap as well.

Clearly this is not a regimen I religiously follow. Sometimes passion overrides the process and quite honestly, so does limiting comments to aphorisms.

I know that quite a few people have a problem with my longer posts, but frankly that's tough on them. They can always thumb it down to make it go away, and since most of the people who complain about them regularly thumb down posts of mine in which I might simply right "Welcome to A2K" or "Have a nice day" there's little incentive to shorten them.

Believe it or not I do often edit the longer ones (they could be longer!) but sometimes I get lazy.

However, I have found that the longer posts often contain my most successful critical thinking; particularly if I am responding point by point to someone else comments. I try to do this whenever I respond and it leads to length, but I have a problem with cherry picking comments for a response. Anyone can find something in a post to which they can fashion a counter-point (especially if they deceptively edit it or take in out of context which is too often the case here), but unless the post contains nothing but gibberish (which fortunately is rarely the case here) I think it approaches intellectual cowardice to respond to only one or two points out of the eight or ten made because you find you don't have a good response for the others.

Responding to all of them will often lead to one or more "Good point." or "I agree with you here." or even "I don't know enough about the subject to respond to this" and there's nothing wrong with that unless you feel compelled to never agree with an adversary, admit you are wrong, or admit that you don't know all of the facts.

So while I don't hold myself to it 100% of the time (or maybe even most of the time), I think a good rule of thumb for critical thinking and meaningful debate is to try and respond to every point someone makes, not just the ones you think you can knock out of the park.

It's interesting that anyone should play games like responding to only the points they can counter or, worse, manipulating someone's words. It's not as if any of us are being graded on our posts or receiving points in a contest (the thumb feature, as used, is a total perversion of a point system). A tiny, tiny slice of the world sees what we write, and quite frankly, praise from other members, while I'm sure is always appreciated, is pretty rare. So it would seem we are mostly motivated by self-regard. If we write something of which we are proud (it's persuasive, it's eloquent, it's witty etc) our sense of pride is our main reward. Since plenty of people cheat when they play solitaire, I shouldn't be surprised that they cheat when they play the A2K game.