Making My Points With The World

Reply to HardWorker Don't we all.

Reply to HardWorker
I get the point.

The point is perhaps to learn to embrace the pointlessness.

The OP seems pointless.

Is making a point, a desire to feel smart or important?

Just psychologizing here.

I write what I do for two reasons 1) I generally don't know what I believe till I put it into words and 2) I want to test my ideas by opening them to criticism. Maybe three reasons 3) I am a recreational rhetorician. Ok, ok, four reasons 4) The people here are the only ones who will talk to me.

For me, philosophy is all about intellectual self-awareness.

Quoting HardWorker

Im not saying everybody should always agree with my points I just want everybody to get my points.

I doubt anyone deliberately aims for their points to be misunderstood. But this doesn’t really approach philosophy until you explore how it is we can develop a shared understanding of each other’s views .

Quoting Tom Storm

I doubt anyone deliberately aims for their points to be misunderstood.

Some people absolutely play games where they TRY to be as opaque as possible, and bait misunderstandings from people which they can pounce on - it gives them permission to attack and insult, they think.

In fact I recently spoke to someone who, in one thread, got upset people were trying to interpret her vague questions, "why are you trying to read my mind?", and then in the same goddamn thread, wrote half a paragraph and then tied it off with "yada yada yada you get what I mean".

So, she gets to belittle me for trying to interpret her vagueries, and then continues to produce more vagueries... I think the belittling is the point

Reply to flannel jesus Some people might seem to play games but I suspect this is often our inability to understand their approach, or their inability to be clear. Humans are great at ascribing malevolent intent towards others when we encounter the strange or incomprehensible from them.

But how's this - I doubt most people deliberately aim for their points to be misunderstood.

Quoting Tom Storm

But how's this - I doubt most people deliberately aim for their points to be misunderstood.

True, BUT in a philosophical setting it's fully possible that it's simultaneously true that most people don't put any significant effort into trying to be understood either. So even if they don't want to be misunderstood, they're not writing their posts with a mind to the question, "is there some way that what I'm saying now is going to not be understood the way I mean it?" They just write away and hope for the best.

It seems remarkably common.

Reply to flannel jesus For me that's a different matter. That's the age old question of people lacking skills and/or an awareness of how they come across. There are many people who are unable to be clear even if they reflect on what they say. They are too inward looking and inarticulate to build clear syntax. They frequently get angry with others for their incomprehension because to them it's all so obvious what they are saying.

Quoting Tom Storm

There are many people who are unable to be clear even if they reflect on what they say.

I guess there's a few general categories, right?

The people who actually try to be rigourously clear and are good at it (these people are usually willing to reword or work through anything unclear upon request)

The people who try to be clear and are bad at it.

The people who don't even try.

When people in the last two groups get pissy that their posts are being understood in ways they didn't intend... whew , frustrating times.

Quoting Tom Storm

I doubt anyone deliberately aims for their points to be misunderstood.

I sometimes wonder how important it is to *have* a point. I remember, back at University, in a literary class, I was trying to explain my point. The lecturer seemed really interested, and then said, I never even thought of that, what an interesting point. He then checked back if he understood me correctly. It turns out he hasn't. I was making a different point, but because that other point I could have made but didn't was so much more fascinating, I forgot what it is was trying to say... Fun times.

Again, at universtiy, I would often try to make a point, then talk myself into a corner and find myself unable to continue, because everything I've been saying up to that point seemed like nonsense, which I then admitted to. It usually didn't go down well with others, who thought I was saying something interesting and were hoping I'd get to the end...

I sometimes wonder if people think they have a point just use repetition and rhetoric to fool themselves. Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream...

This post, btw, doesn't really have a point; more something like a strange attractor.

Pointilism: