"If you doubt this, ask around. I wager you’ll be hard-pressed to find someone who wouldn’t want a safer, fairer, more just world for everyone if they could get it."
I'll take that wager. I've met a lot of people whose concern for others drops off sharply beyond their own family and friends. Then there is the deep tribal impulse that is satisfied only at the exclusion of others, almost as a principle. Suggesting they employ the starman in their discussion won't make a difference because it's not a rhetorical problem, it's just how their priorities reflect on how they act in their daily lives.
The issue is in assuming the most charitable version of an opponent when we have their actions to guide us instead. For example, right now there are lots of Russians who think it's fine to invade, kill and steal, not for safety, fairness or justice for everyone. They just want better for their tribe. And we should respond as such based on their actions.
And if you assume they want safety, fairness and justice for everyone, their responses will vary from 'sure, why not' to 'of course, that's exactly why we're liberating, cleansing and reappropriating'.
Many of us are just selfish bastards, and that's a character flaw.
I may be unlucky, but I have met a number of people who are not just selfish or tribal but actively sadistic. They would do something that does not benefit them if it meant discomfort and disadvantage for their outgroup. This is a little beyond just disinterest or lack of consideration, they actively prefer it. These are people who are constrained only by the rule of law, such as it is.
One of the companies I worked for seemingly attracted this type of personality. Of the people like this I've met (and been actually very cautious around), maybe 90% worked at that specific company.
>I've met a lot of people whose concern for others drops off sharply beyond their own family and friends.
This is why Hierocles the Stoic had the right idea when he pushed people to move one circle over. This is a far more practical goal than striving for a "just world".
Each one of us is as it were entirely encompassed by many circles, some smaller, others larger, the latter enclosing the former on the basis of their different and unequal dispositions relative to each other. The first and closest circle is the one which a person has drawn as though around a centre, his own mind. This circle encloses the body and anything taken for the sake of the body. For it is virtually the smallest circle, and almost touches the centre itself. Next, the second one further removed from the centre but enclosing the first circle; this contains parents, siblings, wife, and children. The third one has in it uncles and aunts, grandparents, nephews, nieces, and cousins. The next circle includes the other relatives, and this is followed by the circle of local residents, then the circle of fellow-tribes-men, next that of fellow-citizens, and then in the same way the circle of people from neighbouring towns, and the circle of fellow-countrymen. The outermost and largest circle, which encompasses all the rest, is that of the whole human race.
Once these have all been surveyed, it is the task of a well tempered man, in his proper treatment of each group, to draw the circles together somehow towards the centre, and to keep zealously transferring those from the enclosing circles into the enclosed ones ... It is incumbent on us to respect people from the third circle as if they were those from the second, and again to respect our other relatives as if they were those from the third circle. For although the greater distance in blood will remove some affection, we must still try hard to assimilate them. The right point will be reached if, through our own initiative, we reduce the distance of the relationship with each person.
“ For example, right now there are lots of Russians who think it's fine to invade, kill and steal, not for safety, fairness or justice for everyone. They just want better for their tribe.”
I think is a way oversimplification of geopolitical situation in Ukraine and Russian motives.
"you’ll be hard-pressed to find someone who wouldn’t want a safer,
fairer, more just world for everyone if they could get it"
As an optimist and humanist, a shocking revelation for me was hearing
of the "Truth and Reconciliation Commission" in South Africa. (I
think via a talk by Chomsky or Zizek)
Many atrocities were committed by both sides during the Apartheid era.
Enough said.
Years later the Government of National Unity wanted to heal the
country, to bury festering resentments and feuds. Perpetrators and
victims were brought together under supervision to talk openly and
work toward forgiveness. It's a great idea in principle. Although the
commission is widely considered successful, a strange thing occurred,
something that we also buried at the Nuremberg trials.
A quite small but significant group were not merely unrepentant, they
used the commission as a platform to attack and abuse their victims
again. "I'm really glad I tortured your children, let me tell you
about how they screamed", and so on.
Sure, always aim to "star man" in debate, but one must be hard enough
underneath to expect occasionally to be shot out of the sky, not by an
uncharitable or entrenched interlocutor but by an plain old evil
asshole. They exist. They're not "psychopaths" or even "trolls", but
get a thrill out of acting so as to add chaos and pain to the world.
You are 100% correct. That quote is garbage. What it's really saying is - "ask around, I'll wager you'll be hard-pressed to find someone who won't pretend to want a safer, fairer, more just world for everyone. In reality, when you explain what fair and just actually means, they will secretly reverse course at the first opportunity".
Just look at the foreign policy of every country in power. Look at the willingness of any power group to give up that power without intense military or financial pressure. Let's see - slavery, wars of conquest, ecological destruction, finding black men automatically guilty, rape, child abuse, monopolies, wealth concentration, regressive California property tax policy, etc.
I think you are being overly negative. Being more concerned with problems we are most familiar with is natural and not at all a "character flaw". Caring more about people we personally know than strangers isn't any kind of moral failure. The world is full of suffering and problems, and it is simply impossible to give the same level of concern to all. So we focus on our inner circles. It isn't a "deep tribal impulse..satisfied only at the exclusion of others". It is simply that the world is very big with very big problems and no one, not even the kindest, most caring individual among us, can give equal weight to all problems and all suffering.
Reading this article, it seems entirely about taking initiative changing your own approach, without an explicit expectation. Asking someone else to star-man is expecting them to change for you, without showing any compassion or respect for their humanity or opinion. It presents a clear assumption that their approach to life is wrong, and so they should adopt yours. You're creating a setting where they cannot agree with you without also accepting inferiority and invalidating their entire life perspective. You leave no room for incremental growth or self reflection.
> "If you doubt this, ask around. I wager you’ll be hard-pressed to find someone who wouldn’t want a safer, fairer, more just world for everyone if they could get it."
I wonder if more people actually want others to see our humanity than us to see the humanity of others. I would strongly bet on that actually.
I think a lot of people whose concern for others drops off sharply beyond their own family and friends believe that others don't have concern for them. It can become a preemptive indifference: they don't care about me, why should I care about them.
What I want to work on and help people realize is that I care about you, even if I don't know you. And the work I do to get there is often me realizing how much people care about me. Maybe this is what he's getting at with the starman concept, to flip ourselves from thinking others are trying to hurt us and reacting to them with hatred or indifference, to believing they actually care about us.
And I agree that many people may not want to do this, so I'm mostly just trying to do it for myself. I wonder if his argument would have come off differently if instead of telling people what they should do, he said these are the tools he employs and how they work in his life.
That's true, but at the same time, calling a Russian soldier a selfish bastard isn't going to stop him from invading Ukraine. Presumably, your goal is to motivate somewhat neutral people to support Ukraine or condemn Russia. In that case, the only thing you can do is to refute rationalizations used to justify the invasion.
As my friends from college (sample set of 10) got older I noticed where people split conservative or liberal (US centric sorry). My liberal friends are generally concerned for everyone in society and how they'll get screwed over or not.
My conservative friends are very concerned about anyone they know, and very worried about how they can't backstop them because of supporting the whole of society. 2 of them would fly / drive across the country at a moments notice to help me out for weeks. But they aren't concerned with people outside that circle. Of the 2 I had deep conversations with, they both were more focused on setting up social circles to support everyone else such as churches, local community, family, which to them is the fallback, not the government.
> a kind of platinum rule to improve upon the golden one
When I read this, I scoffed a little bit. A better idea than one proposed two thousand years ago? Say it isn't so! Why haven't we thought of this before?
I think you hooked rightly on the Ukraine and Russia conflict. Sometimes, there is not a "best version" of someone.
The author seems to reject that outright, saying we need to recognize our opponents humanity in order to effectively argue, with the premise that there's something good in there to tease out.
On what basis can the author say that there's something good inside? Their "humanity"? That reasoning is rather circular...
Even when individuals act with charity and compassion, they act according to their beliefs, interests, and needs. As Reinhold Niebuhr described in Moral Man and Immoral Society, a group of individuals acting according to shared interests, even when doing so compassionately, will inevitably come into conflict with other groups, socially or militaristically, when those interests conflict.
> right now there are lots of Russians who think it's fine to invade, kill and steal, ...
It's not even that the Russians who think this are especially evil people, or irrational people, or people who are unlike us in any fundamental way.
The reason they think this way, and that you do not, is because they believe different myths than you do.
Let's say your worldview is defined by Ivan Ilyin [0]. You don't consider other people or ethics at all. The only thing that matters in the world is God. And God is displeased that the perfect Russia that He created has been spoiled.
The only way to heal the world and make God happy is to restore a certain kind of utopian Russia. That pure and perfect Russia is united in territory and belief, so it can't tolerate any division or fragmentation within itself.
Agents of the devil in the West are deviously dismantling and disintegrating that pure and perfect Russia, piece by piece. Westerners are carving off pieces of territory like Ukraine, and dividing Russian people with seditious Western ideas like democracy and gender fluidity and a free press.
So it's a supernatural struggle between good and evil. An existential battle like that means there's no room for this messy business of parliaments and voting, or compromising with different perspectives.
We need one strong leader, a true and pure leader, to inherit the mantle of past great leaders like Stalin and Peter the Great. He will be God's instrument to make the hard decisions and lead the nation in glorious struggle. This divinely inspired leader will create unity in the world by restoring and reuniting Russia itself.
----
Where do you even begin to have a conversation when you don't share the most basic of beliefs or values? There is no common ground in wanting a safer, fairer, more just world. We have our own foundational myths that we rarely acknowledge or interrogate, and our myths don't intersect with Russia's myths at all.
I watched a security video recently of 3 random people in a convenience store. The store clerk has some kind of medical issue, passes out and falls down.
The 3 random people decide that now they can rob the store with impunity, take a bunch of stuff, and then leave the clerk on the floor. Eventually someone else came in and helped the clerk, but it wasn't like those 3 people were part of some psychopath convention. They just independently decided that getting about $20 worth of free stuff was a better option than calling 911 or checking on the man.
This is a really good idea for people who are thoughtful and genuinely want to learn the truth. There problems with it in practice.
Some people have made their political ideology the foundation that they build their ego on. Any disagreement is intolerable. Others are not thoughtful enough to understand that there can be genuine disagreement in the world of both thought and action which needs to be tolerated.
These people will ruin any concept of starmanning that catches hold by using it as a passive-aggressive cudgel ("I'm sure you are a good person and therefore you will immediately cease your opposition and accept my arguments!", "I'm sure you want to be a good person and therefore can't really believe these things you are saying, which are only for bad people!", "Why are you resisting when I'm starmanning you, you must be Hitler 2.0").
But without labelling it, I do endorse the technique. Almost everyone wants the world to get better.
I have inadvertently been "starman"-ing people my entire life. I usually refer to it as "benefit of the doubt". I have not encountered any problems with it in practice other than that sometimes I end up talking in circles when the other person doesnt really have a strong central point to their argument (or it is just not clicking for me no matter how hard I try to understand)
I think if such practices became mainstream, then people would begin to realize the difficulties involved in having a coherent conversation about a point of disagreement. The passive-aggressive cudgels you mention would fall flat because it is instantly noticeable as not fitting the necessary patterns for coherent conversation.
No one needs to accept or reject the other. the point of an argument is to educate each other, answer questions, and allow each other to fit both opinions into their own world view (ex. what are the limits / specifics to your belief?). Maybe someone changes their mind during that conversation, maybe they dont. maybe someone needs to let the new information ferment in their minds and life for a bit before it clicks. that is part of giving someone benefit of the doubt
maybe you are talking to someone who is venting, or in the middle of a mental episode (i mean that literally, not derogatorily), or was unfortunately born a narcissistic manipulator and cant help themselves. It doesnt matter, they cannot "win" the conversation - no one can - and the more people that realize this truth about conversations in general, the better the world will become
> But without labelling it, I do endorse the technique. Almost everyone wants the world to get better.
It is interesting to see how labeling a technique like this and assigning it a sense of moral superiority seems to invite the exact abuse you describe.
I’ve noticed this with the recent popularity of “steelmanning”; Many of the explicitly-labeled steelman arguments I’ve read lately are actually just strawman arguments, but the author tries to preempt criticism by labeling it a steelman and pretending it is the most robust counter argument that could exist. Often these false steelman arguments arise when the author doesn’t understand the topic as well as they think they do but they believe that “steelmanning” automatically makes them an expert on the counter arguments.
Unfortunately this is true, even with non-political topics. Some people will treat sincere questions trying to understand their point of view as attacks and keep escalating/trying to make it personal.
In the end there isn’t a lot you can do about it, except learn when to cut bait and move on. I agree with you that it’s still worth trying.
>Some people have made their political ideology the foundation that they build their ego on[...]
This remind me about the idea of "holy wars" in "The denial of death" of Ernest Becker.
“Since the main task of human life is to become heroic and transcend death, every culture must provide its members with an intricate symbolic system that is covertly religious. This means that ideological conflicts between cultures are essentially battles between immortality projects, holy wars.”
Also something along the lines of preferring to annihilate the other before they risk to be symbolically annihilated, like if we prefer the physical death before than the death of the symbolic. For both the other (when is an ideological opponent) and ourselves. We may be physically death, but symbolically immortal.
A post I made elsewhere, which seems pertinent here:
Politics and Hermit Crabs
Hermit Crabs wear a shell for protection. If they get separated from their shell, they get frantic and often die if they can't find a replacement. They don't like it when people mess with their shell.
Imagine coming up with a brilliant, powerful political argument. You can smash the shell right off your opponent. Will they thank you for it? There is a real human psychological need behind people's beliefs. There is lived experience behind these beliefs.
It can feel like a real attack when that lived experience is invalidated. People retract into their shell, or attack right back. If their shell is actually busted, they probably won't stick around and find out what else you plan on doing to them; they'll run off and they may find an even worse shell.
So what then? Just accept that they will wear a terrible shell forever?
I think that you have to accept their current situation. You don't have to accept it forever, but you have to see them where they are now. You can't change their shell, and you shouldn't expect them to change to a shell that matches yours any time soon, but if you don't drive them away, then maybe they can accept that your shell is valid, and find value in your point of view.
And to be clear, you don't have to do this for everyone, and you sure don't have to do it on social media. You may not be able to accept anyone's terrible shell right now. That's fine. But remember that we all picked up our shells from our environment; we carry our history around with us.
I'm really impressed by this idea. I've never heard of the idea of "star-manning" an argument before, I presume the author invented it, it's good food for thought.
There's another interesting term in here - "ideological capture" - seems like this refers to the state where a person or organization is supporting policy based on ideology or group identity rather than what policy would yield the best outcomes for all of the people involved.
I don't think star-manning is a replacement for steel-manning. More like there are situations where no matter how well you steel-man someone's argument, they're not going to listen, because you don't like each other (or each other's views). Maybe the place where this idea is most applicable is when someone else is in an adversarial mode, it's really the person themselves that you need to "star-man" to establish that common ground is possible and get them into a cooperative mode.
I still think steelmanning is the right path to addressing conflict.
Even in very tense settings, it’s hard for people to be disagreeable about you accurately relaying their view — maybe even better than they did themselves. That makes people feel listened to and understood, which are powerful motivators in human psychology.
I won’t pretend I always do this, but I’ve certainly had the best success inquiring about their position until I can steelman it and only then addressing why I disagree.
As Chris Voss would say, you don’t want them to say “you’re right”, you want them to say “that’s right”.
I see a few folks in these comments essentially saying "If only everyone else would do this!" This rather misses the point. You don't empathize with your opposition for their sake; you do it for your own sake. You do it because you might learn something. You do it because it helps to build relationships, like (say) the famous friendship between the late justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Antonin Scalia. You even do it because your argument will be more effective. But the bottom line is that you do it because it's better for your own mental health if you try to think of the people around you as good.
You're right that this has unilateral benefits, but it's even better if something like this becomes encoded in social norms. For example, there are online communities where it's simply expected that you'll assume good faith and basic decency from the people you're arguing with. To do otherwise would be a serious faux pas. There are also online communities where everything immediately devolves into flamewars in which everyone is shouting and no-one is listening, and that is considered normal and inevitable. And then of course there's a whole spectrum in-between. I can tell you from experience: the places with nicer discourse norms are more pleasant and the discussions tend to be much more interesting and productive. (Compare HN with, say, most of Twitter.)
Unfortunatly, like NVC, arguing from compassion is really hard to fake.
You may force yourself to practice it, and you will improve. But as soon as you get heat up in the moment, it will all go away.
What really helps you to progress is to work on yourself (whatever is your favorite tool, therapy, meditation, etc).
Because it will improve the compassion you feel (for others, but more importantly, for yourself: a lot of the debate is going on inside), and giving a compassionate shape to your words will then be more natural, fluid, and therefore, will be less likely to melt away in a real life debate.
But trying to sound compassionate when you are angry doesn't work very well. And it requires a huge amount of energy to maintain (ask any politician :)).
This is one of those areas where "fake it until you make it" shows its limits.
However, it does improve the quality of your exchanges a lot on the long run, and for me, it's really worth it.
I'm not saying don't try to fake it, but rather, understand where the ceiling is.
I think this is something you get almost for free when talking to someone you know in a real-world face-to-face conversation. You get full-bandwidth communication with a real human, and it's impossible to ignore their humanity. When you step back from having a conversation with a person you know, to having an argument with a person you don't know, the humanity diminishes - they become just a character on the other side of the room. When you step back from reality altogether, and argue with people online, the humanity is absent entirely (and indeed, the thing you are interacting with might not be human).
I conclude that a healthy debate can only take place in the real world and a prerequisite is getting to know the person first.
> Anyone who has spent time arguing on social media has heard of the straw man fallacy.
I think the main issue is the folly of arguing on social media. It is a setup for dehumanizing and vilifying the other.
I think most arguments on social media are about snark and signaling to your own tribe how smart you are more than actually trying to understand the truth or convince people holding a different view.
Conversations among friends over a beer are much more likely to enlightening and possibly persuasive.
The lines between real life and social media are blurring. You hear more and more commonly about people cutting all ties with old friends or even family members about relatively simple things. It’s a more accepted thing to do now – complete ostracism of those who we disagree with – instead of trying to find common ground.
"Social media" is not social. As a business, it is the monetisation of strife.
As an exchange of ideas, social media is (as you say) mostly people flinging words at one another.
To be "social", participants in social media would need to manifest commitment to real solutions and people would be accountable for their words and deeds. This is how human society works. There are social consequences in real social exchange. It is a trust system.
I propose that the reason why we hear of people's long-time friendships and family ties collapsing is because those social ties have simply become weak. The pretext for the rupture doesn't much matter.
> To star-man is to not only engage with the most charitable version of your opponent’s argument, but also with the most charitable version of your opponent, by acknowledging their good intentions and your shared desires despite your disagreements.
This is an excellent approach. But it depends on the trust system of real society.
I think an underlying mega conflict in online communication is sharing more than we want to share, or at least it has been one plaguing me over the years.
I don't think social media communication has to be dehumanizing, I think it comes into how much do I share about how I'm actually feeling and my actual identity on the internet where hundreds if not thousands or millions of people might see it? And yet it can be soooo easy to share on the internet, from our phone or computer, just talking/typing into the screen, at almost any time and any place?
So then I do think it can come into "how do I pretend to be cool and superhuman...so that people don't know too much about me?"
In a conversation with a friend over a beer, one might open up about why they hate inflation because they think they might lose their job and they're afraid if they lose their job, their wive and kids might leave them. I bet that's the real underlying reason for that person, yet on the internet, that same person might say that evil bankers are trying to destroy us with inflation because who admits to being afraid they're going to lose their life on the internet, with their name attached?
I think, from anecdotal personal experience, that a lot of people harbor deep seated emotions of anger, fear, and hostility. This makes it really difficult to communicate with them, as defensiveness and distrust are often a part of their reaction- and they sometimes lash out with personal attacks, whicb can beentally exhausting and discouraging.
Even with close family members, it is difficult for me to be able to explain my ideas without encountering a barrier in their reaction where they refuse to consider what I have to say.
I think, and this is just my theory, that a lot of people have traumas (sometimes ones they themselves don't realize relate to their associations with the subject being discussed) that make it hard to communicate and they may not know how to approach considering their view might be wrong, or even not wrong but just not the only valid way to look at an issue.
It's extraordinarily difficult to approach certain topics without also encouraging people to confront their biases and encourage them to question things they regard as absolutes- as I mentioned, even with close family members, it's very hard to communicate and have discussions.
It's not an easy thing for them to do, granted, and there is also very little incentive for someone to introspect on why they feel the way they do about something, even less for them to acknowledge there are alternate ways of approaching topics- even hypothetically.
This is how I've operated for most of my adult life. It is generally not received well. It seems to be taken as weakness. It just happened yesterday, on this very forum.
I do it anyway, because I'm clean-shaven, and need to look at myself, every morning.
I've never thought it needed a name, although the Bowie reference is nice.
It can be incredibly draining. I think it's important to also have boundaries and know how to "pick your battles". Some people are unwilling or unable to open themselves up by being sincere, having a genuine discussion can leave people feeling vulnerable and there's a level of trust and willingness to take a risk necessary to truly have a deep discussion about certain topics.
Sometimes it's just not possible. Some people have impenetrable barriers they will defend with no regard for how they do so and the way it affects others.
That being said I like to think of it like I'm reaching out to someone, and often they don't reach back, in a majority of cases they don't want that contact. Those times when someone does, though, brings me great hope.
> I do it anyway, because I'm clean-shaven, and need to look at myself, every morning.
I really appreciate this point. I do this not necessarily to win the argument or change how the other person is thinking/feeling, I do it mostly because I feel better when I do it. Believing someone is out to get me can cause me a lot of fear. Believing they don't care about me can cause me a lot of loneliness. Believing they're trying their best and are swamped with suffering? I actually feel relieved and maybe even grateful that they may have tried so hard to help me.
Will I ever know their deepest intentions? Probably not, but I sure feel a lot better when I believe they have good intentions for me.
Glad to see you comment on here, you're one of the few names I recognize on HN and appreciate what you said and what you often say, thank you.
I think it's helpful to think in terms of merely trying to explain my point of view and share my knowledge. I'm usually looking for conversation, not argument.
Then I don't need to worry so much about winning or making points. It's easier to be kind, compassionate, etc when engaging from that space.
Yes! I want to share what's happening with me and receive what's happening with them. When I read this article, I think I took away that it was mostly about hearing what's happening with others, and I think it's missing that piece of us sharing what's happening with us first.
Of course one should be compassionate and understanding of others, except towards those who are violent, or advocates for violence, or hate, or those who expressly support those who do, or indirectly, or by inaction allow them to exist.
…say the people advocating for ostracism and demonization of their opponents. I agree with this article; there is entirely too much of that kind of behavior going on, and not enough of its opposite.
I want to believe. And in interpersonal interactions, with regular people, in meatspace, it's probably good advice.
But in a larger context, we live in a post-truth world, a hyperreality. Sartre noted the use of bad faith to create a false reality as early as 1944:
> “Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.”
Since the late 1970s or so, it's gotten worse, as hyper-reality has become a mainstream tool of governance worldwide [1] [2]. People don't just disagree about the interpretation of facts and ideas about what should be done about them, but about the facts themselves. And this disagreement about facts is fostered by powerful interests, some cooperating, some competing, for profit and political reasons, the latter of which is mainly about making coordinated and effective opposition movements impossible in multiple ways.
Lana Wachowski, via the character Morpheus: “The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around, what do you see? Businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it.
I'd like to think that starmanning would be a tool for making people ready to be unplugged. But the truth is, people will fight to protect the system, especially when they've been convinced that they benefit from it.
I invited the author on Twitter to participate here on HN, and he said:
> Haha that’s a lot of commentary to field, but if you’re in there with everyone you can tell them I’m happy to take questions or have deeper discussions in a livestream or something like that.
> I also see a few people misunderstanding/misinterpreting #starmanning as being a replacement for steel-manning. It’s meant as an addendum. Steel-manning is about the argument; star-manning is about the arguer.
> And there are no exceptions to it. Everyone can be star-manned.
Summary: Focus first on figuring out the common goal that you are both trying to achieve. From there you can try to discuss the differences in approaches to that goal that you have come up with and steel man the other side.
This seems like a great approach to gain a better understanding of the big picture context, avoid arguing, and have a productive discussion.
What is missing from this essay for me is the acknowledgement that people often do want different things because they do have different values. I think this approach though would make it easier to recognize differences in values and separate out values from facts.
I don't think this is a good summary. My understanding of the idea is to steel-man the opponent's argument and then also add a codicil that describes what compassionate values they have that lead them to that point of view.
For the folks here who are active on Twitter, the author is definitely worth a follow, especially if you’re trying to build a reprieve from the normal vitriolic Twitter experience.
Another possibility: instead of assuming anything, ask questions to clarify where the speaker/writer is coming from. In my experience, people who are arguing in good faith will be glad to go along (as long as you're truly questioning and not badgering or cross-examining). People who are arguing in bad faith will resist, evade, try to turn things around etc. The difference is usually apparent as soon as you ask the first question.
> To star-man is to not only engage with the most charitable version of your opponent’s argument, but also with the most charitable version of your opponent, by acknowledging their good intentions and your shared desires despite your disagreements.
This is all to the good, but it is unfortunate that we need to reinvent this wheel. Thinkers like Plato and JS Mill have made exactly the same point, and other good points besides.
We have a rich literature in how to think and how to argue, and we would do well to pay more attention to it.
[+] [-] Sporktacular|3 years ago|reply
I'll take that wager. I've met a lot of people whose concern for others drops off sharply beyond their own family and friends. Then there is the deep tribal impulse that is satisfied only at the exclusion of others, almost as a principle. Suggesting they employ the starman in their discussion won't make a difference because it's not a rhetorical problem, it's just how their priorities reflect on how they act in their daily lives.
The issue is in assuming the most charitable version of an opponent when we have their actions to guide us instead. For example, right now there are lots of Russians who think it's fine to invade, kill and steal, not for safety, fairness or justice for everyone. They just want better for their tribe. And we should respond as such based on their actions.
And if you assume they want safety, fairness and justice for everyone, their responses will vary from 'sure, why not' to 'of course, that's exactly why we're liberating, cleansing and reappropriating'.
Many of us are just selfish bastards, and that's a character flaw.
[+] [-] foobiekr|3 years ago|reply
One of the companies I worked for seemingly attracted this type of personality. Of the people like this I've met (and been actually very cautious around), maybe 90% worked at that specific company.
[+] [-] 5040|3 years ago|reply
This is why Hierocles the Stoic had the right idea when he pushed people to move one circle over. This is a far more practical goal than striving for a "just world".
Each one of us is as it were entirely encompassed by many circles, some smaller, others larger, the latter enclosing the former on the basis of their different and unequal dispositions relative to each other. The first and closest circle is the one which a person has drawn as though around a centre, his own mind. This circle encloses the body and anything taken for the sake of the body. For it is virtually the smallest circle, and almost touches the centre itself. Next, the second one further removed from the centre but enclosing the first circle; this contains parents, siblings, wife, and children. The third one has in it uncles and aunts, grandparents, nephews, nieces, and cousins. The next circle includes the other relatives, and this is followed by the circle of local residents, then the circle of fellow-tribes-men, next that of fellow-citizens, and then in the same way the circle of people from neighbouring towns, and the circle of fellow-countrymen. The outermost and largest circle, which encompasses all the rest, is that of the whole human race.
Once these have all been surveyed, it is the task of a well tempered man, in his proper treatment of each group, to draw the circles together somehow towards the centre, and to keep zealously transferring those from the enclosing circles into the enclosed ones ... It is incumbent on us to respect people from the third circle as if they were those from the second, and again to respect our other relatives as if they were those from the third circle. For although the greater distance in blood will remove some affection, we must still try hard to assimilate them. The right point will be reached if, through our own initiative, we reduce the distance of the relationship with each person.
[+] [-] roody15|3 years ago|reply
I think is a way oversimplification of geopolitical situation in Ukraine and Russian motives.
Just my two cents
[+] [-] bravura|3 years ago|reply
Many people have a spirit of benevolence, but many other people have endured trauma and deeply believe that the next generation must be hazed too.
[+] [-] nonrandomstring|3 years ago|reply
As an optimist and humanist, a shocking revelation for me was hearing of the "Truth and Reconciliation Commission" in South Africa. (I think via a talk by Chomsky or Zizek)
Many atrocities were committed by both sides during the Apartheid era. Enough said.
Years later the Government of National Unity wanted to heal the country, to bury festering resentments and feuds. Perpetrators and victims were brought together under supervision to talk openly and work toward forgiveness. It's a great idea in principle. Although the commission is widely considered successful, a strange thing occurred, something that we also buried at the Nuremberg trials.
A quite small but significant group were not merely unrepentant, they used the commission as a platform to attack and abuse their victims again. "I'm really glad I tortured your children, let me tell you about how they screamed", and so on.
Sure, always aim to "star man" in debate, but one must be hard enough underneath to expect occasionally to be shot out of the sky, not by an uncharitable or entrenched interlocutor but by an plain old evil asshole. They exist. They're not "psychopaths" or even "trolls", but get a thrill out of acting so as to add chaos and pain to the world.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_and_Reconciliation_Commi...
[+] [-] david38|3 years ago|reply
Just look at the foreign policy of every country in power. Look at the willingness of any power group to give up that power without intense military or financial pressure. Let's see - slavery, wars of conquest, ecological destruction, finding black men automatically guilty, rape, child abuse, monopolies, wealth concentration, regressive California property tax policy, etc.
[+] [-] sonjat|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kmacdough|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jimkleiber|3 years ago|reply
I wonder if more people actually want others to see our humanity than us to see the humanity of others. I would strongly bet on that actually.
I think a lot of people whose concern for others drops off sharply beyond their own family and friends believe that others don't have concern for them. It can become a preemptive indifference: they don't care about me, why should I care about them.
What I want to work on and help people realize is that I care about you, even if I don't know you. And the work I do to get there is often me realizing how much people care about me. Maybe this is what he's getting at with the starman concept, to flip ourselves from thinking others are trying to hurt us and reacting to them with hatred or indifference, to believing they actually care about us.
And I agree that many people may not want to do this, so I'm mostly just trying to do it for myself. I wonder if his argument would have come off differently if instead of telling people what they should do, he said these are the tools he employs and how they work in his life.
[+] [-] Aunche|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] grogenaut|3 years ago|reply
My conservative friends are very concerned about anyone they know, and very worried about how they can't backstop them because of supporting the whole of society. 2 of them would fly / drive across the country at a moments notice to help me out for weeks. But they aren't concerned with people outside that circle. Of the 2 I had deep conversations with, they both were more focused on setting up social circles to support everyone else such as churches, local community, family, which to them is the fallback, not the government.
That's about as far as I got.
[+] [-] bjt2n3904|3 years ago|reply
When I read this, I scoffed a little bit. A better idea than one proposed two thousand years ago? Say it isn't so! Why haven't we thought of this before?
I think you hooked rightly on the Ukraine and Russia conflict. Sometimes, there is not a "best version" of someone.
The author seems to reject that outright, saying we need to recognize our opponents humanity in order to effectively argue, with the premise that there's something good in there to tease out.
On what basis can the author say that there's something good inside? Their "humanity"? That reasoning is rather circular...
[+] [-] cratermoon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] panarky|3 years ago|reply
It's not even that the Russians who think this are especially evil people, or irrational people, or people who are unlike us in any fundamental way.
The reason they think this way, and that you do not, is because they believe different myths than you do.
Let's say your worldview is defined by Ivan Ilyin [0]. You don't consider other people or ethics at all. The only thing that matters in the world is God. And God is displeased that the perfect Russia that He created has been spoiled.
The only way to heal the world and make God happy is to restore a certain kind of utopian Russia. That pure and perfect Russia is united in territory and belief, so it can't tolerate any division or fragmentation within itself.
Agents of the devil in the West are deviously dismantling and disintegrating that pure and perfect Russia, piece by piece. Westerners are carving off pieces of territory like Ukraine, and dividing Russian people with seditious Western ideas like democracy and gender fluidity and a free press.
So it's a supernatural struggle between good and evil. An existential battle like that means there's no room for this messy business of parliaments and voting, or compromising with different perspectives.
We need one strong leader, a true and pure leader, to inherit the mantle of past great leaders like Stalin and Peter the Great. He will be God's instrument to make the hard decisions and lead the nation in glorious struggle. This divinely inspired leader will create unity in the world by restoring and reuniting Russia itself.
----
Where do you even begin to have a conversation when you don't share the most basic of beliefs or values? There is no common ground in wanting a safer, fairer, more just world. We have our own foundational myths that we rarely acknowledge or interrogate, and our myths don't intersect with Russia's myths at all.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Ilyin
[+] [-] googlryas|3 years ago|reply
The 3 random people decide that now they can rob the store with impunity, take a bunch of stuff, and then leave the clerk on the floor. Eventually someone else came in and helped the clerk, but it wasn't like those 3 people were part of some psychopath convention. They just independently decided that getting about $20 worth of free stuff was a better option than calling 911 or checking on the man.
[+] [-] roenxi|3 years ago|reply
Some people have made their political ideology the foundation that they build their ego on. Any disagreement is intolerable. Others are not thoughtful enough to understand that there can be genuine disagreement in the world of both thought and action which needs to be tolerated.
These people will ruin any concept of starmanning that catches hold by using it as a passive-aggressive cudgel ("I'm sure you are a good person and therefore you will immediately cease your opposition and accept my arguments!", "I'm sure you want to be a good person and therefore can't really believe these things you are saying, which are only for bad people!", "Why are you resisting when I'm starmanning you, you must be Hitler 2.0").
But without labelling it, I do endorse the technique. Almost everyone wants the world to get better.
[+] [-] cupofpython|3 years ago|reply
I think if such practices became mainstream, then people would begin to realize the difficulties involved in having a coherent conversation about a point of disagreement. The passive-aggressive cudgels you mention would fall flat because it is instantly noticeable as not fitting the necessary patterns for coherent conversation.
No one needs to accept or reject the other. the point of an argument is to educate each other, answer questions, and allow each other to fit both opinions into their own world view (ex. what are the limits / specifics to your belief?). Maybe someone changes their mind during that conversation, maybe they dont. maybe someone needs to let the new information ferment in their minds and life for a bit before it clicks. that is part of giving someone benefit of the doubt
maybe you are talking to someone who is venting, or in the middle of a mental episode (i mean that literally, not derogatorily), or was unfortunately born a narcissistic manipulator and cant help themselves. It doesnt matter, they cannot "win" the conversation - no one can - and the more people that realize this truth about conversations in general, the better the world will become
[+] [-] PragmaticPulp|3 years ago|reply
It is interesting to see how labeling a technique like this and assigning it a sense of moral superiority seems to invite the exact abuse you describe.
I’ve noticed this with the recent popularity of “steelmanning”; Many of the explicitly-labeled steelman arguments I’ve read lately are actually just strawman arguments, but the author tries to preempt criticism by labeling it a steelman and pretending it is the most robust counter argument that could exist. Often these false steelman arguments arise when the author doesn’t understand the topic as well as they think they do but they believe that “steelmanning” automatically makes them an expert on the counter arguments.
[+] [-] synu|3 years ago|reply
In the end there isn’t a lot you can do about it, except learn when to cut bait and move on. I agree with you that it’s still worth trying.
[+] [-] cyraxjoe|3 years ago|reply
This remind me about the idea of "holy wars" in "The denial of death" of Ernest Becker.
“Since the main task of human life is to become heroic and transcend death, every culture must provide its members with an intricate symbolic system that is covertly religious. This means that ideological conflicts between cultures are essentially battles between immortality projects, holy wars.”
Also something along the lines of preferring to annihilate the other before they risk to be symbolically annihilated, like if we prefer the physical death before than the death of the symbolic. For both the other (when is an ideological opponent) and ourselves. We may be physically death, but symbolically immortal.
[+] [-] csours|3 years ago|reply
Politics and Hermit Crabs
Hermit Crabs wear a shell for protection. If they get separated from their shell, they get frantic and often die if they can't find a replacement. They don't like it when people mess with their shell.
Imagine coming up with a brilliant, powerful political argument. You can smash the shell right off your opponent. Will they thank you for it? There is a real human psychological need behind people's beliefs. There is lived experience behind these beliefs.
It can feel like a real attack when that lived experience is invalidated. People retract into their shell, or attack right back. If their shell is actually busted, they probably won't stick around and find out what else you plan on doing to them; they'll run off and they may find an even worse shell.
So what then? Just accept that they will wear a terrible shell forever? I think that you have to accept their current situation. You don't have to accept it forever, but you have to see them where they are now. You can't change their shell, and you shouldn't expect them to change to a shell that matches yours any time soon, but if you don't drive them away, then maybe they can accept that your shell is valid, and find value in your point of view.
And to be clear, you don't have to do this for everyone, and you sure don't have to do it on social media. You may not be able to accept anyone's terrible shell right now. That's fine. But remember that we all picked up our shells from our environment; we carry our history around with us.
[+] [-] immigrantheart|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] safety1st|3 years ago|reply
There's another interesting term in here - "ideological capture" - seems like this refers to the state where a person or organization is supporting policy based on ideology or group identity rather than what policy would yield the best outcomes for all of the people involved.
I don't think star-manning is a replacement for steel-manning. More like there are situations where no matter how well you steel-man someone's argument, they're not going to listen, because you don't like each other (or each other's views). Maybe the place where this idea is most applicable is when someone else is in an adversarial mode, it's really the person themselves that you need to "star-man" to establish that common ground is possible and get them into a cooperative mode.
[+] [-] zmgsabst|3 years ago|reply
Even in very tense settings, it’s hard for people to be disagreeable about you accurately relaying their view — maybe even better than they did themselves. That makes people feel listened to and understood, which are powerful motivators in human psychology.
I won’t pretend I always do this, but I’ve certainly had the best success inquiring about their position until I can steelman it and only then addressing why I disagree.
As Chris Voss would say, you don’t want them to say “you’re right”, you want them to say “that’s right”.
[+] [-] amalcon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pjscott|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] BiteCode_dev|3 years ago|reply
You may force yourself to practice it, and you will improve. But as soon as you get heat up in the moment, it will all go away.
What really helps you to progress is to work on yourself (whatever is your favorite tool, therapy, meditation, etc).
Because it will improve the compassion you feel (for others, but more importantly, for yourself: a lot of the debate is going on inside), and giving a compassionate shape to your words will then be more natural, fluid, and therefore, will be less likely to melt away in a real life debate.
But trying to sound compassionate when you are angry doesn't work very well. And it requires a huge amount of energy to maintain (ask any politician :)).
This is one of those areas where "fake it until you make it" shows its limits.
However, it does improve the quality of your exchanges a lot on the long run, and for me, it's really worth it.
I'm not saying don't try to fake it, but rather, understand where the ceiling is.
[+] [-] jl6|3 years ago|reply
I conclude that a healthy debate can only take place in the real world and a prerequisite is getting to know the person first.
[+] [-] possible_option|3 years ago|reply
Assuming good faith is not always effective: it's completely vulnerable to various forms of trolling including https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning
"The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it."
Trolls love making people waste their time refuting bullshit.
Choose wisely who to argue with.
[+] [-] RcouF1uZ4gsC|3 years ago|reply
I think the main issue is the folly of arguing on social media. It is a setup for dehumanizing and vilifying the other.
I think most arguments on social media are about snark and signaling to your own tribe how smart you are more than actually trying to understand the truth or convince people holding a different view.
Conversations among friends over a beer are much more likely to enlightening and possibly persuasive.
[+] [-] teddyh|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] heresie-dabord|3 years ago|reply
... detached from any real trust system.
"Social media" is not social. As a business, it is the monetisation of strife.
As an exchange of ideas, social media is (as you say) mostly people flinging words at one another.
To be "social", participants in social media would need to manifest commitment to real solutions and people would be accountable for their words and deeds. This is how human society works. There are social consequences in real social exchange. It is a trust system.
I propose that the reason why we hear of people's long-time friendships and family ties collapsing is because those social ties have simply become weak. The pretext for the rupture doesn't much matter.
> To star-man is to not only engage with the most charitable version of your opponent’s argument, but also with the most charitable version of your opponent, by acknowledging their good intentions and your shared desires despite your disagreements.
This is an excellent approach. But it depends on the trust system of real society.
[+] [-] jimkleiber|3 years ago|reply
I don't think social media communication has to be dehumanizing, I think it comes into how much do I share about how I'm actually feeling and my actual identity on the internet where hundreds if not thousands or millions of people might see it? And yet it can be soooo easy to share on the internet, from our phone or computer, just talking/typing into the screen, at almost any time and any place?
So then I do think it can come into "how do I pretend to be cool and superhuman...so that people don't know too much about me?"
In a conversation with a friend over a beer, one might open up about why they hate inflation because they think they might lose their job and they're afraid if they lose their job, their wive and kids might leave them. I bet that's the real underlying reason for that person, yet on the internet, that same person might say that evil bankers are trying to destroy us with inflation because who admits to being afraid they're going to lose their life on the internet, with their name attached?
[+] [-] rendall|3 years ago|reply
This approach could be used in meatspace, too. And, like it or not, our lives are increasingly being spent online.
[+] [-] fritztastic|3 years ago|reply
Even with close family members, it is difficult for me to be able to explain my ideas without encountering a barrier in their reaction where they refuse to consider what I have to say.
I think, and this is just my theory, that a lot of people have traumas (sometimes ones they themselves don't realize relate to their associations with the subject being discussed) that make it hard to communicate and they may not know how to approach considering their view might be wrong, or even not wrong but just not the only valid way to look at an issue.
It's extraordinarily difficult to approach certain topics without also encouraging people to confront their biases and encourage them to question things they regard as absolutes- as I mentioned, even with close family members, it's very hard to communicate and have discussions.
It's not an easy thing for them to do, granted, and there is also very little incentive for someone to introspect on why they feel the way they do about something, even less for them to acknowledge there are alternate ways of approaching topics- even hypothetically.
[+] [-] ChrisMarshallNY|3 years ago|reply
I do it anyway, because I'm clean-shaven, and need to look at myself, every morning.
I've never thought it needed a name, although the Bowie reference is nice.
[+] [-] fritztastic|3 years ago|reply
Sometimes it's just not possible. Some people have impenetrable barriers they will defend with no regard for how they do so and the way it affects others.
That being said I like to think of it like I'm reaching out to someone, and often they don't reach back, in a majority of cases they don't want that contact. Those times when someone does, though, brings me great hope.
[+] [-] jimkleiber|3 years ago|reply
I really appreciate this point. I do this not necessarily to win the argument or change how the other person is thinking/feeling, I do it mostly because I feel better when I do it. Believing someone is out to get me can cause me a lot of fear. Believing they don't care about me can cause me a lot of loneliness. Believing they're trying their best and are swamped with suffering? I actually feel relieved and maybe even grateful that they may have tried so hard to help me.
Will I ever know their deepest intentions? Probably not, but I sure feel a lot better when I believe they have good intentions for me.
Glad to see you comment on here, you're one of the few names I recognize on HN and appreciate what you said and what you often say, thank you.
[+] [-] DoreenMichele|3 years ago|reply
Then I don't need to worry so much about winning or making points. It's easier to be kind, compassionate, etc when engaging from that space.
[+] [-] jimkleiber|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] teddyh|3 years ago|reply
…say the people advocating for ostracism and demonization of their opponents. I agree with this article; there is entirely too much of that kind of behavior going on, and not enough of its opposite.
[+] [-] NoGravitas|3 years ago|reply
But in a larger context, we live in a post-truth world, a hyperreality. Sartre noted the use of bad faith to create a false reality as early as 1944:
> “Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.”
Since the late 1970s or so, it's gotten worse, as hyper-reality has become a mainstream tool of governance worldwide [1] [2]. People don't just disagree about the interpretation of facts and ideas about what should be done about them, but about the facts themselves. And this disagreement about facts is fostered by powerful interests, some cooperating, some competing, for profit and political reasons, the latter of which is mainly about making coordinated and effective opposition movements impossible in multiple ways.
Lana Wachowski, via the character Morpheus: “The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around, what do you see? Businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it.
I'd like to think that starmanning would be a tool for making people ready to be unplugged. But the truth is, people will fight to protect the system, especially when they've been convinced that they benefit from it.
[1]: https://www.academia.edu/33103253/Hyper_Normalisation_contex...
[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thLgkQBFTPw
[+] [-] rendall|3 years ago|reply
> Haha that’s a lot of commentary to field, but if you’re in there with everyone you can tell them I’m happy to take questions or have deeper discussions in a livestream or something like that.
https://twitter.com/StrangelEdweird/status/15515497699311697...
> I also see a few people misunderstanding/misinterpreting #starmanning as being a replacement for steel-manning. It’s meant as an addendum. Steel-manning is about the argument; star-manning is about the arguer.
> And there are no exceptions to it. Everyone can be star-manned.
https://twitter.com/StrangelEdweird/status/15515500388574494...
[+] [-] gregwebs|3 years ago|reply
This seems like a great approach to gain a better understanding of the big picture context, avoid arguing, and have a productive discussion.
What is missing from this essay for me is the acknowledgement that people often do want different things because they do have different values. I think this approach though would make it easier to recognize differences in values and separate out values from facts.
[+] [-] rendall|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway894345|3 years ago|reply
https://mobile.twitter.com/StrangelEdweird
He also has half a dozen articles for NewsWeek that readers may find interesting: https://www.newsweek.com/authors/angel-eduardo
[+] [-] notacoward|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] chernevik|3 years ago|reply
This is all to the good, but it is unfortunate that we need to reinvent this wheel. Thinkers like Plato and JS Mill have made exactly the same point, and other good points besides.
We have a rich literature in how to think and how to argue, and we would do well to pay more attention to it.