After a couple decades of verbal swordplay on the net, I have to agree that slaying trolls has lost its allure. I've learned that a frontal assault on a paragraph errant just isn't that compelling to write or read. In heaven and earth and net, I aspire to more.
“Like what?”, you may ask.
In any conversation (online or not) I can choose several ways to engage:
1) I can directly confront the specifics that were written: a conclusion, reasoning, or evidence. On the net it's typical to be contrary, but often in ways that aren't especially imaginative or enjoyable for others unless they too just want to argue.
2) I can bypass someone else's specifics and propose an alternative point of view, a fresh perspective or a confounding dependency that isn't common knowledge. This is likelier to introduce an element of surprise to the exchange, inviting others to dive deeper into the problem or solution space, encouraging others to employ more imagination and not be so binary in debating T/F on each point of the assertions.
3) I can ask questions: for clarification, to suggest new dependencies or implications, or propose factors or mechanisms that aren't necessarily contradictions but might be tangents or parallels or essential unknowns.
And if I do choose option #1, to openly disagree, I can voice it in a less confrontational style or focus on only the point I think is most interesting or essential (or amusing).
The writing style I choose makes a difference too. Rather than making bold pronouncements, if I can couch a point as my opinion or a doubt I have, I can deflect rather than provoke.
In the end, I have to decide what I want from this exchange, to discuss ideas or argue. Personally, I'm tired of the latter.
“Like what?”, you may ask.
In any conversation (online or not) I can choose several ways to engage:
1) I can directly confront the specifics that were written: a conclusion, reasoning, or evidence. On the net it's typical to be contrary, but often in ways that aren't especially imaginative or enjoyable for others unless they too just want to argue.
2) I can bypass someone else's specifics and propose an alternative point of view, a fresh perspective or a confounding dependency that isn't common knowledge. This is likelier to introduce an element of surprise to the exchange, inviting others to dive deeper into the problem or solution space, encouraging others to employ more imagination and not be so binary in debating T/F on each point of the assertions.
3) I can ask questions: for clarification, to suggest new dependencies or implications, or propose factors or mechanisms that aren't necessarily contradictions but might be tangents or parallels or essential unknowns.
And if I do choose option #1, to openly disagree, I can voice it in a less confrontational style or focus on only the point I think is most interesting or essential (or amusing).
The writing style I choose makes a difference too. Rather than making bold pronouncements, if I can couch a point as my opinion or a doubt I have, I can deflect rather than provoke.
In the end, I have to decide what I want from this exchange, to discuss ideas or argue. Personally, I'm tired of the latter.