(untitled)

What are your tactics for ensuring discussion lasts and maintains quality? >producing a dense amount of points and perceptions a person can criticise or comment on, preferably in lists >ensuring posts are appropriately short and easy to read >while criticising another person's points, making sure to point out exactly when you're not exactly sure of an interpretation, so they can elaborate >trying to cautiously draw out further conclusions on their thoughts to give them opportunities to correct you on misunderstandings

i know this might sound out of bound as it's more on the mod side, but having them remind people to stay on topic and not to use personal attacks and not argue in bad faith helps alot. As for the user side, always try to argue in good faith, and not trolling or soykaf posting to get a rise out of people. the community here saw what it wanted and what it didn't want. And there seems to be a cultural consciences here (for the most part) that makes it better than most imo.

You mean here? all about knowing who to reply, I can't recall a case where it wasn't obvious who was interested in either knowing more about a subject or trying to understand a different pov and who came "to win" to put it lightly

Personally I try not to make my language unnecessarily complicated so that people don't find me tedious and are more likely to listen to what I have to say.

>>15867 >You mean here? Nah, in general. >I can't recall a case where it wasn't obvious who was interested in either knowing more about a subject or trying to understand a different pov and who came "to win" to put it lightly The person actually wanting to discuss is important, but I find that sometimes the "well dries" and there aren't things to discuss anymore unless you're willing to force it and break the conversation's pace.

I have this thing I do whenever a reply triggers the internal "bullshit alarm" I've developed over the years First, I copypaste the reply into libreoffice. Then, I delete all the parts that contain ad-homs, insults, opinions stated as fact, predictions stated as fact, pathos, memes, etc. If it's not making a "real" argument, out it goes. I then reply to the new post I created in libreoffice, instead of the one in the thread. If nothing remains, I don't reply. This not only makes it easy to filter out garbage, it also lets me find good points made by people who simply don't know how to debate very well.

>>15950 Sounds like you waste more time with that approach tbqh

>>15950 >>15956 It's easier to just not be an asshole while writing a message imho. I go back and do minor edits for clarity and such, but if I feel I'm being unduly harsh, I just nuke the whole thing and move on. No point in being a dickhead.

>>15862 Taking some advice from NN Taleb, if I find I've made a couple of different points (or asked a couple of questions) while writing a post, then I tend to delete the less important one. Then I feel happier posting because I know that someone is more likely to respond to the point that matters most. I can still reply to multiple points, but I try not to raise more than one counterpoint in each case.

putting some distance between yourself and the object of conversation helps. most of the best conversations i have are just about trying to come up with a good way to describe/characterize something rather than trying so prove a specific point. people get defensive when you start poking at their argument (even if you aren't trying to refute it) so a lot of the setup for a good conversation is just sub-textually convincing the other person that you aren't just trying to set them up so that you can make them look stupid. i've also learned to just accept the other person's semantics instead of quibbling over definitions. easier to make up a new term for something than convince someone else to change the way they use a word. e.g. someone says "X is MURDER" and you can either get into an incredibly tedious argument about the definition of murder or you can say "ok fine X is one category of murder" and then present more precise language that draws the distinction you want to make. seems to have a disarming effect on people.

>>15862 Learning to identify trolls and flame posts is crucial since this prevents derailing.

>>15862 It's important to choose a relevant image when starting a thread. I don't use images or files otherwise unless they actually add to the discussion. Relevancy of discussion to the thread is another important form of this. When entering a thread, I normally read the entirety of the discussion and then reply to every post reasonable to respond to. If I can't do this, I'm unlikely to join the discussion at all, but I sometimes do. I don't post if I don't have anything important I can write. I proofread my posts to eliminate writing errors. If I feel I've a lot to add to a discussion, I'll write a post and then do something else for a while, revisiting it and adding or editing before submission. When responding to someone being rude, which is rare here, I don't exacerbate things. >>15865 Active moderation helps greatly. It's good when a bad tangent is just lopped off, especially when it doesn't get entangled with the surrounding discussion. >>15897 The best thing to do when the discussion dries up is sometimes to do something worth reporting back about. If a thread is about some general activity, go off and do it, and now there's something for a new post to help revive things. >>17254 This thread has made me consider my methods more than usual. I write constantly, so by now I've internalized rules for what reads right and what doesn't. I treat posts here like formal writing in the sense everything should be correct and well-formatted, but it's still a conversation and the surrounding context acts like a meta-rule. I also change my style often so my posts aren't easy to correlate.