the Greater Nomadic Council

Manners and Conversation

Let's continue this experiment. Phil writes:

[C]onsider a conversation you have had, any conversation where ideas may enter in (literary, political, theological, aesthetic, whatever). Do you and the others flesh out points, willing to show (sans acrimony) contradictions or leaps in logic, and able to see the bigger picture through examples (while not getting locked into concerns about minute and irrelevant specifics on the examples)? Or are we restrained, to a certain extent, by our own manners and, for lack of a better term, social "rules-of-play"? Do we instead look for a consensus, trying to avoid ripping the other apart, or (on the other hand) defend one's own position not in terms of finding Truth but rather holding the line, all the while finding nits to pick with the opponent?

There is obviously still some value in conversation despite its shortcomings. Otherwise, why would we persist? There is the social grooming aspect of small talk, the equivalent of picking bugs from each other's fur, but I doubt that's what Phil has in mind. Those sorts of conversations rarely, if ever, attempt to discover the truth and concern themselves with the mundane. Valuable, but largely uninteresting unless you're in them or a sociologist. The next type of conversation might be the one concerned strictly with transmitting facts. These two types suggest the simple dichotomy of rational and emotional. Since we're concerned with the highest forms of rational discourse, let's skip the deep, emotional discussions to go straight to what is in this case the ideal—the sober, rational, and abstract conversation that seems so difficult to achieve. Here manners may be a hindrance.

The search for consensus, or at least, a verbal truce directs many conversations, even the more abstract, ostensibly less personal ones, particularly when the parties involved disagree, but amiably. To this extent politeness prevents a more meaningful, probing conversation. It's particularly difficult to provide concrete examples or to grasp the larger picture. However, I think this has less to do with social rules than with the rapid nature of conversation. Who actually thinks before they speak? Even when discussing difficult, obscure topics, I tend to just spout whatever comes to mind rather than pausing and reflecting first. In my experience, nearly everyone is guilty. This can be lessened when discussing topics one has already studied and formed opinions on though.

Pointing out flaws in logic is also troublesome because of manners. It is, in some ways, impolite to notice that your conversation partner is using less than stellar reasoning. Maybe this is why many debates devolve into mere nit-picking. It's easy to prove someone wrong on a minor detail and people are more likely to take correction there as well, assuming they are not idealogues.

So, we have two problems preventing good conversation, format and manners. For the format, I think what we strive for is slower, more thoughtful conversation, something more along the lines of writing. Again, the obvious answer is blogs, but does that mean nobody had good conversations before? Of course not. Perhaps they just took their time answering. Perhaps such conversations rarely exist. Either way, slowing down responses and being tolerant of long pauses seem like they would improve the level of discourse significantly. An obvious answer, but difficult to do. Rapid conversation and immediate response is so ingrained it will take time and effort to break it. Manners, though, are more difficult. The easiest option is to simply choose conversation partners that are not easily offended, regardless of what you say, but those can be difficult to find. Maybe a better option is to find those who are capable of holding their egos in abeyance and can take correction. Here again, Socrates is a good example. Although few (any?) got the better of him in the dialogues we have, he was always open to correction and willing to readily admit mistake. Why are many people unwilling or unable to do so? Maybe it's because of the emotional function conversation usually fills. After all, we are at our cores emotional beings. It is difficult for us to separate anything from ourselves or our feelings, even when they have little to do with one another. However, it seems some ground rules, a distinct set of manners relating to serious conversation, would help. Phil suggests this was once the case:

"Passive" is the key word here. In this day and age, we can look back at the dialogues of Plato, and act as spectators of a conversation, but the experience of the thing, while perhaps imitated, is not actualized. In this true type of dialogue, we can refute, confirm, challenge, re-interpret, and so forth with our fellow conversationalists.

Maybe the problem is simply we have the wrong set of manners now. Blog discussions (the good ones) seem to get around this due to their slower pace and insistence on civility. There's something about the written word that shifts us into a more serious mode, one that helps divorce the ego from the ergo. Maybe if we can just slow down and converse in that mode we can have the active, challenging conversations we want. I know it's possible. I've had them before, but they are rare and were stumbled upon. They were typically with people I already agreed with to a large extent. What we need is a system, an understanding among the participants of the expectations.

Anyways, I thought I would throw my reaction out there. I feel that this whole post has been little more than rambling, but I'm going to leave it that way to better approximate a real conversation. After all, that is what we're attempting here, even if it is at a slower speed.