If your side lied, would you even want to know?

[Anomalism]

To question yourself or reinforce your beliefs? If I'm not mistaken, and I could be you and I disagree on most everything but I am prepared to have an actual discussion if you are game.

To challenge myself. I'm not afraid of being wrong, and I respect the collective wisdom of a community like this. If I am wrong about something, I want to know. I would pay you for that.

 

[forkup]

To challenge myself. I'm not afraid of being wrong, and I respect the collective wisdom of a community like this. If I am wrong about something, I want to know. I would pay you for that.

I get the intention, but I think this is a bad place to rely on collective wisdom. It's a political forum — and in my experience, most people here aren’t really chasing truth. They’re defending tribes.

And honestly, “collective wisdom” often just means outsourcing your thinking to a group that flatters your assumptions.

The best way I’ve found to sharpen my views is to challenge them — seriously and directly. Not to be told what to think, but to stress-test what I already believe. That takes individuals willing to argue honestly, not a group consensus.

As I said I'm willing to play that role for you, and I hope you are willing to do the same for me.

I don't say we need to agree about everything but it would be nice to at least talk in good faith.

 

[Anomalism]

I get the intention, but I think this is a bad place to rely on collective wisdom. It's a political forum — and in my experience, most people here aren’t really chasing truth. They’re defending tribes.

And honestly, “collective wisdom” often just means outsourcing your thinking to a group that flatters your assumptions.

The best way I’ve found to sharpen my views is to challenge them — seriously and directly. Not to be told what to think, but to stress-test what I already believe. That takes individuals willing to argue honestly, not a group consensus.

As I said I'm willing to play that role for you, and I hope you are willing to do the same for me.

I don't say we need to agree about everything but it would be nice to at least talk in good faith.

I don't come here to be told what to think. I come here to see if anybody is capable of challenging what I think. There is collective wisdom here. I know that because I have learned and grown from it before. There's a lot of people with a lot of life experience. To deny the collective wisdom of a place like this is to insult the people that inhabit it.

 

[forkup]

I don't come here to be told what to think. I come here to see if anybody is capable of challenging what I think. There is collective wisdom here. I know that because I have learned and grown from it before. There's a lot of people with a lot of life experience. To deny the collective wisdom of a place like this is to insult the people that inhabit it.

I don’t think it’s an insult at all — and I’m not trying to insult you. As I said, I’m speaking in good faith.

People can have a lifetime of experience, but that doesn’t automatically mean they’re committed to truth. That was the root of your question, wasn’t it? If my hypothesis is right — that many people are more interested in being right than in being accurate — then building your views on theirs doesn’t help.

Not because they’re dumb or inexperienced, but because they’re reasoning from the wrong foundation.

I don’t know if you’re religious, but think about this: there are dozens of belief systems, each with sincere, intelligent people fully convinced they’re the ones who’ve got it right. At best, only one of them is right — more likely, none of them are. So is shared belief or deep conviction really a reliable path to truth?

I don't believe it is if you care to know what the truth is.

 

[Anomalism]

I don’t think it’s an insult at all — and I’m not trying to insult you. As I said, I’m speaking in good faith.

People can have a lifetime of experience, but that doesn’t automatically mean they’re committed to truth. That was the root of your question, wasn’t it? If my hypothesis is right — that many people are more interested in being right than in being accurate — then building your views on theirs doesn’t help.

Not because they’re dumb or inexperienced, but because they’re reasoning from the wrong foundation.

I don’t know if you’re religious, but think about this: there are dozens of belief systems, each with sincere, intelligent people fully convinced they’re the ones who’ve got it right. At best, only one of them is right — more likely, none of them are. So is shared belief or deep conviction really a reliable path to truth?

I don't believe it is if you care to know what the truth is.

If you're introspective enough you can grow in a place like this.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Most people think they want truth, but what they actually want is to be right.

If someone could prove, with evidence, that your favorite leader, your party, or your cause was based on lies, would you investigate, or would you look away to protect your emotional investment? Because that’s not loyalty. That’s self-preservation wrapped in ideology.

Truth doesn’t care who it embarrasses, and if you only chase truth when it hurts the other side, then you were never on truth’s side to begin with.

You were on your own.

Question should be "Why would you want a side instead of looking at each policy and seeing if it's good or not?"

But this is US partisan politics where people are sheep.

 

[forkup]

If you're introspective enough you can grow in a place like this.

I don’t think we’re that far apart — we both care about growth and learning. Where we differ is how we think that happens.

You seem to trust in collective wisdom — that if you're introspective and open, you’ll absorb insights from the people around you. And sure, sometimes that works. But in my experience, real growth doesn’t come from consensus — it comes from friction.

This place has helped me grow, but not because I leaned on the crowd. I grew because I challenged it. I sought out resistance. I let people stress-test my views until the weak parts cracked. Then I rebuilt them. That made me sharper, more rigorous, and more honest — with others, but especially with myself.

To me, introspection isn’t passive. It’s not just about looking inward. It’s about what you do when your thinking is confronted, not comforted. And frankly, I think that’s a more reliable path to truth than agreement ever will be.

So I’m not here to insult anyone. I’m here to learn — the hard way, if needed. I’m not looking for people to validate what I already think. I’m looking for people willing to push back in good faith. That’s how I try to show respect — by taking your views seriously enough to engage honestly with them.

If you’re after the same thing, we may disagree, but I think the conversation’s worth having.

 

[JWBooth]

Good thing I haven't got a side, as both sides are made up of (almost) nothing but liars.

 

[John Edgar Slow Horses]

I am watching forkup and anomalism interact.

Something worthwhile may come from it.