While most people aren't caught up in the high conflict dynamic, I fear that's only true to the extent they're disengaged from national politics. In other words, the understory for our national politics IS high conflict. Seems like there are a number of currently debated angles of response, like: de-emphasize national politics (federalism); re-emphasize policy substance (filibuster elimination); electoral reform to weaken conflict entrepreneurs (multi member districts, ranked choice voting, etc.); spiritual revival and intermediate institution building to reorient meaning and purpose. It feels like a problem that's entangled with so many dynamics - cultural, institutional, technological.
"If you try to find an “understory” for your opponent, then, rather than take their opinions at face value, you will find yourself looking for some evil motivation that is behind their position"
I disagree, but probably because I see the act of trying to find an understory a little differently than you mean here. If you are honestly trying to understand another point of view, and not merely trying to invalidate it regardless of the method used to do so, you'll be less likely to fall into the trap of asymmetric insight. Even less so if you're familiar with the idea, whether or not you've heard the specific term. Asymmetric Insight comes from refusing to honestly understand another person and taking an emotional cop-out to reinforce yourself. In many ways, it's the opposite of trying to deepen your understanding. Asymmetric Insight is all about you, whereas understanding is all about the other person. Asymmetric Insight is about reinforcing yourself, and understanding is all about exposing your preconceptions to scrutiny.
The problem isn't that trying to find another's "understory" leads to the Asymmetric Insight trap. It's that trying to do so dishonestly leads to that and many other intellectual failures.
I agree with what you say. But I suspect that if you just tell someone "look for the understory in the other person's position" 99 percent of the time they will come back with Asymmetric Insight.
I challenge anyone to "find an understory" for Critical Race Theory (as one of several examples) that does not demonize its proponents. All its premises are vicious lies!
Learn about everyone's "understory" because that is part of learning about the world and people and how they work. Do it to learn how universal it is and you will learn not to demonize. Do it to learn all the different ways people can be self-ignorant and self-deceived. This will help you in your efforts to learn your own understory.
Alternative to Civil war. I agree on the common interests as this is bottoms up. The problem I have with putting it on the leadership / media is that much of this is voter / demand driven (Bryan Caplan - the Myth of the Irrational Voter). If it is voter / demand driven, it's hard to see how improved leadership / media coverage could improve the climate from the top down. Even if it's right that most people are moderate, it's hard to see how their values / norms overthrow the conflict oriented.
Ms. Ripley's suggestion that to get out of high conflict, one needs to “investigate the understory” underlying one's opponents argument(s) looks, to me like she is suggesting that we attempt to read our opponent's mind. Scott Adam's decrys this approach as "the mind reading illusion" and "loserthink"[1]
The vague suggestion to “investigate the understory” should be replaced with the clear instruction to 'ask such clarifying questions as necessary as to make explicit one's opponent unstated assumptions, claims, and reasoning'.
Ref.
[1] "THE MIND READING ILLUSION
If your complaint about other people involves your belief that you can deduce their inner thoughts, you might be in a mental prison. We humans think we are good judges of what others are thinking. We are not. In fact, we are dreadful at it. But people being people, we generally believe we are good at it while also believing other people are not."; https://www.amazon.com/Loserthink-Untrained-Brains-Ruining-America/dp/0593083520; Chap. 3
As the team owner who drafted Amanda, I must admit I am a little embarrassed to say I have not yet read her book either. It's in my pile but keeping with FITS dominates my reading time. That being said, I have read most of what she and others have written about the book this month, and listened to several hours of interviews. I think that she would agree with you that identifying your own "understory" is more important, but I think she would object to idea that mutual inspection would lead to weaponizing the understory of your opponent. In this interview, she does not mention the intervening step that she calls "looping," which is a form of active listening. One of the keys in successfully moving high conflict to good conflict is simply for both sides (all sides) to feel heard. In looping, you tell your opposite number "This is what I hear you saying . . . . is that right?" and you keep on going in an iterative process until they say "yes, that's it." At this point, they feel heard and you have achieved an understanding - even if still in strong disagreement - of their position. Then, hopefully, they mirror the process back to you. The goal is to achieve what Robert Wright calls "cognitive empathy;" a genuine understanding not only of the other party's position, but - more importantly - why it is so important to them. It is not an easy state to achieve, unless both parties are committed to turning down the heat.
Again, I have not read the book, but I do think it is safe to say that it is not a book of simple answers. These processes are difficult.
While most people aren't caught up in the high conflict dynamic, I fear that's only true to the extent they're disengaged from national politics. In other words, the understory for our national politics IS high conflict. Seems like there are a number of currently debated angles of response, like: de-emphasize national politics (federalism); re-emphasize policy substance (filibuster elimination); electoral reform to weaken conflict entrepreneurs (multi member districts, ranked choice voting, etc.); spiritual revival and intermediate institution building to reorient meaning and purpose. It feels like a problem that's entangled with so many dynamics - cultural, institutional, technological.
"If you try to find an “understory” for your opponent, then, rather than take their opinions at face value, you will find yourself looking for some evil motivation that is behind their position"
I disagree, but probably because I see the act of trying to find an understory a little differently than you mean here. If you are honestly trying to understand another point of view, and not merely trying to invalidate it regardless of the method used to do so, you'll be less likely to fall into the trap of asymmetric insight. Even less so if you're familiar with the idea, whether or not you've heard the specific term. Asymmetric Insight comes from refusing to honestly understand another person and taking an emotional cop-out to reinforce yourself. In many ways, it's the opposite of trying to deepen your understanding. Asymmetric Insight is all about you, whereas understanding is all about the other person. Asymmetric Insight is about reinforcing yourself, and understanding is all about exposing your preconceptions to scrutiny.
The problem isn't that trying to find another's "understory" leads to the Asymmetric Insight trap. It's that trying to do so dishonestly leads to that and many other intellectual failures.
I agree with what you say. But I suspect that if you just tell someone "look for the understory in the other person's position" 99 percent of the time they will come back with Asymmetric Insight.
I truly wish I could still disagree with you on that.
I suggest an amendment to Dr. Kling's " in good conflict our position is negotiable".
To wit: 'in good conflict our position is:
— empirical and neither nominative nor faith-based;
— is based on facts and logic that is subject to refutation by the disconfirmation of asserted facts or the determination of errors in logic'
You don't choose your enemies. They choose you. Read
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/street-violence-as-a-political-tool
I challenge anyone to "find an understory" for Critical Race Theory (as one of several examples) that does not demonize its proponents. All its premises are vicious lies!
Learn about everyone's "understory" because that is part of learning about the world and people and how they work. Do it to learn how universal it is and you will learn not to demonize. Do it to learn all the different ways people can be self-ignorant and self-deceived. This will help you in your efforts to learn your own understory.
What do you mean by "understory"? Sorry for asking.
Alternative to Civil war. I agree on the common interests as this is bottoms up. The problem I have with putting it on the leadership / media is that much of this is voter / demand driven (Bryan Caplan - the Myth of the Irrational Voter). If it is voter / demand driven, it's hard to see how improved leadership / media coverage could improve the climate from the top down. Even if it's right that most people are moderate, it's hard to see how their values / norms overthrow the conflict oriented.
"The challenge is to keep this minority from taking control of political life"
Aww man, if you had called it the tyranny of the minority we could've given Taleb FIT points.
Ms. Ripley's suggestion that to get out of high conflict, one needs to “investigate the understory” underlying one's opponents argument(s) looks, to me like she is suggesting that we attempt to read our opponent's mind. Scott Adam's decrys this approach as "the mind reading illusion" and "loserthink"[1]
The vague suggestion to “investigate the understory” should be replaced with the clear instruction to 'ask such clarifying questions as necessary as to make explicit one's opponent unstated assumptions, claims, and reasoning'.
Ref.
[1] "THE MIND READING ILLUSION
If your complaint about other people involves your belief that you can deduce their inner thoughts, you might be in a mental prison. We humans think we are good judges of what others are thinking. We are not. In fact, we are dreadful at it. But people being people, we generally believe we are good at it while also believing other people are not."; https://www.amazon.com/Loserthink-Untrained-Brains-Ruining-America/dp/0593083520; Chap. 3
As the team owner who drafted Amanda, I must admit I am a little embarrassed to say I have not yet read her book either. It's in my pile but keeping with FITS dominates my reading time. That being said, I have read most of what she and others have written about the book this month, and listened to several hours of interviews. I think that she would agree with you that identifying your own "understory" is more important, but I think she would object to idea that mutual inspection would lead to weaponizing the understory of your opponent. In this interview, she does not mention the intervening step that she calls "looping," which is a form of active listening. One of the keys in successfully moving high conflict to good conflict is simply for both sides (all sides) to feel heard. In looping, you tell your opposite number "This is what I hear you saying . . . . is that right?" and you keep on going in an iterative process until they say "yes, that's it." At this point, they feel heard and you have achieved an understanding - even if still in strong disagreement - of their position. Then, hopefully, they mirror the process back to you. The goal is to achieve what Robert Wright calls "cognitive empathy;" a genuine understanding not only of the other party's position, but - more importantly - why it is so important to them. It is not an easy state to achieve, unless both parties are committed to turning down the heat.
Again, I have not read the book, but I do think it is safe to say that it is not a book of simple answers. These processes are difficult.