Back when I was teaching, the first rule of my class was: There is no arguing with me. Now, this would promptly prompt a certain reaction from a certain breed of so-called good student: Coffeen is so conceited! He thinks he’s right! Which is hilarious for multiple reasons, most notably, because, well, uh, I was the fucking professor so, yes, I think I’m right. (While I miss many things about teaching, the assumed self-entitlement of students is not one of them.)
What made my rule particularly alarming — and presumably disarming — to these students was that these were rhetoric courses. And, to this certain breed of student, rhetoric is about debate, the art of arguing an issue. But the thing is: I have a very different view of what an argument is. (And as I was the professor, I got to teach my world view, however unfair students found this.)
To argue about something, in the traditional sense of the word, assumes that there is an initial agreement about the issues at hand, that the debaters share a common ground. How could either party take sides if there was not a prescribed space with sides to begin with?
And, in my class at least, how could we possibly share a common space? After all, the students haven’t yet been introduced to the new space. That’s what the class is for. So what’s there to argue about? Nothing at all. So I asked students not to spend their energy understanding rather than arguing. For my course — like any real course, I assume — not only introduced a new space but a different conception of space.
Here, in this rhetorical space, there is no established common ground ever or anywhere. Yes, there is this world. But we necessarily know it — see it, think it, speak it — from our particular vantage point. There are no grand issues that stand outside time and space. Everything is historical. Everything is perspectival.
Everything, in fact, is an argument. This is not to say that everything is contentious — that is only one possible mode of an argument. No, an argument is the assertion of a perspective. And everything — every person, rock, idea, pixel, mood — is the assertion of a perspective. Each thing — visible or invisible, organic or inorganic — declares: I go like this!
The world is an infinite proliferation of perspectives, each thing declaring in an impossibly complex baroque harmony — equal parts resonance and dissonance — I go like this! So what’s there to argue about?
Of course, there are some things that say: I go like this so you should go like this! We call these fascists or cancer or sanctimonious pricks or moral, faux religious douchebags. And they often need to be dealt with — but not argued with.
The thing is, students are often taught that a good student argues, giving the teacher a run for his money. We get this, I believe, from a crappy reading of Plato. Socrates seems to argue with folks and, at the end, they’ve learned! But that’s not what happens in those dialogues at all. Socrates just nudges everyone until they’re no longer sure of themselves — and then everyone walks away knowing nothing. That is, Socrates uses argument not as a way to know but as a way not to know.
Now, a contentious argument may be fun for some people. They enjoy getting all worked up, feeling like there is a right and wrong. And you know what? This can be a productive release for all of us at some point or another. But as an essential element of education? Egad, no!
Few things are as soul crushingly boring as a contentious argument. Both parties get all worked up, spewing this and that, each getting more pissed off at the other. The so-called debate around the so-called issue of abortion is a great example (I still can’t get over that it’s called “abortion” — the stopping of something in progress. Shift focus to the woman’s menstrual cycle, for instance, and it’s no longer an abortion but a renaissance. Anyway….). The so-called pro-life movement and the so-called pro-choice movement are not speaking to each other. From the perspective of each, the other is insane. What’s there to argue about?
This is the reason for a structured legal system: it creates a common space that allows contentious argument to take place. But outside of the courtroom? Arguments get everyone involved nowhere at all. If I don’t like someone’s way of going, if I find it destructive or ugly, I walk away. Indifference can be quite powerful — at least in maintaining one’s well being.
Are there situations in which an argument needs to be met head on, when waking away just feeds it? Of course. This is what political resistance is all about. To wit, Occupy’s reaction to unfettered capitalist greed. Occupy didn’t argue. It, well, occupied — which is to say, it went a certain way that interfered with the way capitalism goes (capitalism demands labor and unquestioned consumption; occupy refused both).
THINKCENT
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Save-That Here
& Penny-for-Thoughts There
& Pondering-These-Theses Everywhere. Bam!
& Penny-for-Thoughts There
& Pondering-These-Theses Everywhere. Bam!
Religion is a way to give yourself the things you didn’t know you needed. Give here could be adding spaces of time, taking away the one thing and adding another. It really is the injunction not from some external source. It is foreign but also from within. This is a place within which is the full consciousness, rather than the multiplicity we normally inhabit. Faith is a magic in itself even without a particular faith in something producing some magical acts. Your believing in something, when a negative attitude is the quicker and more expedient, really is the miracle.
My reply:
Nice post. My thoughts, though I admit that I read your blog because I basically agree. So for me it is like church or something. Amen.
So I agree, walking away is the most effective way to snuff out an idea. Few arguments are defeated, rather the ideas’ force gives out first.
When we are able to walk away-arguing is sport. When we have to stay-arguing is the perpetuation of a union. That is, the true test of when it is appropriate to argue versus when we ought to hold our breath is when we are in a union. Be it friend or mate or whatever unions you have, to argue is to be on the inside. To argue and not as sport is not a free-to-leave-and-stay-gone activity.
I wish more teachers would have taken this tactic in my philosophy classes. The dynamic of the class prior to an exam or paper was always this open forum of whatever pet ideas struck them. People after the exam or paper were…listening.
It is a good lesson to learn. When amongst people that you do not know and don’t care to know, do not argue. Do not argue with authority. Do however argue with those responsible for creating authority, but never with the thing itself. Unless you want to be crushed.
Sometimes we argue just to express ourselves, get the idea out there. But if you have expressed your take and listened and gained the benefit of seeing the unknown view, you have been exposed to the ideas and that is enough for me. It is when you are no longer able to walk away that an argument is true and good and not just some pastime. If I am trying to accomplish a task with someone else, then that is when the argument really matters.
How someone argues also really matters, manner and approach: they shouldn’t know you are arguing if you want to really win. In a classroom, we are to be critically engaged and that gets confused with arguing our side. Students are so caught up in the outcomes of ideas that they fail to see what is at hand. Hell people always fail at this.
I hate books that fail to argue.
I am a collector of ideas and views. So arguing really is just sport to help play with viewpoints, to test them out, and to see where my interlocutors stand and also, maybe surprisingly for me, where my convictions reside.
I love my philosophical friends ability to sustain an argument. It takes an “as if space” that becomes a shared place. But the “as if space” is not always there for all people.
November 17, 2012 5:58 AM 
http://hilariousbookbinder.blogspot.com/2012/11/arguments-are-boring.html
“Arguments Are Boring
Now, I never asked my students to agree with me or like me or adhere to my world view. I could care less either way. But I did ask that they understand what I was saying. And arguing doesn’t lead to understanding — or to much of anything other than ruddy cheeks and sweaty pits while adding just a little more bile and banality to the world.”
What if antibacterial soap kills all the good bacteria?
Football pick em Confessions-before week 9
I am not ready to really press my luck in the NFL bottle the lightning game. I went with the standard Good Teams, GB, HOU, ATL. I wanted to go with DEN and DET but thought better of it. When you pick the good ones they have a tendency to do what they have been doing. DEN and DET have potential to score points but they also have lapses. Anyway I thought is was important to point out that I really looked into this and though I did not feel guided to go with any one team that I picked I am sure I would have gone with HOU, unless I wanted to be contra what everyone else is likely to do. I would have gone with CHI earlier in the week but out of respect for the product that I have seen as of late from TEN I let that game go. GB was something that others see and I admit that I am respecting the matchup because of ARI’s success earlier in the season and the latest trend really does indicate a team that could use help…please don’t get it this week. ATL was a late game and of the late games I went with this one because it will either be close or in ATL favor. The other games have potential but once again the forces are meeting and there is an unknown outcome-more so than normal. I confess that it is important to score well this week precisely because last week was so bad that I went from 2nd place to 4th and I don’t want to fall too far behind. I am just plain competitive when there is strategic reputation on the line. Love Games where decisions are made and I get to see the result and get to adjust my play.
more notes
I enjoyed the workshop. So the value of being happy is a tricky subject. It is actually very difficult to quantify even our own happiness. Happiness is all to often a social exchange. So if I want to quantify my own absolute happiness I have to be able to separate the individual pleasures from whatever else that concerns me Take a standard gangster theme, when you are trying to extract information from a tough guy that can withstand a lot of pain individually, you just need to find someone that that tough guy loves. In that circumstance the tough guy if he is not a sociopath is compelled to wilt. He imagines the pain in others and this breaks through the tough guys will to refrain from talking. Now imagine this tough guy is told by his wilted grandmother to keep quiet that she can take it (also believing in the cause or whatever). The tough guy may wilt or may not but here we are seeing the value of pleasure/pain being conveyed with some interesting exchange value. We are selling our own pleasures to get somewhere. Christ on the cross is not just in pain because he was teaching some anti-Jew theories and getting what all unpopular people that strike the ruling elite as dangerous. Rather Christ is spending his suffering to fulfill some other purpose. At least this is a spin, the problem of happiness is often spin. Christ wanted to die, in so far as it fulfill his destiny. Ok so happiness is some means of social trade and interaction. I can spend hours cleaning my house so that later versions of me will not have to trip over my shit, or my mother is visiting and I find her displeasure in me as motivations for acting.
Philosophy Workshop Notes
Happiness. What is this phenomenon of Happiness? Is happiness how many of some thing or other that we have? Is happiness the actualization of our being in some higher or more complete state? Are we able to judge the happiness of others and calculate a value system to it? Does happiness stand on the outside of our religious practice, that is, is there an animosity of happiness and our inclusion to a group? Does happiness act as some distraction from a political actuality, that is do politicians invoke happiness in a legitimate way?
A series of questions with no real answer is the result of the workshop for me. I am glad to have taken part in the workshop. Ah, to have matters to ponder that seem to matter. My own thought on happiness is that it is just another value system. It is like money. We use the happiness of others within our daily lives. We have to consider others feelings when we walk around and make actions in the world. Our actions can be much more expensive in dollars if we don’t first consider the feelings of others. If they will be happy then the world is lubricated to give us what we want. Sometimes without needing cash money. For example today I was able to sweet talk my uncle into letting me do my laundry at his house. I made sure that I considered his feelings and calculated the cost and the type of barter that might be necessary to get what I want. There has been a payment of considering his happiness that has had to taken place and also I had to have considered all of his needs and the cost. What I am saying is just that happiness is used just like money. We can take on pain to get some end. We are giving up pleasures but we see some value beyond the pain. Really happiness is just a value. We try to project that value as much as we can but just like the cost of gas tomorrow, it is not always clear that the barter will be the cost we expect. Can we actually know the happiness value without presenting our plan and getting a reaction from those we expect to be affected. Sometimes the cost to others is too much for even those that stand to benefit. They can not enjoy knowing that others suffer.
All of us can picture, and do automatically picture, how some circumstance might be or might turn out to become. These pictures are something that only you own. as such, they are not foregone conclusions. Rather they are only a picture of both your ability to ask and answer a question about the composite of your knowledge and/or senses.
register and vote
I think everyone should get registered to vote, cut off is looming to register. If you were not planning on voting, then you owe it to everyone to vote for one of the other candidates-that you actually like. I have no vested interest in any of them at this point, but there will be more candidates than just the two spending all the money on media hype. You don’t even have to tell anyone that you voted with your heart rather by some elaborate calculations of whom might possibly win or whatever. Just vote and give the right person for you some love. They will like it and you might too.
When you’ve lost “community” you still have body. Just a more fragile project.
