You Are Probably Overgeneralising In Debates
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Imagine starting an argument with: “Bathtubs kill thousands every year. They are immoral. They are spread all around the world like a plague, supposedly offering comfort but all they do is kill people”. You wouldn’t do that. You know better than to over-generalise in order to make a point.
As an intelligent individual you would say instead: “The Bathtubs at Mr. Anderson’s sauna parlor are very dangerous, causing serious injuries to 3 people while one died after hospital complications”. This is a completely different statement and most likely one an average person would use, if we were talking about bathtubs.
Whenever I get into discussions, supporters of one idea can overgeneralise enough to trash the whole thing right from the start. This happens only about ideologies. Never about chairs, bathtubs, cars or any other physical objects. Although ideologies and objects, are built and operated by people, they seem to be treated differently, especially when it comes to debates.
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Ideologies are not even tangible entities. You can’t touch or operate communism, christianity, atheism, voluntaryism. They are general ideas that encompass specific practises. Often those practises, like philanthropy and human progress, are shared from all ideologies—they were after all conceived for a better world.
Things never go as planned. This is not necessarily because of the intrinsic properties of some ideologies but rather because our planet is subject to entropy much like the rest of the universe. Constructing threads of causality onto ideologies is rather ridiculous. One can cause a cup to brake. There is a direct causal link. An ideology though cannot cause millions of deaths because there are myriads of causal interactions within that ideology. Constituting it as an agent of causality is indistinguishable from magical thinking. Nonetheless, when things go south humans can't help but overgeneralise. As causal beings we seek interpretations. Most of the time anything will do.
You can mention Communism and someone will bring Stalin’s Soviet Union as a counter argument. You mention Anarcho-Capitalism and someone else will bring Pinochet’s Chile. Nobody is immune from this whether they are Anarcho-Capitalist, Orthodox Christian, Social Democrat or anything else in between. The issues these ideologies encompass are obviously shades of gray rather than black and white. Supporters of opposing ideologies though, don’t care about gray zones. Ideologies are bred and propagated in black and white. This is afterall how they become ideologies.
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Being a freethinker becomes quite hard in an era of people clumping into ideological groups. Common statements like “Governments kill people” although they are as ridiculous as “Cars kill people” discourage meaningful discussion. It wouldn’t make sense to say “Abandon the automobile industry because they kill people”. So why would anyone say “Abandon the idea of Governments because they kill people?”. I adhere to voluntaryist ideals myself and never used this form of argument in order to debate a statist. I would be as naive if I did. They might replied with a simple "Well, if you don't like it Mr. Voluntaryist, leave". And they will be correct.
Some government administrations under specific leaders, influence groups of people that kill each other. This is true. One has to be very specific when debating thesse issues. In the same way some drivers that are irresponsible, do kill people by operating cars. You wouldn’t attack a Volvo factory because your neighbor run over someone with his car. Why would you do the same about “Governments” when a specific administration of a specific country causes the problem at that given time? Overgeneralising is the evolution of witch-hunt. Afterall, we are not so different from our ancestors.
“The Car” as an agent, is as imaginary as “The Government” or “God” or “Economics”. These things cannot exist as concepts unless we are being extremely specific about them. “The Fiji-Island Government” , “The Indian God Shiva”, “The Austrian School of Economics”. Language, doesn't care about reality but rather about communication. Humans developed language in order to transfer ideas, not necessarily to convey objective reality. This is rather self evident, but we tend to neglect this important fact in our discussions.
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“The Government” is not something that exists. “The US. Government of the Obama Administration” does. Even then, one has to be very specific. Strip down any ideologically stimulated situation and you will see that there is a person, with probably a family and children caught up in the middle, lost in tranlation. This is true whether one is a leader or a follower. A soldier did not wake up one day with an urge to kill people. Someone implanted an ideology into their head through false causalities and overgeneralizations. The person who did this also got it from someone else. You fall back enough to the initial perpetator and you end up nowhere. The problem won’t be solved if the "X” concept fails. The individuals that make up that "X" concept will still group together and form much similar ideas under "Y" or "Z". One has to shake off the idea of groupism completely, not just a general concept some people adhere to.
Governments don’t kill People. People kill people. Science doesn’t liberate humanity. People liberate or enslave each other. Science can’t make a jet engine that flies us to the moon or another that shoots missiles at our homes. Human agents operate machines and ideologies. When one overgeneralizes they are stripped from their individuality and become pawns of a blurred idea. People die because people blame individuals based on over-generalised concepts. This is why it is so easy to attack someone in an online debate rather than in person. We see the idea, not the person.
We are social beings. We can’t help it most of the time but only as individuals we can escape the overgeneralising pitfall. So, who is ready to stand alone?
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I enjoyed this. It boils down to being non-judgemental too I think. Recognising that everyone comes from a perspective of difference. No two thoughts are the same. I may imagine an idealism like you, but I may want a different structure, different sub-ideologies and so on.
I was an angry Atheist once - and it all came crumbling down when I met super duper nice Christians, that accepted me for my beliefs - so why wasn't I doing the same?
Nice, nice post
Agreed.....the view I take is of not mistaking one's opinion for that of right vs. wrong would go along way in society.
It would! :) - Quite a mature adoption of communication is that :)
Bathtubs aren't moral agents. Morality only applies to human interactions.
Did you really link me here for this? My article explicitly says multiple times that "government" is nothing more than men and women who force people to pay them.
Downvoted for wasting my time.
Morality is subjective according to one's environment. Neither bathtabs or general concepts such as "the goverment" are moral agents since different people in different goverments hold different morality. Also, quote mining logical fallacy. You did not argue on context + strawman, you pivoted your argument to morality
Ofcourse I did since you seemed a bit lost with your article on statism. I was trying to help you get over those 101 first steps. I have seen many young voluntarists go through them. I went through it myself but I wasn't such a vindictive pussy. In your artcile you blame clearly "statists" or "the goverment" as if you represent all 7 billion people on earth. You are obviously wrong.
You downvoted because you are a sour looser who can't accept when he is wrong. I can understand that you have low self-estime by posting your massive photo with your girlfriend in a size that can be viewed directly from the moon — yelling (hey guys i am no longer a virgin) but really, its kind of pathetic to also downvote others.
You have been downvoting my articles since yesterday and they had nothing to do with our argument. You took the debate on a personal level. That's exactly where you lost.
So, on top of immature, naive anarchist you are also a liar. A strong human that can stand on their position does not flag their opposing view. But I guess Betas cannot help but be Betas.
Here is some advice for your burn. Apply with caution.
I can think of a number of well payed Steem authors that would do well to read this ;)
Good post!
I came here because of your opening line lol. Stayed for the whole article. Nice.
Another note on 'debates'...
It has been 'proven' in studies, that when 'debating' with friends, humans will often take a much more extreme point of view on a subject, in a larger social group, than we would among say, two friends. Good things to know, next time you find yourself in a heated debate. :)
Oh how I love a good debate among friends. lol.
True.
People are the most adaptive programmable bots ever. Often times they are made to work against their own interest though the exploit of the weakness you discussed.
Every concept is an abstraction, so we must be very careful, even language has its limits.
Unfortunately few people can afford having their own mind...
sad but true
Firstly, excellent article. It is important that one also do not get too caught up in one's cleverness, and want to shoot down to many others that are floundering around this thing we call life. I have enjoyed many of your articles, and find that we are probably very close in terms of values and philosophy. However, (there is always a but right), even if I completely agree with your statements around generalisation, I do not believe your assertion of all ideologies being equal holds true, and it is simply the executors of these that are the problem. It is exactly because humans create these ideologies that there are good and bad ones. You mentioned communism, and I can add Nazism and Apartheid to that list. These are essentially very much based on toe the line or die. I would say that like some cars being built well and safe and kill fewer people, and others poorly designed and probably kill more, same goes with ideologies. One should not be to general about all ideologies I suppose.
@robertm
Thank you.
I don't believe in equality as you know. I believe every single thing is different and everything is related in context with it's environment.
All ideologies are only similar when it comes to how they are perceived, NOT how they are defined.
All ideologies are perceived as concepts that demand people to group together.
People group together to oppose another group. This is the very definition of the group and what binds all ideologies together.
Remember, even a well build car can kill more people than a porrly made one. It depends on the driver, not the car. Same applies about ideologies. Fascism and Communism evolved out of the nation-state being threatened by external factors. The factors were mainly population explosion after the medical and industrial revolution, tripling our lifespan. Lack of resources made nations collide (most likely) and the old imperial ideals, emerged. Examining history objectively, through the spectrum of evolutionary anthropology, this is how the events most likely played out. This is why they could only belong to that specific time in history and nowhere else.
Context is vital when examining history. One cannot possibly assert today that one is a communist or a fascist. Those are just sensationalist epithets to convey an argument.
This is the usual, very old, divide and rule technique.
it is rather something ingrained in our nature. we just need to fight it
Good answer @kuriacos.
I suppose my key point is that while this is theoretically very true in real human engagements even those that takes no position has a position. And often these lack of position people are the ones that tend to be so focused on fight any position someone else knows, that they do not realise how they themselves by taking an opposing position, even if it is to take no position is actually an ideology.
You indeed touch on some very good points about the nature of history and evolution in the social domain, and I like your theories. But one can also at times look to hard for context, and thus start creating post facto context. At the time Hitler came to power, there was many different ideologies as there are today, all trying to deal with similar issues of industrialisation and wealth equality and distribution, albeit on nation, or individual levels. My view is that I do not mind anyone's ideology, as long as it leaves room for opposing ideologies. Certain ideologies leave by their very nature no room. other ideologies as a matter of principle give that room, but can be manipulated to groups wills and thus essentially move of from their actual underlying value system. Hijacked democracy is no longer democracy, and monopolistic capitalism is no longer capitalism. These are of course simplified views and we can spend many an evening discussing this, preferably over a bottle of wine. For me right and wrong is less important, but the fact that I get to engage and share my thoughts with thinkers like yourself is far more important
Thanks for your time and effort to express your views and share your knowledge. It is appreciated.
All ideologies leave room. Thing is, not all administrations of those ideologies leave room. Even in here in so called anarchic, voluntarist, decentralised steemit one could come and flag me and silence me completely Orwell-1984-Style.
Democracy is always the law of the jungle and monocapitalistic capitalism (you mean corporatism) is not capitalism. (i will write a dedicated article for that).
I also like to share my thoughts. I like our conversations. Lets keep them coming. I followed you so we can talk about them
Thanks for the reply. Will read that article, as it is a topic I am very interested in.
Very provocative post, @kyriacos. I enjoy reading your ideas. I find that I resonate with much that you say here, while some of it seems "off" to me.
Perhaps tangentially, anyone who compares Pinochet to anarcho-capitalism obviously doesn't understand one or the other. While he brought about a freer market for the country, there was nothing anarchistic about it. It was a coup followed by a brutal dictatorship that wound down into a democracy.
IMO, comparing the government to cars simply doesn't work. Cars have absolutely no volition. Governments do. But I also avoid this dilemma by embracing Nock's position of making a distinction between the state and the administrative agency that is government. The government can administer without coercion. However, the state is coercive by nature. A state uses government and the government can become the state, but the government doesn't have to be a state. The state coerces and kills, whether directly or by extension.
This distinction is very helpful in discussions where the two are mixed. Even the most vociferous anarchists agree (sometimes reluctantly) that there needs to be some order. And those who've taken the time to think through the challenges, will recognize the need for some form of administration. This is government. It's as simple as that.
When we can make that distinction, then most of us can look at the war mongering and draconian measures and see it as the work of the state. In the case of the US, there really is no distinguishing the state from the government, except perhaps on local levels. On a federal level, they are one. Perhaps this distinction helps avoid the over-generalization you speak of.
I absolutely agree that Chile has nothing to do with anarcho-capitalism but opposing sites view it as such since it was a post-coup society.
ofcourse it does. You continue commiting the same fallacy. Which Goverment? For example the Swiss have a system close to anarchy. Really no central goverment. Singapore as well.
Also, we both know that cars can alter personality as much as goverments. plenty of examples outhere. the psychological hype is massive. I would say that every single inanimate and animate object has volition on the individual. this is why it exists afterall with a given set of value.
It is only if it keeps you there without your will. If you can leave then there is no coercion.
There is no such thing as order. Order is spontaneous and doesn't need agents.
The distinction that needs to be made is not with goverment vs state but rather goverment/state vs people.
Thanks for the reply @kyriacos.
I didn't really commit a fallacy, because I didn't say anything about "government" other than that they have volition. I didn't characterize them at all, nor state that they all do anything in particular. I certainly didn't say anything about a "central" government. I simply asserted that if a government exists, it has volition. If it doesn't have volition, it doesn't exist. If it's anarchy, it can still be a government, it just can't rule. But it still has volition. As far as a car having volition, we'll have to disagree.
You dismissed my assertion that the state is distinct from the government. If this distinction is not maintained, then of course you'd dismiss the rest of my assertion. If you entertain the distinction I offered, then you most likely can agree with the rest of my assertion... I think. :)
Coercion is not only keeping you against your will. It also involves control of personal assets and forcing certain actions.
kyriacos:We perceive things differently but hey, that's why people are different i guess. I see the car manufacturer as someone who can exert volition on you through the car. same goes about advertising it with a hot chick, paintining red, running wild through the beach. It is not the same as someone running a broke down car. Clearly the object can be used to manipulate behaviour. consumerism is much the same.
A very good example of state without goverment is Switzerland. Ask anybody who is the president and they won't know. the country is divided in cantons and even other subdivisions and all decisions are made with small democratic groups for local areas. An anarchic society would have to work much the same.
In regards to coercion. You can can move your assets elsewhere. Cryptocurrencies allow you this. There is a choice if you want to live anarchic.
In regards to order, I simply don't believe in it existence and I explain it both philosophically and scientifically in the article i tagged. Order is just an erroneous word much like "nothing". there is no such thing as "nothing' there is always something everywhere.
I do accept the distinction of the state vs the goverment. What i meant is that neither are the problem in any state or any goverment. The problem is the agents that control or engage in them.
nice discussion
"Lets legalize guns and drugs to take away gang revenues" so you would legalize kidnapping people and forcing them in to prostitution!? literally a convo I had on Steemit the other day.
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