Do you think your comparison of Bruce’s parents being shot in an alley to the holocaust is engaging with me in good faith? No, you will have to do better.
You literally said any tragedy will do. They gave an example from one of the most famous superheroes that is marked by a tragedy setting them on their course and it shows how NOT just any tragedy will do.
A debate in good faith doesn't try to twist what someone says to catch them in a contradiction, but instead tries to interpret their argument from a position of charity. It's literally called the Principle of Charity.
So, do you think, in the context of this discussion, that the guy talking about major global tragedies is referring to personal tragedies when he said that line? If not, then what do you think is gained by being obstinate like the other guy is on insisting on arguing about the personal tragedy that inspired Batman?
They didn't twist anything. It's what he wrote verbatim. And pointing out how someone's claim is incorrect isn't a mark of bad faith engagement. The person clearly said "Any tragedy will do". When confronted with someone giving an example of a tragedy (and a quite popular one among superheroes at that) they claim that the person is engaging in bad faith. This is untrue.
"So, do you think, in the context of this discussion, that the guy talking about major global tragedies is referring to personal tragedies when he said that line?"
There is a wide river between being overly charitable and engaging in bad faith. And because you aren't doing one doesn't mean you are doing the opposite. You are steelmanning what he said. Again what they said was "ANY tragedy will do." No mention of the global or personal tragedy you bring up. If they had said what you said or even clarified that is what they meant as opposed to falsely claiming bad faith engagement, there would not have been subsequent discussion.
Yeah, you're not trying to twist anything...you're just intentionally taking their line out of the context of the conversation to make a hyper literal interpretation that doesn't pass any RATIONAL interpretation of an argument, in order to catch him in a contradiction that most people can understand likely isn't what he was trying to say.
But I'm not debating you twice about the same topic in the same conversation. So, since you decided to jump over to the other comment where I said something similar to someone else, then please, just pick one.
You understand perfectly. This person said something but when it's held to the slightest scrutiny they falsely claim the people giving examples are engaging in bad faith. Embarrassing.
I recommend reading about the Principle of Charity. In short, if you're acting in good faith, then you should generally try to interpret what people say in the most rational way possible, and to consider the strongest reasonable interpretation of what they said.
To use this example, clearly that guy, speaking about major global tragedies, likely wasn't referring to much, much smaller personal tragedies. Unless you think the best interpretation of the meaning behind what he was saying is that minor personal tragedies are included, then you come off as arguing in bad faith. Also, there is nothing to gain with your argument. You successfully twisted his words some, but him, anyone that agrees with him, and even some people that may agree with you or are on the fence, see that you pretty much just abandoned the argument entirely to focus on twisting his argument in a way that doesn't address anything he actually meant, even if it does toe the line of what he said.
Basically, you got a minor win for people that already agree with you, and don't care about being as honest as possible, and most everyone else is likely going to think that you're just using dishonest debate tactics.
It's not applicable here. The person said something and people are engaging with what he said. If he meant something different as you contend then he should have clarified. He did not. Instead he chose to claim other people were engaging in bad faith. Even by your own understanding of being charitable that person wasn't behaving in that way either.
What's more you wrote "clearly that guy, speaking about major global tragedies...". You are steelmanning what he said. Again what they said was "ANY tragedy will do." No mention of the global or personal tragedy you bring up. If they had said what you said or even clarified that is what they meant as opposed to falsely claiming bad faith engagement, there would not have been subsequent discussion.
Yes, people are engaging with the most literal interpretation of what he said, not the most likely to fit what he meant. Stopping that is literally the entire point of the principle of charity. Saying that it's not applicable here doesn't make any sense.
BTW, you should look up steelmanning and how it compares to the principle of charity. If you think I'm "steelmanning" then you also think that the principle of charity applies. Literally the point is that you interpret arguments in the strongest way that they can rationally be interpreted, because in general, you should be assuming that people aren't trying to be irrational idiots. Anyone demonizing "steelmanning" is openly rejecting the principle of charity, as they're effectively synonyms. And no, that's not just something I said, it's something you can find in conversations about this online (and the literal definitions even use very similar terms).
And none of this is about defending him after the fact, but I'm sure if you know the word "steelmanning", that you know what strawmanning is, so why are you doing that here to me?
Again, what they said was "ANY tragedy will do..." and you're trying to argue why you should take that as literally as possible, instead of trying to understand what people are saying. People like you are why I'm so detailed in my comments. If you don't respond to anything else, do you earnestly think that he meant that sentence in the context of that conversation to be interpreted as literally as you have?
And yes, he could have taken a better tactic than pointing out the bad faith after the fact. It turns out that people who don't say things as clearly as possible later do it again more often. It's one of the reason why you should reject this idea of "steelmanning", because you appear to be using that term to justify intentional bad faith activity by you.
3
u/RugDougCometh 5h ago
Do you think your comparison of Bruce’s parents being shot in an alley to the holocaust is engaging with me in good faith? No, you will have to do better.