# Tips to be a nonconfrontational poster **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [November 15, 2023, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198 "2023-11-15T17:25:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![DavidNRockies](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidnrockies/32/6279_2.png) [@DavidNRockies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidNRockies)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/61 "2023-11-22T01:55:08Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The world is full of beliefs sincerely held by absolute morons. _“Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”_ –MLK ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/62 "2023-11-22T01:56:52Z")
Goddammit, MLK, stealing my points and saying them better than me. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/63 "2023-11-22T04:37:47Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > We argued politics a lot, and one of his favorite things to say was a variation of, “You know I’m right, you’re just arguing because you don’t want to admit it.” I also argued politics as a teen and also encountered this take from a self-styled libertarian (who AFAIK grew up to be a reasonable businessman). > The world is full of beliefs sincerely held by absolute morons. Probably yes. > What it comes down to is, I think people _vastly overestimate_ the amount of bad faith arguing out there. It depends upon what you mean by bad faith. Wiki, emphasis added: > **Bad faith** ([Latin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin): _mala fides_) is a sustained form of [deception](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deception) which consists of entertaining or pretending to entertain one set of feelings while acting as if influenced by another. It is associated with hypocrisy, breach of contract, affectation, and lip service. It may involve [intentional](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intentionality) deceit of others, or **self-deception** ([Self-deception - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-deception)). Bad faith is everywhere and its distinguishing characteristic is lack of care about getting the argument right. A common and undue concern with sincerity just leads you down a rabbit hole. How the proponents feel is secondary to what they do, what they express. Bad faith is one of the great issues because it’s imperfectly understood (also by myself). At what point does conventional delusion tip into bad faith, its more extreme variant? Conventional delusion is everywhere after all. Most of us think like soldiers too much of the time. When faced with an inconvenient fact or argument they ask themselves, “_Must_ I accept this?”, and proceed to poke holes. Soldiers concern themselves with defending a position. Far better is to think like a scout, a person concerned with creating an accurate map. Recommended book, of which I’ve only read a couple of chapters: > **[The Scout Mindset](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scout_Mindset)** > > The Scout Mindset: Why Some People See Things Clearly and Others Don't is a 2021 non-fiction book by Julia Galef. > In the book, Galef argues for what she calls a scout mindset: "the motivation to see things as they are, not as you wish they were". The scout mindset emphasizes curiosity, unbiased truth-seeking, and facing reality, even if that reality is unexpected. Galef contrasts this with a "soldier mindset", which she says is a natural tendency to use motivated reasoning to defend one's exi... Cultivating a scout mindset requires some work, which I personally have not put in. The point: we’re probably wired to think like soldiers. Bad faith is ubiquitous. Politeness, persuasion, and simple diplomacy demand that we assume good faith, but that’s not an accurate depiction of the world so we should consider it a first approximation only, a very convenient and generally advisable fiction. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/64 "2023-11-22T04:44:44Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Sincere applause for the OP: there’s far too much discussion about rules and regulations in ATMB, and far too little about best practices. Hats off to Pleonast. Good points. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/65 "2023-11-22T14:38:49Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Cultivating a scout mindset requires some work, This is an excellent tip! > The scout mindset emphasizes curiosity, unbiased truth-seeking, and facing reality, even if that reality is unexpected. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/66 "2023-11-22T16:04:44Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Recommended book, of which I’ve only read a couple of chapters: > > [The Scout Mindset - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scout_Mindset) I read the whole book a while back, and I also recommend it. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/67 "2023-11-22T20:59:14Z")
The problem with being a scout is that soldiers usually beat them in a fight. ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/68 "2023-11-22T22:21:40Z")
> [@eschrodinger](#): > > A really useful book for me was _We Need to Talk_, by Celeste Headley. It’s about having conversations, and the single most important thing I got from it is to stop thinking about what other people need to do better to understand me, and start thinking about what I need to do better to understand others. Worry less about people not listening to me, and worry more about listening to and understanding them better. > > It’s very hard to do, but really worth it. My old (and favorite) boss’s favorite saying was “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.” mmm ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2023, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/69 "2023-11-23T13:54:36Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > The problem with being a scout is that soldiers usually beat them in a fight. Or they get fucked by scoutmasters… I’ve only read the Wiki article, but if that is correct that Elon Musk is given as an example of the kind of mindset to emulate, the book is not getting my eyeballs ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2023, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/70 "2023-11-23T15:02:15Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > I’ve only read the Wiki article, but if that is correct that Elon Musk is given as an example of the kind of mindset to emulate, the book is not getting my eyeballs If you’re avoiding the book because it doesn’t confirm what you already believe, you’re precisely the kind of person who could benefit from reading the book. Musk is used as an example in a chapter on thinking about risk. Supposedly, when Musk invested in SpaceX and Tesla, he did so _not_ because he thought they would be successful (he gave them each about a 10% chance of success), but because the potential upside was so large that they were “bets worth taking.” > [@](#): > > Instead of being motivated by the promise of guaranteed success, a scout is motivated by the knowledge that they’re making a smart bet, which they can feel good about having made whether or not it succeeds. Even if a particular bet has a low probability of success, they know that their overall probability of success in the long run is much higher, as long as they keep making good bets. They’re motivated by the knowledge that downturns are inevitable, but will wash out in the long run; that although failure is possible, it’s also tolerable. I’m certainly no fan of Elon Musk, and I’m not sure that Musk is as good an example, even just in this one area, as the author seems to think. But I do appreciate the point she’s trying to make. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2023, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/71 "2023-11-23T18:33:29Z")
**Moderator Note** > [@MrDibble](#): > > Or they get fucked by scoutmasters… Let’s not have comments like this in ATMB, please. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2023, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/72 "2023-11-23T19:54:13Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > If you’re avoiding the book because it doesn’t confirm what you already believe No, I’m avoiding the book because of what it says about someone I do know a bit about. ---
**Author:** ![B.Serum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/b.serum/32/14266_2.png) [@B.Serum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/B.Serum)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2023, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/73 "2023-11-23T22:08:42Z")
Seconded! Julia Galef is a smart cookie. ---
**Author:** ![B.Serum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/b.serum/32/14266_2.png) [@B.Serum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/B.Serum)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2023, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/74 "2023-11-23T22:14:22Z")
This is a subject I’ve been interested in for a while and have been building a recommended as et of reading lists on [critical thinking](https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/19759501-b-serum?shelf=1-irrationality), [discord](https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/19759501-b-serum?shelf=2-discord), and — most relevant to the topic at hand — [engagement](https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/19759501-b-serum?shelf=3-engagement). ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2023, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/75 "2023-11-24T01:54:59Z")
Those look like some good lists. If you’re looking for more recommendations, I’ve liked [_Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error_ by Kathryn Schulz](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7811050-being-wrong) and [_How To Think: A Survival Guide for a World at Odds_ by Alan Jacobs](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34050965-how-to-think), in somewhat the same vein. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2023, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/76 "2023-11-24T05:02:31Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > The problem with being a scout is that soldiers usually beat them in a fight. Scouts dominate map-making battles. The scout and soldier are archetypes of course. Graf tries to steelman her case. So she addresses lawyers, who are professional advocates. Should they think like solders? Graf: > Even jobs that don’t seem to depend on scout mindset usually do once you look closer. Most people associate being a lawyer with arguing for a side… But when a lawyer is choosing cases and preparing for a trial, they need to be able to form an accurate picture of the strengths and weaknesses of their case. Overestimate your own side and you’re setting yourself up for a rude awakening in the courtroom… She cites a couple of studies: > …law students who are randomly assigned to one side of a moot court case become confident, after reading the case materials, that their side is morally and legally in the right. But that confidence doesn’t help them persuade the judge. On the contrary, law students who are more confident in the merits of their own side are significantly _less_ likely to win the case-- perhaps because they fail to consider and prepare for the rebuttals to their arguments. Cite: > Eigen and Listokin, “Do Lawyers Really Believe Their Onw Hype, and Should They? A Natural Experiment” 2012 There’s a similar effect with law school negotiation exercises. Randomly assigned students tend to believe their side deserves more money, but those who do so tend to fail to reach agreement and walk away with less money on average. Lowenstein et al “Self Serving Assessments of Fairness and Pre-trial Bargaining.” 1993. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2023, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198/77 "2023-11-24T16:32:58Z")
Thank you for the recommendations. _Being Wrong_ was already on my TBR list, but _How to Think_ is new to me. I think there is a certain honor in being wrong, because if you feel you are wrong, or you have doubt, it means you are honestly seeking the truth. There are a lot of subjects, even ones I feel strongly about, where I have allowed myself the space to consider that maybe I don’t have all the facts. I have a friend who is on the conservative Christian/libertarian side. We’ve always connected over our love of movies and the fact that we’re all in helping professions. One day we went over to his house and we all ended up talking about abortion. It was not a heated conversation, more of a congenial one. This despite the fact I have very strong reproductive rights leanings and my friend works for a clinic that counsels young mothers who are choosing life (not the shady kind.) My husband said to me afterward, “It’s incredible how open-minded you are.” I try, I really try. And I know not everyone considers that a virtue. But I like the idea that everyone posseses a little piece of the truth. When my mind closes up it’s usually because someone is arguing in bad faith or just very rude and aggressive in their opinions. I can’t stand that even if I agree with the person. I’m not claiming to be perfect in this regard. But it means something to me that I try. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tips-to-be-a-nonconfrontational-poster/993198.md?page=3)