IPAK-EDU Will Be Developing and Offering a Formal Course in Logic and Reason. Here's How You Can Help.

Too often, people believe that an argument is a nasty disagreement. It's so healthy to know what a formal argument is, and what fails to qualify as a formal argument.

I’m seeking angels to underwrite a number of courses at IPAK-EDU so our offerings are top-notch.

One of the courses I’d like to develop is a forum in which I can teach interested members of the public Logic, Reason, and Rational Discourse. Too often, people engage, actively or from the sidelines, in exchanges all the while confusing what should be happening (rational discourse) with other types of human interactions.

No, that’s not an argument. That’s a fight. I hope they both brushed their teeth.

Formal adversarial systems use formal ways to share thoughts, consider evidence, and derive conclusions in a social setting in which two (or more) “sides” have an interest in the outcome of the consideration.

An example of an adversarial system is a formal debate. In formal debate, concessions of points actually count toward the person conceding, at least in part, for rationality and objectivity. Another example is any legitimate legal setting. A third would be rational discourse in scientific journals. Finally, a fourth example would be an election, among candidates, of a person for public office.

Of course, these types of human interactions are woefully warped and corrupted. Our very perception of what these systems should be has become twisted. Winner-take-all is for Hollywood. Nevertheless, certain tactics bleed across former cultural divides. Attacks on defendants or witnesses’ character, ad-hominem, works in the court of law. The bar is now lowering to where such attacks leak into day-to-day interactions.

We have seen the emergence of pathologies of cognition in our generation. Whether we like to admit it or not, Americans love to witness an icon they love crash and burn. It’s the classic enigmatic tale of the tragedy. We’ve adopted a sense of radical independence that helps set healthy boundaries, but then it appears that many expect that everything is at risk all of the time if we’re found to have made an error, no matter how small. See how those are related? We don’t want a tragic ending for ourselves individually, because that means we’ve lost the game. Stop a moment and think about that in your own interactions and in your own life. What can you truly afford to lose without losing “everything”? How far can it go before your ego kicks and you say “my dignity” and “my self-respect”? If your self-respect depends on what other people have to say about you or think about you, it’s not really self-respect, is it?

Personal Attacks Are Concessions.

The comments in recent articles here at Popular Rationalism provide many examples in which a person resorts to attacking the messenger when the message is unassailable. The use of ad hominem attacks in that setting classically leads to an obvious concession of the point by the assailant. There are some tried-and-true tactics for dealing with ad-hominem attacks.

Logical Fallacies (Formal and Informal)

There are also numerous logical fallacies that people can fall into. Those will be addressed. There are sloppy habits in discourse, such as failing to fully describe the fundamental aspects of one’s question, or their argument, which when learned can then be used to once again raise the bar of discourse to a standard worth having.

In times such as these, a return to the principles of formal logic, reason, and rational discourse would be wonderfully helpful to all - regardless of which side one takes on any issue. Censorship, de-platforming people, and cancel culture can all be viewed as concessions. They are more than harmful. They are a symptom of a weakening psyche; an illness of the collective mindset. Just think Jerry Springer, and you’ll get the idea.

And that, by itself, then is hackable: The use of frailty to insult lowers the bar of rationality allowed to be in use to next-to-nothing. Perhaps that’s the goal. But how can you fight against the “I’m offended!” accusation if you don’t know precisely what the alternative should be?

Rational people can disagree without being insulted. They may be flabbergasted, or stunned at the immunity of their “opponent” to facts, but they artfully and expertly maintain their composure, and refuse to allow their opponents’ admission of a concession via tantrum, rage quit, insult, ad-hominem, etc. to bring them down to their level.

Warning: This is NOT a course on how to defeat your opponents online or in your personal life. Defeat is never the goal. If it is, then you will at best draw a stalemate: I believe my evidence, and you believe yours, so we’ll agree to disagree. Bloodied but unbowed. But for what?

The goals are much loftier, and students will be able to expect nothing less than peace of mind in the face of adversity if they do that hard work of mastering the content toward a goal of mutual understanding. I may not agree with how you weigh your evidence, but I understand why you weigh your evidence how you do, and while I would never weigh it that way, I’ve made the effort to see the world through your eyes. Now I can help you see where you’re up-weighting what I would not, or down-weighting what I would not, and at least now you have to make a decision on whether to adopt my understanding or refuse it, left to your thoughts on how you reconcile that decision. The same experience goes for me.

So, if you’re interested in seeing this type, of course, developed and offered at IPAK-EDU, you can pitch in and underwrite the effort of curriculum development - and this will take effort - by dropping by the IPAK-EDU website and signing up for the IPAK-EDU Curriculum Development fund. All proceeds for the next 30 days will be applied to the development of Logic, Reason, and Rational Discourse. Expect logic tables, conditional inference, prior probabilities, and decision trees. Types of inferences. Expect to understand completely certain exchanges like Arguments. Question. Challenge. Query. Reflection. Concession. Compromise. Contemplation. Sacrifice. Yielding. Experience. Evidence. Ad hoc argumenten. Epiphany. Delusion. Distraction. Deflection. Red Herring. False dilemma. Straw man. Nuance. Earnest consideration.

And more. Much, much more. Such as the #1 and #2 characteristics that tell me whether a person is seeking objective knowledge, or might, instead, be merely biasing the system to their advantage.

Let the games begin!